reconciling rand with reason: a most challenging test of belief

B = altruism and oppression: not always in bed together

Those who know me in my daily life know that I run a constant gauntlet against the redistribution of wealth and intellect within our society, and I resultantly spend most of my time feeling like the conspiracy theorist of my social circle- I do not merely lay aside crazy ideas about how the government continues to oppress me and my intellectual equals. But it is only in the face of Ayn Rand’s suggestions and the nature of my religious background that I have attempted to justify a society that encourages altruism with little actual execution, especially when corrupt complexes like welfare and library censorship were originally designed with the best ‘intentions’ in mind.

As much of the Western world owes itself to the Christianity started in the cultural generators of European empires, the doctrine of Christ means a great deal to the fundamental nature of our society specifically, even in the face of a Constitutional amendment guaranteeing religious freedom to those within our borders. Seldom does a common individual, at the deepest and most idealistic level, disagree with a simple suggestion of Christ:

"Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you." (Matthew 5:42)

It is simple to see and understand that the higher power that much of our nation believes in, in one form of existence or another, wants all of us to play nice. But at what point does the bettering of one man lead to an attack upon another? Where in this complex would the common man’s higher power say, ‘enough’? To phrase the cliché dogma of Christians everywhere, ‘What Would Jesus Do’? Explanations, it seems, come both from the earthly plane and from a more divine origin. Rand attacks the common nature of altruism:

“Do not confuse altruism with kindness, good will or respect for the rights of others. These are not primaries, but consequences, which, in fact, altruism makes impossible. The irreducible primary of altruism, the basic absolute, is self-sacrifice—which means; self-immolation, self-abnegation, self-denial, self-destruction—which means: the self as a standard of evil, the selfless as a standard of the good.” (Philosophy: Who Needs It, 61)

Obviously, Rand does not acknowledge a humanitarian capacity for selflessness, neither in the form of charity nor philanthropic intent. This most plainly bears the overtones of the Catholic original sin- the predisposition of being a marked man from crib to coffin. Whether checked against a biblical background or a more common secular one, the logic makes sense: everybody has screwed up over something. (“For all have sinned and fall short of the Glory of God”, Romans 3:23) As a result, Rand’s argument successfully bears the weight of men destined by design to be sinful- or, in common terms, to make mistakes.

However, does this successfully qualify her statement that true altruism is indeed a bane, nay, a disease upon society’s capacity for liberty because of the possibility that men may act selfishly? It is the ‘all altruism is vile’ blanket that shows a tattering of holes, for exceptions exist to every rule, except the rule that exceptions themselves exist. Rand expresses discontent with the notion of the ‘common good’:

“When “the common good” of a society is regarded as something apart from and superior to the individual good of its members, it means that the good of some men takes precedence over the good of others, with those others consigned to the status of sacrificial animals. It is tacitly assumed, in such cases, that “the common good” means “the good of the majority” as against the minority or the individual. Observe the significant fact that that assumption is tacit: even the most collectivized mentalities seem to sense the impossibility of justifying it morally…” (Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, 20.)

All men may be capable of twisting true altruism into a self-demeaning and oppressive complex, but it cannot be assured. Rand has destroyed the exception- a most simple, but still important, logical fallacy. Altruism in the truest, most conceptual sense is an ideal only ever sought on our planet and never entirely attained, but as remarked upon by Rand’s attack on collectivism, should never be used to oppress in the name of the ‘greater good’. The most grassroots form of altruism known as kindness is far more relevant to the teachings of our higher power, and far less demanding upon society’s intellectual and cultural resources.