From: mjones@fenway.aix.kingston.ibm.com (Mike Jones)
Subject: Re: Why the hostility?
Date: Tue, 29 Dec 92 18:50:00 GMT
Reply-To: mjones@donald.aix.kingston.ibm.com
Organization: IBM T. J. Watson Research
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lwloen@rchland.vnet.ibm.com (Larry Loen) writes:
: In article <ALEXJ.92Dec28113636@claudius.juliet.ll.mit.edu>, alexj@juliet.ll.mit.edu ( Alexander Jackl ) writes:
: |> Douglas Meier in post <1992Dec26.21.2840.11849@news2.cis.umn.edu> mentions
: |> "Free Shit Brigades which control several college campuses".

And after this, he wonders why people don't find his philosophy appealing?

: |> Could you explain that a little more clearly?  On most of the campuses I
: |> have been on very few people would get political or upset about Objectivism
: |> or it's opposite (which is...?).  So, if you could say something about that,
: |> I would appreciate it...
: |> ALso I find it curious that you use the term "socialist" as synonymous with
: |> "Anti-Objectivism".  Perhaps we are using different definitions of Objectivism.
: |> In my understanding and interpretation "socialism" describes a particular 
: |> economic theory espoused by Marx that is, in our culture and time period has
: |> been negatively linked with communism (due to their owninnacurate use of the 
: |> word for themselves... WHat does the philosphy of Objectivism have to do with 
: |> socialism?

Socialism is the favorite straw man of Objectivists. The word "statism" is
often used synonymously with it, as a way of demonizing any undesirable
activity which, somehow, an Objectivist system would eliminate. By attaching
the undesirable outcomes to an "ism", Objectivists blur the line between
"this might happen under system X" and "this is an insecapable outcome of
system X".
  
: Alex, if you want to know what he is talking about, scan the last six
: months or so of the Wall Street Journal editorial page.  In the midst of
: all the usual economic and political stuff, you will find the occassional
: article about various sorts of activities against various forms of 
: conservative thought of any kind, especially reasoned conservatism.  You might 
Oh, Larry! So, we see that Objectivism == (reasoned) conservatism,
presumably as it is currently practiced. Another common working definition
of Objectivism as presented on the net equates it to Libertarianism, almost
invariably right-Libertarianism.

: also look into the fight over the Dartmouth student newspaper, which might be
: covered elsewhere other than the Journal's editorial pages.  It was novel in
: that the student paper was basically conservative, and the university tried
: to surpress it.  This was no small matter; the Journal quoted from the university
: president who supported the surpression.  The reasoning sure sounded tortured 
: to me (reminiscent of "we had to destroy the village to save it").

Indeed you might. If you look in any depth at all, you would discover that
the newspaper is an independent newspaper published by a group of Dartmouth
students, and not "the Dartmouth student newspaper" as most of us think of
such things. In fact, it arose as competition for the student newspaper. The
"suppression" occurred only after the paper printed a series of scurrilous,
sometimes racist, and borderline libelous article. And, you know, it's
funny. The "suppression" primarily took the form of forbidding the
distribution of the paper on campus, as I recall. One would think that a
good conservative group would support the rights of the owners of private
property (i.e., the Dartmouth campus) to control what goes on there.

The Dartmouth debacle is practically a primer on PC, Left and Right. The
whole thing has been blown completely out of proportion by both sides.

: My favorite story, which might be apocrophal, was a claim that a male
: college professor, in deference to a claim of sexual harassment, took
: down a painting of an old master (Reubens or some such) that was in his
: office and out of obvious public view, because it contained a naked breast
: or two.  Someone or other, in her interpretation of feminism, claimed that
: it was sexist and created an obnoxious work environment for her.  True or
: not, I can't say, but it makes for entertaining and sometimes scary reading.

Round two: accusation by anecdote. In fact, the case to which you seem to be
referring concerned a female professor who took down a painting which the
university had hung in a classroom because it made her uncomfortable. Now,
you might say (and I'd probably agree) that she was being silly and that one
might hope that a college professor would have more enlightened
sensibilities. On the other hand, the truth just isn't as interesting (nor
does it support your preconceptions) as the tabloid account you gave.

   Mike Jones  |  AIX/ESA Development  |  mjones@donald.aix.kingston.ibm.com

If there is such a phenomenon as absolute evil, it consists in treating
another human being as a thing.
	- John Brunner, The Shockwave Rider
Newsgroups: alt.philosophy.objectivism