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*Of Atlas Shrugged That Sparknotes Missed By Sam Konopczynski

1. A strong Desire to Murder College Professors


-One of the Many Quotes (around 40): it was a desire to kill. The desire was not directed at the unknown thug who had sent a bullet through the boys body, or at the looting bureaucrats who had hired the thug to do it, but at the boys teachers the soft, safe assassins of college classrooms -Why it is weird Die! Die! Kill them All! Protect the precious children from other ideas! Ayn Rand obviously had something against her mentors like any libertarian college graduate who just graduated from a State College in the USSR...in a nation whose ideology she hated except she didnt hate her professors. In fact, much of her ideology is based on her college experience with Aristotle, Plato, and Nietzsche, Victor Hugo and Dostoevsky all of whom she loved even though her philosophy is diametrically opposed to every philosopher on that list except Aristotle. -Why it makes sense In Atlas Shrugged, not all college professors are evil, one professor, Hugh Akston. The character of Hugh Akston probably represents the old guard of Russian/American intellectuals who hated communist or socialist ideology that had become more mainstream after the great depression. The year of her graduation (1925), there was a purge of specific students and proffessors (including Rand) who were allowed to graduate before they were forced out. The hate is not for the professors she followed, but for the professors that replaced them especially mainstream Keynesian Economists.

2. College Graduates Are Stupid


-One of the Many Quotes (around 30): She thought suddenly of those modern college-infected parasites who assumed
a sickening air of moral self-righteousness whenever they uttered the standard bromides about their concern for the welfare of others,

-Why it is weird Isnt college supposed to give you credentials? Not in Atlas Shrugged! Apparently because of those professors previously mentioned, the word college becomes synonymous with retard looter. Even characters that are hinted to have gone through college are rarely described as having done so. Why not? -Why it makes sense In addition to the aforesaid dislike of college proffessors, the main group of people who believed in things like internationalism, socialism, and the like were often college students. Thus Rand saw college students as stupid, but little did she know

People who want to manipulate government policies to their own short term benefit rather than the economy as a whole

People who want to manipulate government policies to their own short term benefit rather than the economy as a whole

Pretentious College Graduates who Think they Understand Economics People who actually understand economics

Pretentious College Graduates who Think they Understand Economics People who actually understand economics

Yup, Today college students make up a large part of the libertarian party, as do self righteous millionaires who want low tax rates and none of those pesky labor laws that require that you feed your workers, just as in the 1950s college students adopted socialism as part of their pacifist anti-segregation hippiedom, as did self-righteous low income workers who wanted government handouts. But in a way Rand turned out to be correctnot graduating from college can make you a millionaire.

3. Zombies
-One of the Many Quotes (around 15): Accept the fact that you are not omniscient, but playing a zombie will not give you omniscience- And The man at the bottom who, left to himself, would starve in hopeless ineptitude, contributes nothing to those above them, but receives the bonus of all their brains. -Why it is weird, but makes sense. Actually it makes a lot of sense, portraying the bad guys as lifeless voodoo spell controlled corpses, but the reliance on the mystic voodoo description ends up making the bad guys sound like a lot of awesome, powerful wizards at times, even when it is effective at others. Anyway, what could be more appropriate for a novel about the individual against the collective? What makes more sense than a monster that literally wants brains? Too bad they didnt use sexy vampires

4. The Sexy Shoulder


-One of the Many Quotes (around 20): It was a black dress with a bodice that fell as a cape over one arm and shoulder, leaving the other bare; the naked shoulder was the gowns only ornament, -Why it is weird Yes, Ayn. Its all about the shoulder.

Actually, that just got a bit more believable.

-Why it makes sense The books title is Atlas Shrugged. Now do you get it? Yeah? Atlas holds the world on his-? Anyway, it is still awkward when the Rand treats the shoulder of all things as the center of sexual beauty/masculinity and weirder when it causes orgasms in some steamier scenes. I am not joking about that last part.

5. Male Sexual Dominance


-One of the Many Quotes (around 40): That special pleasure she had felt in watching him eat the food she had prepared she thought, lying still, her eyes closed, her mind moving, like time, through some realm of veiled slowness it had been the pleasure of knowing that she had provided him with a sensual enjoyment, that one form of his bodys satisfaction had come from her . . . . There is reason, she thought, why a woman would wish to cook for a man -Why it is weird
Ayn Rand was definitely a feminist, her philosophy called for it just as the fact that although she was homophobic, she called for gay rights and even gay marriage. So long stretches like the quote above that display women as subservient come off as backwards at times. The reasoning behind her logic is more bizarre. It relies on an assertion that women are motivated (in part) by a desire to please men sexually. Worse, she hints at times that men have a right to force it. In The Fountainhead, the first encounter between the hero and the heroine is described as rape and the hero is described as having a right to do it. In Atlas shrugged, encounters of a similar nature are marked by the subservience of Ms. Taggart to the domination of Mr. Rearden. No it is not the hints of S&M that bother me

They only serve as more proof that she was ahead of her time!

I am bothered by the fact that the S&M is explained through ideological rants. Of all the things you had to explain through objectivism, why kinky sex and housewives service in the kitchen?

-Why it makes sense


This was written in the 1950s.

In conclusion Atlas Shrugged is an awesome book that becomes awkward sometimes because of Rands insistence of her philosophy in every aspect of the book. Thanks for reading.

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