I took the title for this entry from Thomas Paine. I have his "Rights of Man" beside me while I sleep. I may have the actual phrase wrong, but I'll check later. I like how it sounds, at any rate.
Just some quick comments about my last blog. My thoughts on Rand and her opinions about folk music (and other types of music) was taken rather badly at the forum in which they were posted. In fact, I don't think that anything I've said online was taken as badly, except perhaps that time when I defended my country against what I construed to be stupid bigotry and paranoia from other members at PFFA, who, as it happens, were mostly Americans themselves. I say "what I construed to be" because that very discussion, which took place well over a year ago, actually served to make me take a closer look at the people around me, made the glaring hypocrisies of many "Christian" Americans way more apparent than ever before, made me see their (non-rationally) self-centered stupidities in a whole new light.
One person at the Objectivism forum merely asked that I not use his name in a "post like that." He didn't offer any arguments (at least not as of this writing) to my essay. He was just obviously repulsed by it. It gave him an unclean feeling, and his not-so-fresh feeling washed all over me in a deluge of guilt. This always happens to me. I get guilty when I see that my thoughts have been met with contempt. But in this case, I feel secure in the knowledge that my comments were reasonable, as at least one member of the Objectivism forum pointed out in my defense.
No guilt this time. Objectivists are regarded as cultists by most people. I don't see them that way. I sincerely think that a great deal of the case against Objectivism is flatly erroneous; but the people at this board are of the Peikoffian branch of O'ism. They are orthodox O'ists. They regard O'ism as a "closed system" which is "not dogma."
Well, you can't have your cake and eat it too, as a certain someone might have suggested. Orthodox O'ists are an easily offended, excitable bunch, who are lousy at accepting criticism.
Just some quick comments about my last blog. My thoughts on Rand and her opinions about folk music (and other types of music) was taken rather badly at the forum in which they were posted. In fact, I don't think that anything I've said online was taken as badly, except perhaps that time when I defended my country against what I construed to be stupid bigotry and paranoia from other members at PFFA, who, as it happens, were mostly Americans themselves. I say "what I construed to be" because that very discussion, which took place well over a year ago, actually served to make me take a closer look at the people around me, made the glaring hypocrisies of many "Christian" Americans way more apparent than ever before, made me see their (non-rationally) self-centered stupidities in a whole new light.
One person at the Objectivism forum merely asked that I not use his name in a "post like that." He didn't offer any arguments (at least not as of this writing) to my essay. He was just obviously repulsed by it. It gave him an unclean feeling, and his not-so-fresh feeling washed all over me in a deluge of guilt. This always happens to me. I get guilty when I see that my thoughts have been met with contempt. But in this case, I feel secure in the knowledge that my comments were reasonable, as at least one member of the Objectivism forum pointed out in my defense.
No guilt this time. Objectivists are regarded as cultists by most people. I don't see them that way. I sincerely think that a great deal of the case against Objectivism is flatly erroneous; but the people at this board are of the Peikoffian branch of O'ism. They are orthodox O'ists. They regard O'ism as a "closed system" which is "not dogma."
Well, you can't have your cake and eat it too, as a certain someone might have suggested. Orthodox O'ists are an easily offended, excitable bunch, who are lousy at accepting criticism.
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