The line between good and evil

[Barney]

[For Ayn Rand,] the line between good and evil runs between big business and government, not through every human heart.

This is an enormous error. It was correct the first way.

I don't understand this. Please elaborate?

[Ondrej]

I've not thought it through really but I've got big red flags and neon warning signs and sirens going off in my head when I read it. It's dangerously not right. Probably most dangerous because we can cite so many examples of bad business and bad government.

But business and government don't make decisions. People make decisions. Business and government do not operate in the realm of ethics, people do. What Solzhenitsyn was getting at was that the catastrophe of socialism in the Soviet Union was his fault; all of their faults. They did not speak up. They did not stand on their principles. They went along with it. Instead of blaming the government, he was blaming himself and everyone else.

[Barney]

business and government don't make decisions. People make decisions.

You say this and things like it quite often but I've never understood the point you're trying to make. Of course when we say "the government forces you to do X" we mean "people (acting as representatives of the government) force you to do X." Of course when we say "the business did so-and-so" we mean "people (acting as representatives of the business) did so-and-so." What is to be gained by making this clarification?

I've got big red flags and neon warning signs and sirens going off in my head when I read it. It's dangerously not right.

Either I don't understand you or I agree rather more quickly than I thought. I think Rand's universe is deeply false to reality because all the government people are evil, grabbing looters, none of them are trying to do the right thing. None of them care about supporting businesses or about the poor people they often claim to care about. Granted, some of the businessmen are evil, like Orren Boyle and Jim Taggart, but they are evil because they're in league with the government and are using government to get what they want, rather than earning it honestly.

I think it is more realistic to say that we are all both good and evil. Each and every politician is both good and evil; each and every businessman is both good and evil. But that is not the world of Atlas Shrugged. Additionally, in the world of Atlas Shrugged, the politicians are not only evil but unbelievably stupid. Their interventions are always unutterably foolish - such as the "anti-dog-eat-dog rule" or the "equal opportunities bill" that meant you can only own one business. Perhaps this was a caricature to make the point as plain as possible. What is the point she's trying to make, then? Simply that, in her view, every time the government intervenes, it is for the selfish interests of looters and besides it always makes things worse anyway. Is that the world we live in?

[Ondrej]

You say this and things like it quite often but I've never understood the point you're trying to make.

In the Bible we are continually met with kings "after God's own heart" and kings with an evil heart. They are the government roughly speaking. As much as we recoil from the idea of a dictatorship, they can work fantastically. But they can also be terrible. It depends on the person in control. In the same way, governments or business of any kind can work fantastically or be tyrannical. It depends on the people.

But we also recognize patterns. We shy away from dictatorships because, when you have a bad one, there is no recourse. We recognize that it is wise to have checks on governmental power.

But that is a tangent. The real point I'm trying to highlight is the importance of individuals living righteously, speaking the truth, and judging correctly.

I think Atlas Shrugged is definitely a caricature. People in government are not all the way she characterizes. But they are absolved of consequences of poor decisions by virtue of the fact that they do not earn the money they spend. There is no reality check on the government in the same way there is with businesses. So they do not have to live righteously, speak the truth, or judge correctly. I think there are many examples of government behaving foolishly because of good sounding motivations like "anti dog eat dog". You yourself have expressed criticism for competition.

This is a half formed thought. But I'm out of time.

[Barney]

The real point I'm trying to highlight is the importance of individuals living righteously, speaking the truth, and judging correctly.

I've created this thread to talk about this.