Some of us must join a trade union. We are asked to conform to the policies of the union leadership, join forces in mind and body to convince the world how strong is our resolve, how righteous our cause. There is brotherhood in a trade union, and one must do one's part to protect the working person. Companies are characterized as evil and willing to take advantage of the worker. We must be ever vigilant of devious efforts to get more work out of us than is fair.
When we negotiate our labor contract with the company, we are told by union officials that we made the company successful and deserve to make more money--unaware that what we get from the company depends on the company’s ability to pay, and if we ask too much, we give competitors a chance to take business away. Most often, the propaganda succeeds in getting increases that keep up with the cost of living—meaning the unions are superfluous. When high wages exceed the cost of living, and they seldom do, the company must retrench (lay people off) or lose business. The union blames this on the company’s vicious pursuit of profit.
The most vicious collective idea in history is "race". It has created the most vicious treatment of human beings. Through Racial Theory, we are told that human beings are divided into collectives that hold certain physical and cultural characteristics. Though most of us believe that all persons are equal, we live in a society divided along racial lines with a strong denial of the residue of imperialism still imposing subconscious prejudice, discrimination, and domination by some against others.
There is no such thing as a "race" (See the chapter A Primer against Racism). Yet many people jump into a blind stampede to find ethnic or racial collectives in which to belong. That there is no scientific basis for race divisions is lost to our institutions. This stampede has created the most vicious cruelty man has ever invented.
However, the worst destroyer of human beings is the religious collective. Religion requires the subjugation of the Individual mind to the opinions and emotions of others, priests, past generations, ancient documents and religious peers. Religion requires the acceptance of commandments, bringing morality into the realm of "order" and duty and out of the realm of reason. Religion preaches a cosmology that the universe is a struggle between good and evil. It encourages us to engage our minds in mystic trances and union with God, telling us that we should avoid the real world in favor of the spiritual. Religion preaches self-sacrifice for the sake of a meaningless idea called the "poor". Religion preaches that anything of this world (sex, love, pleasure, money and material possessions) is evil. It says that anything born of renunciation (of the Individual and his needs) is good and likewise anything born out of self-sacrifice is good. Many religions have a world view that stresses that their religion is the true religion and others are false, idolatrous or of the devil. Some foster a war, either of love (which is really hate for the individual), or of hate and murder (genocide) to rid the world of falsehood and evil.
Mysticism is, in itself, a mind destroying idea. To require that human beings get knowledge, not by observing reality and thinking, but by observing their own emotions elevates mindlessness above thinking and reason. To glorify unthinking acceptance, faith, is to denigrate thinking and reason. It sentences human beings to lives of mediocrity and uncertainty. It teaches them that their minds, their thinking minds, are not as important as their wishes, fears and whims.
Are today's collectives more benign than those of the past? If we look at the events of the 20th Century, we find that the most brutal period of that century was prior to and during World War II. This was the period when Racial Theory and collectivism had their strongest influence and most devastating impact, where Jews and other nationalities were exterminated in an effort to “cleanse” Europe to provide “living room” for the German Aryan. However, we must recognize that after this period, the Soviet Union engaged in brutal treatment of millions and had been doing so even up to the last few years (and may still be doing so). And today, there are many people in Communist Chinese camps. Further, there are many nations on this earth that are backward, uneducated and poor specifically because their repressive governments would rather maintain power than bring their people into enlightened freedom. The ideology of this gargantuan historical reality is collectivism.
But more importantly, we must understand that collectivism means the sacrifice of the human being for the sake of the collective. To use the cliché, many people live lives of quiet desperation, never knowing that the source of their unhappiness, the source of their mediocrity, is collective joining and fear of the opinions of others. This is a devastating nightmare that millions suffer through today. Collectivism has not diminished. It has merely slowed its vicious murderous tactics because too much light was shed upon it after the War. But it still kills many quietly and under the cover of a blanket of silence.
All collectives require that the Individual make an effort to fit in, to become a member. The Individual must subordinate his mind, his work, his money, his life to the needs of the group. If he does not, he will be exposed to the "mask" of the collective--and that is a fate worse than death.
Collectivism so pervades our culture that most believe only collectivism will maintain institutions. This includes business enterprises that foster teamwork and insist on personal sacrifice for the sake of the business, not to mention unquestioning loyalty and mindless obedience to company viewpoints and policies. It includes police departments where solidarity and honor codes sometimes require "cover ups" of corruption. It includes gangs that capitalize on the corruption of government. It includes political organizations and government agencies (that hold a double standard between themselves and citizens) that do all they can, legal or illegal, constitutional or unconstitutional, to expand their power and control.
