So I write a post about the current state of the atheist movement, about certain people who seem to embody what is wrong with it, and how I am frightened that the failure of the atheist movement to stand up to the menace of Islam is driving people into the ranks of some very frightening types indeed.<\/p>\n
And in a half-sentence aside I mention that I am glad for my education at the hands of Nietzsche and Ayn Rand and that that has protected me from falling into that trap.<\/p>\n
Go on, guess<\/em> which fifteen words out of over two thousand people have been focusing on.<\/p>\n There is something about just mentioning Ayn Rand’s name that causes people to freak the hell out<\/em>.\u00a0 It is a cue for people to start on about how she is absolutely terrible, utterly childish, nothing good there at all – and these people will go on about this for length, in real life, and online, and reassuring each other over and over again that, of course<\/em>, they<\/em> are too intelligent to take her seriously.<\/p>\n This condemnation is always absolute.\u00a0 It’s never “Well, she had a few good ideas, but…”\u00a0 Or “I can see where she was coming from, but…”.\u00a0 It is always absolute, utter condemnation.<\/p>\n Selah.<\/a><\/p>\n Pause and reflect how utterly weird this is.\u00a0 I do not know of any other thinker who inspires this kind of a reaction.\u00a0 Just about every other thinker gets at least a modicum of consideration, no matter what.\u00a0 For example, here we have the BBC giving a thoughtful treatment of Karl Marx<\/a>, never mind the horrors his ideas inspired. You routinely have people talking about the “contributions” Mohammed made, never mind the fact that the guy was a rapist war criminal.\u00a0 For that matter, even out and out fascist and fascist-inspired thinkers get a more respectful treatment in some quarters than does Rand.<\/p>\n We live in the time when a spokewoman for the President of the United States can praise the greatest mass murder of the twentieth century:<\/p>\n