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The Sky Is Falling (or - Why I Believe that Everyone and Everything Sucks) Gloom, despair, agony on me (WOE!), Deep dark depression excessive misery (WOE!), If it weren’t for bad luck I’d have no luck at all (WOE!), Gloom, despair, agony on me! (From the television show Hee-Haw) Of course you have more than enough reason for this ingrained pessimism, do you not? Just look at the state of our nation and one can easily see that at any moment the sky will be falling! If you ask me, there really is very little to live for. Obviously your only option is an armed revolution to overthrow this vile dictatorship that you live under. It’s either that or you will be stuck choosing between hiding in the self-delusional fantasy world of Galt’s Gulch, or committing suicide. The empirical evidence of your doom is all around you, is it not? Just turn on the 6 o’clock news and surely the evidence is irrefutable. The nation's economy is in ruins! The nation's effort in its illegal war on terrorism is a quagmire! Any moment now abortion will be made illegal and gays will be hanging from every lamp-post in America! Any day now, the police will be coming to round up all the atheists and pot smokers! George Bush is the reincarnation of Adolf Hitler, and the only alternative is John ‘Joe Stalin’ Kerry! Oh woe unto us! Cry for the beloved country. You'd better run to the library ... that copy of Spengler’s The Decline of the West will soon be a bestseller again. Your curse is that you see too profoundly, is it not? Something must be done, and who better than you to expose a world teetering on the brink of disaster? Catastrophes, crises and conspiracies are everywhere to be seen. You, the anointed one, must expose the 3 Cs to your blind brothers and sisters. If you fail, the earth will literally stop rotating and plunge into the abyss. Luckily for the world, it has you, the inspired devotee of Objectivism. You long ago cornered the market on having a better solution. Did I say “better”? My apologies, I meant to say, “the only solution.” To suggest that you have anything but the only solution would be to suggest that the world just might be able to flourish without a strict adherence to your philosophy. Now we can’t have that can we? God forbid that your philosophy of life is reduced to a tool towards bettering your own life, and is not the prerequisite for the existence of Western Civilization itself. Heaven help you, if you acknowledge the stunning and extraordinary achievements of mankind prior to Objectivism. May lighting strike you dead, if you even consider actually living in this world, as opposed to holding it in total contempt. Of course you have to set the right example. It won’t do to be too happy, now will it? After all, in the face of so many catastrophes you shouldn’t speak or write of the inconsequential and temporary successes that occur from time to time. You must stay focused; you cannot lose sight of the malevolent and hopeless condition of our nation and the sheep within it. Just think of the consequences! Why, you just might have to face the fact our nation has progressed without all the preconditions you have placed on the very concept of progress. At some point you may even have to acknowledge the greatness and inherent goodness of this nation - in spite of it not living up to your standard of value. The mere thought of this is enough to throw a person as self-righteous as you into a paroxysm of self-doubt. That will not do, will it? Which brings me to the second part. Now I won’t pretend that your personal life is of any importance. We both know that in the face of such weighty and life-and-death issues we should not waste time examining something as inconsequential as your personal relationships or general outlook on life. But humor me for a moment - you just may find a little something that enables you to add me to that list of sheep you hold in such contempt. There can never be too many people to hold in contempt, now can there? One will usually find that a person’s general outlook on the world greatly betrays his outlook on individual people and on himself. Given the hopeless state of our nation and the rest of the world, can there be any doubt that your neighbors and friends are hopeless as well? The depth of personal individual corruption must at least mirror that of society as whole, must it not? I suspect that it was the latter conclusion that you arrived at well before passing judgment on the rest of humanity. But, I digress. No reasonable person can doubt the utter futility of hoping to find kindred spirits at your level of enlightenment. Your parents are hypocrites, your friends intellectually bankrupt, women are whores and users, men are destructive and posturing fools, your teachers are idiots, athletes are stupid, intellectuals nerds, children spoilt, and even pets are a hindrance. I cannot argue the validity of your conclusions; its truth is self-evident. Besides, to even consider an alternative