Atlas Shrugged

[Locutus of Bored]

Admiral2 wrote:

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If you're a conservative, yes, both installments so far have been very good.

If you voted for Obama and think Occupy Wall Street had a point, no, it sucked.

Uh oh. I voted for Obama and think Occupy Wall Street was poorly organized, ineffective, and lacked a clear direction or concise goals. Please tell me what I should think about Atlas Shrugged, Admiral 2! I don't know which box in your extremely limited worldview I should fit in to. Also, how do my political views effect my appreciation of Cloud Atlas, since there seems to be some overlap?

[Robert D. Robot]

Admiral2 wrote:

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If you're a conservative, yes, both installments so far have been very good.

If you voted for Obama and think Occupy Wall Street had a point, no, it sucked.

It seems that if you are someone on the FAR Right, desperate to grasp ANYthing that supports/glorifies your point of view (Also see: "Obama's Birth Certificate is a Fake" and "Obama is a Muslim who brings his dog along on trips in a separate plane" (Yes, I was lucky enough to have THAT interesting discussion with a relative over Christmas!!...)), you probably thought that this movie was great.

If you are one of many on the FAR Left, you wouldn't have needed to have seen the movie in order to have decided for yourself that it was a piece of steaming crap.

On the other hand, as Mirrorball Man has stated, the majority of people without an agenda who simply went in to see a movie thought it was quite lacking.

[scnj]

I think the funniest thing to me is that there's a movie in 2012 about how trains will save the economy. Trains.

[Gov Kodos]

Listen to 'City of New Orleans' often enough...

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I actually think trains COULD help the economy, but I doubt I think it in the same way Rand did.

[Hound of UIster]

scnj wrote:

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I think the funniest thing to me is that there's a movie in 2012 about how trains will save the economy. Trains.

High speed rail is doing wonders in China. Of course most of it was constructed by the government from force technology transfers. I doubt the Randians or their Goddess would be very excited by that.

[The Mirrorball Man]

scnj wrote:

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I think the funniest thing to me is that there's a movie in 2012 about how trains will save the economy. Trains.

In the next couple of decades, I think some parts of the world are going to regret that they haven't invested more in train infrastructure.

[stj]

Hound of UIster wrote:

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High speed rail is doing wonders in China. Of course most of it was constructed by the government from force technology transfers. I doubt the Randians or their Goddess would be very excited by that.

Ayn Rand was a writer. That means copyright was her bread and butter, which meant that her philosophy/economics/politics put supreme emphasis on intellectual property laws, even though economic history reveals the key role played by the spread of technology despite such laws. The notion that capitalism is perfect holds no water where her checkbook was concerned, though. That's why her characters were drawn as actually doing "creative" work, even though the number of inventors who got rich is minuscule.

[J. Allen]

stj wrote:

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Ayn Rand was a writer. That means copyright was her bread and butter, which meant that her philosophy/economics/politics put supreme emphasis on intellectual property laws, even though economic history reveals the key role played by the spread of technology despite such laws. The notion that capitalism is perfect holds no water where her checkbook was concerned, though. That's why her characters were drawn as actually doing "creative" work, even though the number of inventors who got rich is minuscule.

"She was full of hypocritical bullshit" is a much shorter sentence to type, and just as accurate.

[Greg Cox]

arch101 wrote:

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Forget the film. But, you should read the book before it's banned.

Seriously? You really think it's going to be banned?

You can buy erotica in Wal-Mart now. I think book banning's gone out of style--except for the crazy folks who try to yank Harry Potter out of school libraries or whatever.

[stj]

J. Allen wrote:

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"She was full of hypocritical bullshit" is a much shorter sentence to type, and just as accurate.

Yes, but...it's not precise. Why should anyone care what I say if I don't say what was BS, or why it was hypocritical? I daresay there are implications in my avatar that most people are not interested in nor political enough to pick up on. But it would be remarkable if there was any interpretation that make my disapproval of Ayn Rand noteworthy. Unless I spelled it out a little.

Greg Cox wrote:

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Seriously? You really think it's going to be banned?

You can buy erotica in Wal-Mart now....

Christians firmly believe that they are being persecuted, that even Christmas is under attack. And that's just a specific subset of the conservative mentality. Yes, very likely he/she is very serious. Books are not banned, however, they just don't get mass distribution or stay in print. Of course, that's always because of market forces.

Fortunately for Objectivists, the definition of "market forces" is rather elastic.

Each student admitted to the University of Georgia's Terry College of Business will get a free copy of the Ayn Rand novel "Atlas Shrugged," thanks to a 10-year, $1.5 million grant from BB&T Corp.

The grant will pay for more than fiction, however. The college will use about half the $150,000 annual donation to develop new coursework that will show undergraduate students the historical foundations of capitalism, how the economic system is viewed today and its future prospects.

http://forums.4aynrandfans.com/index...howtopic=11834

[Set Harth]

Locutus of Bored wrote:

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Also, how do my political views effect my appreciation of Cloud Atlas, since there seems to be some overlap?

That's affect, not effect.

[T'Girl]

scnj wrote:

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I think the funniest thing to me is that there's a movie in 2012 about how trains will save the economy. Trains.

Please come to Seattle and talk to the people who want to spend hundreds of millions on a light rail system that will carry only a few thousand people a day.

[Alidar Jarok]

Actually, rail has been making a comeback (especially in cargo shipping). As much as people want to mock that, I think the terrible writing and poor message is much easier to mock.

[Admiral2]

The Mirrorball Man wrote:

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And if you just happen to be a lover of cinema, you'll realize that those were terrible movies.

Nobody watched or critiqued these movies as just "a lover of cinema." You're deluding yourself if you think your politics had nothing to do with your opinion.