As benign as today's collectivism might seem, these are still wrong methods of dealing with and controlling people. There is no reason to accept collectivism on benign or other terms. Collectivism, in the forms that it has taken since the development of ritualism, is a mistake. It is a form of social organization that at some point in man’s history, and for some reason not now known, was seen as so essential that it has become a cultural institution, rooted in prehistory and unchallenged. Perhaps it developed because man was intellectually incapable of doing other than what the leaders and prophets demanded. Perhaps early man was incapable of thinking of a proper system, given the unforgiving nature of reality. Perhaps he was too young or too afraid to know better. Perhaps collectivism, born out of emergency cooperation during times of catastrophe and divine retribution, was seen as essential. But for some reason, men felt compelled to think collectively and therefore passed that compulsion down through culture, the myths and laws and commandments that said obey and live for the tribe, the nation or the folk. Perhaps it developed because there was always a sword enforcing it; it is hard to say, but one thing is sure, collectivism only benefits leaders and prophets.
Obama versus Ayn Rand
Ayn Rand once famously said through her character Ellsworth Toohey: “It is always safe to denounce the rich.”[5] In my view, this is true because our culture has a bias against the wealthy individual. In spite of this, ours is the one society in history that has established the freedom that creates the opportunity for people to become rich. This contradiction has created an interesting dynamic: the progressive movement whose premise is that those who earn the most are required to pay the most in taxes. It also includes politicians who assume that all Americans should make their moral and economic decisions based, not on their own self-interest, but on what the government considers to be the general wellbeing.
This dynamic was eloquently put forward by President Barack Obama in 2008:
“We reward people a lot for being rich, for being famous, for being cute, for being thin… one of the values I think we need to instill in our country, in our children, is a sense of ‘usefulness’, in other words, are we useful, are we making other peoples’ lives a little bit better?”
I think this quote reve
als something more than just an identification of how Obama thinks we treat the rich. It reveals an opinion both about how Obama sees the rich and about the fact that he views social service as a much more important value than self-interest. The truth is that, in our economy, we decidedly do not reward people for being rich. Because of progressive taxation and other onerous punishments, the rich are effectively tied to a whipping post. We certainly don’t wait for them to be rich and then reward them. In fact, the truth is exactly the opposite of what he states.
Is it possible that Obama has never learned to draw the distinction between hard work and a life of living off of others? Have his early “organizing” days made it possible for him to live off of donations from others rather than from his own production? Is it possible that all his life he has avoided doing anything truly productive?
In my view, the career politician, as is Obama, is an enigma in our society. Normally, we elevate people to the position of leadership after they have spent their lives actually being successful. Successful businessmen or military men have proven to us that they know how to organize profitable organizations or win in war. They are men of accomplishment. They are doers who understand that you can get nothing done without effort and careful deliberation. A career politician on the other hand gets his start by focusing on collective goals, on organizing people around a movement that has an ideological base. Career politicians are good at convincing people that they care about them but they are not good at actually producing valuable goods or protecting citizens. They are good only at appealing to altruism and convincing people that we should vote to create political change; the change that consists of emulating Robin Hood, finding enemies of the people and convincing the people that we need to fight those enemies. Most often those enemies are the people who are rich and have accomplished productive careers.
Obama’s phrasing in his quote, reveals that he does not understand that before one can be rich, one must first organize resources and actually perform work. This phrasing may reveal a mindset that doesn’t understand what it takes to become rich because, as an organizer and career politician, he did not take the same road to riches that most of us do. Or it may reveal an attitude that people who work (and become rich) are somehow doing something that is not quite tasteful and refined, which may confirm the elitist attitude for which he is criticized.
I found another example of this attitude when I analyzed Obama’s speech to the Democratic National Convention in 2004 where he called Individualism “famous.”
I wrote:
“The undercurrent that is moving toward more freedom in our country is the last thing the liberals want and the one thing they must prevent...by gaining power. So they will use the language of freedom and patriotism to gain power in order that they can later take that freedom away in a morass of social responsibility and the coercive imposition of socialism. That they are uncomfortable with the language of freedom shows how far they have gone and how radicalized they have become. They are unfit to lead because they have no connection to the practical aspects of leadership. They are a bunch of radicals who have been out of the mainstream in a practical sense for decades and have never actually led...which was a problem for the Clintons as well...and why they lost power. They did not lead. Today, progressives can only educate in our schools and they do a poor job of that because they brainwash children and college students with "socially responsible" ideology. Look at the results.