raises some rather nasty issues, does it not? Why, you just might lose all those perfectly rational reasons you have for not singing, dancing, laughing, or even loving. You may even be confronted with the horrific truth that you did not adopt your philosophy of life in order to see more clearly, but in order to ensure that no one will be able to clearly see you. But you don’t have to worry about that, now do you? Fear not, I am sure your fellow human beings will find a way to let you down. Just keep that critical eye opened wide, and trust me - you’ll find a good reason never to go near them. Now let me see if I have this straight. You’re sitting behind a state-of-the-art computer, in an air-conditioned house with electric light, listening to classical music from a 17-dollar CD, sipping on a Coca-Cola, and munching on a pizza that was delivered to your doorstep after making a phone call a mere 20 minutes ago; and you're typing away about the utter futility of finding joy or freedom in the world as it is today. Everyone and everything sucks (especially the opposite sex! – oops sorry, that betrays just a little too much, doesn’t it?!). Oh wait, now that wasn’t right, was it? After all, you are often found praising and exalting people and things. It’s merely a freak coincidence of chance that all that you praise is inanimate or long dead. Maybe, just maybe, when you’re feeling really brave you reach out to someone across the safety of a wire and screen? But, I digress. And here we come to the two fundamental issues at hand. What exactly is Objectivism, and what is it that you hope to achieve by being an Objectivist? From the tone of many posters I would have to conclude that Objectivism is an infallible political movement with the goal of establishing a utopia on this earth. Further, I would have to assume that what many seek to achieve is their inclusion among those named on some future monument of heroes. In summary, you have made it a philosophy of martyrdom. Well let me tell you something, my cynical and stoic Objectivist friend: you’re full of crap! So full of it, that it’s beginning to spill out all over everyone that comes into contact with you. Remember that line about ‘hating the good for being good’ - well friend, you’ve come close. You hate the happy, for being happy. Don’t point your slimy finger at me and scream hypocrite! You're damn right I have railed against injustice, I have criticized achievement when it’s a half-measure, I have denounced, I have warned against, and I have predicted terrible repercussions if certain trends continue. I stand guilty as charged. Not only that, but I have every intention of continuing to do so. BUT, you and I do not share the same boat; we share no kindred spirit. I do not lose sight of the noble, I do not stop seeing the beauty and good of humanity, and most importantly – I refuse to make suffering a virtue. Whatever else my failings may be, and they are many, I love life and I am in love with the extraordinary benevolence that I see in most of my fellow- men. It's one thing to pay lip-service to a love of achievement, reason and mankind. It’s something altogether different, to live it. Which leads me back to those two questions. What is Objectivism? It is a philosophy of life for the betterment and happiness of the individual man on this earth. It is not a political movement, it is not a ‘third way,’ it is not a table of commandments, it is not an end in itself, and it is not as you have made it: a system of rationalizations for not living life to its fullest and wallowing in self-pity. What is it that one should hope to achieve by being an Objectivist? A greater clarity to see and be willing to be seen for who you really are. It is a method by which to more fully understand the nature of man in order to elevate yourself and those whom you value. It is a system by which to improve your method of valuing, so that you may be of a greater value yourself. In the political context, it a tool by which one evaluates the value of a given political system or its parts to one's rational value system. It is a means by which one grows in one's intellectual development for the primary purpose of one's own selfish happiness. If your life is devoid of laughter, you are not an Objectivist. If your life is devoid of hope, you are not an Objectivist. If your life is built on pessimism, you are not an Objectivist. If you hold the majority of humanity in contempt, you are not an Objectivist. If you have become so jaded that your sanction of a person or concept requires perfection, you are not an Objectivist. If you have become too terrified to risk loving another person, you are not an Objectivist. And if you honestly have come to believe that there does not exist even a single person in whose eyes you are willing to drown, you are not even a human being. Objectivism was not meant to be a suit of armor to protect you from life, but a tool by which you could more fully live that life.
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