Carol:
Throw the Porcupine a Blanket
The film version of Ayn Rand’s 1957 Atlas Shrugged came through town a few weeks
ago. My husband went to see it on a dull day, and apparently the movie was dull, too. I
read the novel when I was in college, so I don’t remember much about its philosophy
other than the concepts of “rational self-interest”and individualism.
The title refers to the mythical Atlas, a powerful titan condemned by Zeus to carry
the heavenly sphere upon his shoulders. Over time, the celestial globe in the myth was
mistaken for the earth, which is why maps are named for Atlas. Rand uses Atlas to
symbolize the heavy “burden” placed on the shoulders of highly creative and productive
individuals by the weaker, parasitic majority. Her earlier work Anthem depicts a future
world in which individuality has been squelched and the pronoun “I” has disappeared
from the vocabulary. The main characters discover a “sacred” word: EGO.
I’m not interested in an “I” versus “we” debate in black and white, that people are
either self-centered egoists looking out for our own interests or service-valued altruists
who place higher value on others than ourselves. I prefer a “yes, but” or a “both/and”
approach. One of the most frustrating conversations I ever had was with a college
friend who argued that human beings always act out of self-gratification at the most
primal level out of love, hate and fear, indulging in whatever makes them feel good.
What about someone who is self-destructive, I asked, like drug addicts? She replied
that they act out of instant reward to alleviate pain and didn’t know how to delay
gratification. What about people who sacrifice themselves for others, like soldiers
or religious martyrs? She said they act out of values that reward loyalty and self-
sacrifice, outweighing fear of war or death. Not one example I gave could move her
from the position that all people are innately selfish and will act out of ego even though
the action may appear selfless. She was smart, rational, eloquent, and for some reason
I felt sorry for her underneath my frustration.
Years later, I came across Lawrence Kohlberg, who examined moral behavior much
as Piaget looked at cognitive behavior . After analyzing responses of young boys
presented with moral dilemmas, Kohlberg proposed a model beginning with early
stages of action out of obedience to authority or self-interest and evolving to higher
levels of action out of a sense of universal justice greater than the “I.” Harvard
professor Carol Gilligan conducted her own studies, asserting that Kohlberg skewed
his system against values traditionally attributed to women that viewed relationships in
more complex ways than just rights and rules.
An example that sticks in my mind was a dilemma about a porcupine who asked some moles if he could share their cave in winter. He was so prickly that the moles asked him to leave, but he told them they could leave if they weren’t happy. How to resolve it?
A “justice” approach would say the porcupine should leave because the cave belonged
to the moles (some young boys proposing killing the porcupine). A “relationship
approach" would seek compromise rather than justice, wrap the porcupine in a blanket.
What about Atlas? Does his condition constitute a moral dilemma? He has been
sentenced to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders for eternity. Ayn Rand
suggests that with a shrug, he can relieve himself of that burden through “enlightened
self- interest.” Either Atlas continues to carry the load of the world, or he gives it up.
But, there is another option—hey, guys, give Atlas a little help. Maybe we could take
shifts, or a bunch of us hold the world up together.
That’s my thought for the world today.
Sources:
“Carol Gilligan.”
“Carol Gilligan.”
Crain, W.C. “Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development.” Theories of Development. 118-136
Megan:
Thoughts on (the end of) the world
This topic could probably go a few ways: political, environmental, philosophical, apocalyptic… Hey did you hear the Rapture is coming up this weekend? According to the Internet (www.wecanknow.com), this Saturday, God will call His followers bodily into heaven, and then sometime in October the world is going to end completely.
In high school, I saw a bumper sticker that said “WARNING: In case of Rapture this car will be unmanned.” The hubris of that driver made me furious. I wanted to ram her with my car. More recently, I was checking a church website for directions so I could attend a wedding and noticed a note at the bottom of the page. It said that visitors should not be alarmed if they find that the church empty because that just means that God has returned for his people. Maybe it was because I was older, but that didn’t bother me the same way the bumper sticker had. I respected the couple who were getting married enough to pause for a moment and wonder if they knew something I didn’t.
A few years ago, I spent an entire summer reading the Left Behind books by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins– a 16 book religious fiction series about the End of Days. It was a compelling if not particularly well-written story following the post-Rapture events and conversion of a group of people who had been Left Behind. I checked in with the website to confirm the spelling of the authors’ names, and there is a notice advising readers that May 21st is not the correct date of the Rapture, citing the book of Matthew that no one will know the actual time.
I know people who believe that the world will end in 2012. I also know people who think it will just mark a change or leap in our evolution – that there will be some sort of paradigm shift. That’s pretty vague, but I can wrap my head around it. Sometimes I have day dreams about how the world will end or change, about technology failing or rebelling, about having to live off the land. Or maybe it will be contact with aliens, or a supernova. Or zombies. There are just too many possibilities to be scared all the time.
I have a friend who worries about the apocalypse. She worries about her daughter, and hopes it doesn’t happen until the baby is old enough to run and hide and keep quiet. My friend’s fear is too genuine to laugh at – no one wants children to be hurt. I went and saw An Inconvenient Truth with my cousin, when her son was only a few months old. I told her that movie made me not want to have children and I could tell it had shaken her as well.
Every time I don’t get a job, I console myself that this just means I’ll have more time to spend with my family before the world ends. My passport expires next summer, and maybe that’s another reason I moved back from England. If it hits the fan, I didn’t want to be 6,000 miles away. Now I worry about Bella. I wonder if she will survive a natural or manmade disaster, if she will be my loyal companion or a desperate last meal.
In high school, I saw a bumper sticker that said “WARNING: In case of Rapture this car will be unmanned.” The hubris of that driver made me furious. I wanted to ram her with my car. More recently, I was checking a church website for directions so I could attend a wedding and noticed a note at the bottom of the page. It said that visitors should not be alarmed if they find that the church empty because that just means that God has returned for his people. Maybe it was because I was older, but that didn’t bother me the same way the bumper sticker had. I respected the couple who were getting married enough to pause for a moment and wonder if they knew something I didn’t.
A few years ago, I spent an entire summer reading the Left Behind books by Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins– a 16 book religious fiction series about the End of Days. It was a compelling if not particularly well-written story following the post-Rapture events and conversion of a group of people who had been Left Behind. I checked in with the website to confirm the spelling of the authors’ names, and there is a notice advising readers that May 21st is not the correct date of the Rapture, citing the book of Matthew that no one will know the actual time.
I know people who believe that the world will end in 2012. I also know people who think it will just mark a change or leap in our evolution – that there will be some sort of paradigm shift. That’s pretty vague, but I can wrap my head around it. Sometimes I have day dreams about how the world will end or change, about technology failing or rebelling, about having to live off the land. Or maybe it will be contact with aliens, or a supernova. Or zombies. There are just too many possibilities to be scared all the time.
I have a friend who worries about the apocalypse. She worries about her daughter, and hopes it doesn’t happen until the baby is old enough to run and hide and keep quiet. My friend’s fear is too genuine to laugh at – no one wants children to be hurt. I went and saw An Inconvenient Truth with my cousin, when her son was only a few months old. I told her that movie made me not want to have children and I could tell it had shaken her as well.
Every time I don’t get a job, I console myself that this just means I’ll have more time to spend with my family before the world ends. My passport expires next summer, and maybe that’s another reason I moved back from England. If it hits the fan, I didn’t want to be 6,000 miles away. Now I worry about Bella. I wonder if she will survive a natural or manmade disaster, if she will be my loyal companion or a desperate last meal.
No comments:
Post a Comment