Changing the Culture; Saving America

The following is a message relayed for Jason Crawford:

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Fellow Objectivists:

In case you haven’t already seen it, I wanted to let you know that the three-lecture series “Cultural Movements: Creating Change” is available for free on the Ayn Rand Institute’s web site. These are the lectures given by Yaron Brook and Onkar Ghate at this summer’s OCON. They are near the top of this page:
http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=participate_arc_activism

In my opinion, every Objectivist should hear these lectures.

If you haven’t already heard the lectures, I highly recommend that you watch the videos online. If you have, I suggest that you spread the word among Objectivists you know.

To summarize their importance in my own words: For decades, the repeated theme in the Objectivist movement has been that we must concentrate on influencing academic philosophy in university departments. Now, Drs. Brook and Ghate are saying that it is time for the movement to branch out: that we need intellectual, cultural, and in some cases even political activism in every area, every subject, every industry, every pursuit. Academia is no longer hostile territory for Objectivism, and the culture at large has been softened to our message. It is no longer too early to begin the wider Objectivist Revolution–it has, in fact, already begun–and if we don’t act soon, it may be too late, as religion and environmentalism eat away at the American sense of life.

ARI can’t lead the entire effort–your help is needed. Successes such as Lin Zinser’s group Foundation for Individual Rights in Medicine
(FIRM) or John Allison’s efforts as head of BB&T Bank show us it can be done.

Many OCON attendees, myself included, found the lectures inspiring and motivating. I hope you will too.

Regards,
Jason Crawford

Making Rational Judgments (Show 080)

The topic for Show 080 arose from a conversation between Mosley and regular listener iheartcells. Mosley made a comment about the status of homeless people, saying that they are lazy people who made bad decisions. iheartcells asked, “Are you sure that you have enough information to make that judgment?” In the show Mosley and Arthur discuss this.

Topics in the show include: Mosley and iheartcell’s discussion; making unwarranted judgments; judgments as not just for the bad, but for the good; today’s negative connotation with judging others; different types of judgment; justice as a virtue of making rational judgments and acting accordingly; judgments as requiring rational standards; the need for and evaluation of evidence; judging friends; moral agnosticism; the morality of being overweight; making assumptions; the source of the need of rational judgment as self-preservation; praising the good as of primary importance; rash judgments; judgment applied to the financial crisis.

In the end, Mosley concluded that he did not have enough information to make his judgment, with the understanding that judging others and making sure that one does so rationally is of crucial importance.

On this topic, Ayn Rand said:

One must never fail to pronounce moral judgment.

Nothing can corrupt and disintegrate a culture or a man’s character as thoroughly as does the precept of moral agnosticism, the idea that one must never pass moral judgment on others, that one must be morally tolerant of anything, that the good consists of never distinguishing good from evil.

To see more of what she had to say on this and other issues, feel free to check out The Ayn Rand Lexicon.

Politics & Culture (Show 079)

First, a few updates on talkObjectivism: After being a regular guest on the talkObjectivism podcast for so long, Arthur is now going to be the co-host. His contributions are greatly appreciated.

Also, Mosley recently updated the website to the latest version of WordPress, which should help with some of the previous issues we were having, and Brandon will now be writing the show notes regularly, in a different format.

For those wondering what happened to last week’s show, Show 078, there was no show because the TalkShoe service was unavailable at the time.

Now for the show notes: The topic of Show 079 stems from the recent “bail-out bill” that passed in Congress, leading Mosley and Arthur to discuss today’s politics and culture, and its outlook for the future.

Topics include: Democrats blame today’s economic problems on the free-market, calling for more regulation; Republicans fail to defend the free-market and conceed that “greed” is evil; “capitalism” and “the free-market” as just buzz-words to Republicans; what Republicans stand for: religiosity; Republicans offer the wrong values, whereas the Democrats offer none; is it best to vote for the Democrats? Republicans? anyone at all?; the real battleground: the dominant cultural ideas, not immediate political gains; Obama as anti-American and his potential effect on the culture; the process and progress of cultural change.

Labor Unions & Free Markets (Show 075)

These notes were written by a listener, Steve, who is a member of the talkObjectivism Facebook group.

Is there something wrong with labor unions? Mosley questions the source of his dislike for unions: Maybe people have a right to collaborate in order to fight for their needs, higher wages, etc.

When unions are in private companies, there is a ceiling to claims that unions can make. When the company can no longer make a profit, the union can’t keep demanding raises and benefits. (The current GM troubles are a good example of this). When unions are in government industries, there is no ceiling to the costs of demands, because the government (therefore the taxpayer) has an essentially bottomless pocket.

One example of unions and related government/labor issues is the minimum wage. We discussed the alleged benefits of government mandated wages. While some claim these mandates benefit “the poor,” in fact they only benefit those who are already employed at some level above the minimum wage. When minimum wage levels are increased, the pool of capital available for labor has to be distributed among fewer people. This means people get laid-off, or at least not hired. Historically, every time the minimum wage has been increased, unemployment has gone up. Since the minimum wage keeps the unemployed from entering at the bottom of the economic ladder, it keeps unskilled laborers (who are willing to work for less) from competing with the more experienced, higher paid workers.

A coalition of “bootleggers and Baptists” is formed. Those who honestly believe (however misguided) that wage increases benefit people are joined by the labor union elders who have a stake in protecting themselves from competition.

Mosley goes on to explain the background of the Pittsburgh public port authority system, and rumors of a private system coming along. Steve calls in with the story of the Trans-Santiago bus system as told by Professor Mike Munger of Duke University, on the EconTalk podcast put out weekly by the Library of Economics and Liberty. The Chilean government municipalized what was once an open market of over 300 private bus companies. The bus market used to run in the black, about a $60 million dollar per year industry. After outlawing private buses and municipalizing the service, the government bus system is now about $600 million in the red.

Arthur calls in to remind that in weighing any two “imperfect systems” there is a difference between a government system and a private system. Government systems tend to be stagnant, and can only be as good as the committee that engineers it. In a public system, the goods and services offered improve through a constant process of trying to satisfy the consumer. Arthur also points out that all goods have to be produced by someone, even when they are paid for by the government (the taxpayer). The government doesn’t produce – it can only redistribute the funds of those who do.

Steve Ditko – Part 2 (Show 072)

We continued our discussion about Steve Ditko and how his Objectivist views shaped his artwork and career. Thanks to Javier Hernandez, we were able to get Blake Bell, the writer of the new book about Steve Ditko, and Mort Todd, who worked closely with Steve on several projects since the 1980s. This was a very interesting show. If you enjoyed last week’s show you are going to love this one.

If you would like to learn more about Blake and his book, visit ditko.comics.org. His book Strange and Stranger: The World of Steve Ditko is out now and you can pick it up at Amazon.com.

Todd Mort also has a few sites I would like to plug. Sadistik is a project where he translates Italian photo comics to English. You can also check out his media company at ComicFix.com.

I would like to thank everyone that was on the show. It was a lot of fun and I look forward to talking with you again sometime.