“That Obama called Individualism "famous" during his convention speech is the point where the mask drops. Since it is "famous" it must be acknowledged, but for a progressive, Individualism is an uncomfortable, almost dirty idea. It wreaks of egoism and "can do" rugged self-alienation...they would feel so uncomfortable around people like that. So they will call it "famous" which means that it is a factor to be acknowledged and dealt with. Those for whom it is "famous" must be pandered to and fooled into believing that the liberals are really just good ole Americans living the American dream. Don't be fooled; their American dream is at the expense of hard-working individuals and on behalf of the "chosen" few.
“They will acknowledge the roots of our nation, sing praises to the power of self-reliance and hard work, call it important because it is important to others, not to them. They will, instead, talk more enthusiastically about the freedom to "sacrifice" and the right to "give to others" in a true "bait and switch." Imagine what they would be saying if the ideas of freedom and rugged Individualism had never been "famous." I'm sure they'd be talking about the "famous" idea of "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." We would not be listening to them defending themselves against "false" accusations that they are communists. They would be admitting to what they are: communists.” (I wrote this in 2007)
Michelle Obama says:
“[S]omeone is going to have to give up a piece of their pie so that someone else can have more.”
Lenin would not have agreed more.
“Campaigning in Ohio before flying to Wisconsin for an election-eve rally, Mr. Obama said the wealthy had “made out like bandits” under the Bush administration and called for an end to tax breaks for companies that move jobs overseas.
“In the last year alone,” Mr. Obama said, “93 plants have closed in this state. And yet, year after year, politicians in Washington sign trade agreements that are riddled with perks for big corporations but have absolutely no protections for American workers. It’s bad for our economy; it’s bad for our country.””[6]
The community organizer is coming out in these words. An organizer like Obama obtains power through agitation. He invents an atrocity and then convinces the “poor” that they have been unfairly treated. First, he assumes that business enterprises don’t belong to the business owners or “big corporations”; they belong to the people and (he charges that) the “big corporations” have robbed the people of their ability to make a living by keeping their profits rather than investing them in people. This justifies “protections” for the workers. These government-imposed “protections” are nothing more than the meddling of a person who has no idea what it takes to run a corporation.
To understand this, you have to ask yourself why plants close and what it means that they do close. Sometimes they close because the labor environment has become so onerous (when unions gain coercive power) that the business can no longer create products that compete with other similar products. The business has to close in order to protect the capital investments that the business owners make. This makes it possible for them to re-invest that capital in businesses that are profitable. In some cases, the business can only continue to exist if it moves to a location where labor costs are low. If the union is not willing to accommodate the need of the business to pay lower wages, then the plant must move. If it does not do this, it must go out of existence. There is nothing Obama or the government can do about this.
A plant might close because the technology used by the plant has become obsolete and needs to be replaced. Sometimes the new technology used by competitors is so efficient that it makes competing against them difficult. The plant may need to move to an area that has more technically proficient employees while the employees who are not technically proficient must find new jobs or retire.
Sometimes a plant closes because the product it makes is no longer desired by people in the marketplace. Sometimes it closes because government regulations make it impossible for the business to compete against other larger enterprises that are able to afford the costs of government regulations.
The reasons mentioned for these closings are valid and they provide the economy and the poor with a valuable benefit. They save investment capital so it can create other jobs. When the government, unions and organizers like Obama take the attitude that the businesses should not be in the business of making a profit but should instead make decisions on the basis of what the community needs, a major disservice is done, not only to the economy, but to the communities.
If there
is no business enterprise left because the business thought first about the workers instead of profit, no one will defend the business. Instead, the owners will be criticized for being inefficient. Organizers and socialists who are the culprits in these situations will continue their war against the profit motive.
What does Obama do once he closes the factory by pretending to defend the workers? The destruction machine that he has created can now hoist him up for even more power. He has something new to protest about…the company closing down. After he and organizers like him have caused the business to close, he’ll run for President and say:
"We believe that there is a place in the American economy for every American's dream. And we know that when we extend that dream of opportunity to more Americans, all of us gain."
The fact is that none of Obama’s tactics, economic policies or even his hope for a better future, can make every American’s dream possible. Obama creates nothing, produces nothing and can only use the power of government to manipulate business enterprises by forcing them to tow the government line.
But these businesses must already be productive before any of Obama’s hopes can be realized. It will not be Obama who will make them successful but hard working business owners and productive employees who are free to invest their capital and energy in the best possible way; exactly what the closed businesses had wanted in the first place. In fact, the only thing that can make every American’s dream possible is a market free of the manipulations of people like Obama.
Individualism Page 8