| Wednesday, May 14, 2008 | |
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FAQ on Free Market Health Care
By Paul @ 12:05 AM   
I've received multiple e-mails in response to my recent letter to the editor in the May 11, 2008 New York Times advocating a free market in health insurance. I appreciate the fact that the correspondents all took the time to read my letter, see my affiliation with Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine (FIRM), search for the FIRM website, find my e-mail address, and then write me with their comments and questions.The various correspondents posed a number of good questions about the nature of a free market in health insurance, as well as some more fundamental issues on individual rights and the proper role of government in health care. I've had several stimulating rounds of e-mail discussion with folks from around the country. And even though we didn't always agree on some important issues, all of the e-mails I received were polite and articulate, and I appreciated the many thoughtful remarks from all of the writers. One correspondent recommended that I post my responses online so that other interested parties would have a place to read a more fully developed and explicit explanation of the ideas related to a free market in health insurance. I thought that was an excellent suggestion. Hence, I've paraphrased and collated an essentialized set of questions (and my subsequent responses) in the form of this brief FAQ. (This FAQ has also been posted on the FIRM blog here.) =========== Q1) In a free market for health insurance, should insurers be able to exclude someone based on a pre-existing condition? Q2) Why should whether I live or die depend on whether an insurance company finds it too costly to pay for my care? Should my fate be determined by whether a corporation finds it profitable? Q3) How would a free market guarantee that all Americans will have necessary health coverage? Q4) What if someone has a bad disease through no fault of his own, can't afford the treatment, and no insurance company will cover him? Who will pay for his care? Q5) Isn't the purpose of a government to promote the common welfare of all citizens? Q6) Your position is very harsh and Darwinian. If you were dying of cancer and could not afford treatment, would you really say to yourself, "Oh well, this is my random bad luck, no one has an obligation to treat me and so I must die"? Q7) Isn't it my social obligation to subsidize the health care of those who can't afford it? Q8) I agree that health care is not a "right", but isn't it moral for the US government to raise taxes to improve the overall welfare of the nation? Universal health care (ideally administered through a free-market mechanism to the greatest extent possible) would be a good use of that power. = = = = = = = = = = Q1) In a free market for health insurance, should insurers be able to exclude someone based on a pre-existing condition? A1) Yes. In a free market, insurers (like any other businesses or individuals) are entitled to set whatever terms they wish for the products they wish to sell. Similarly, customers can choose to accept those terms, decline them, or negotiate with them for some other mutually agreed-upon alternative. It's also important to note that our current system is far from a free -- at best it's semi-free. Insurance companies are under numerous government constraints about what sorts of services they must/must not offer, who they can/cannot exclude, what sorts of prices they can charge, when they must accept customers, etc. For instance, some states require that a healthy 22-year old man must pay the same premium as a 60-year old man with multiple chronic health problems. Some states require that insurance companies that offer small group policies must accept every group that applies and must accept every member of the group regardless of lifestyle choice or health condition. Constraints such as these make it difficult for customers to purchase insurance in the first place. These constraints are the cause of our current problems and it is those contraints that I wish to see repealed. (For more details, please refer to "Moral Health Care Vs. 'Universal Health Care'" by Lin Zinser and myself.) Q2) Why should whether I live or die depend on whether an insurance company finds it too costly to pay for my care? Should my fate be determined by whether a corporation finds it profitable? A2) One should reverse that question. Should an insurance company be obliged to run at a loss? For example, there are many people who wish to force insurers to cover expensive treatments that are of minimal (if any) proven efficacy, such as bone marrow transplant in patients with late-stage breast cancer. If or when such laws are passed, insurance companies don't survive for long or else they pull out of local markets where such laws are in force, thus depriving all the other residents of that locality the possibility of purchasing insurance from that company. If an insurance company cannot be profitable, then they can't provide coverage for anyone. More fundamentally, should an insurance company be obliged to pay for your care purely because you need it, regardless of the cost to them? The fact that you have a need does not create an automatic obligation on others to fulfil that need. Q3) How would a free market guarantee that all Americans will have necessary health coverage? A3) There's a premise in your question that I must disagree with - namely that it's the government's responsibility to guarantee health coverage for all Americans. It is not, any more than it's the proper role of the government to guarantee that every American has a job or a car. Health care is a need, but that's not the same thing as a right. A right is a freedom of action that an individual possesses, such as the right to free speech. Rights impose no positive obligations on other people, merely the negative obligation to leave you alone. Rights are not automatic claims on the goods and services produced by others -- that is just state-sanctioned theft. To further concretize the difference between a need and a right, consider an innocent child with a rare disease who will die unless he gets a bone marrow transplant from a matching donor. The only potential donor with the proper tissue match is someone who doesn't want to donate, for whatever reason (maybe he's scared of needles, maybe he's a Jehovah's Witness, maybe he's just an ornery old cuss). We'll also stipulate that the potential donor understands exactly what is at stake for the child, and that he correctly understands that donating bone marrow is a very safe procedure that would involve a few minutes of tolerable physical pain and a couple of hours of his time, but otherwise wouldn't impair his life afterwards. The fact that the child will die without that bone marrow does not mean that the child's family (or anyone else) has the right to strap that potential donor down and forcibly take a marrow sample from him against his will. The child's need does not constitute a right to that other man's bone marrow. Q4) What if someone has a bad disease through no fault of his own, can't afford the treatment, and no insurance company will cover him? Who will pay for his care? A4) The short answer is, "Anyone who wishes to do so." If someone incurs an unfortunate random hardship (even though it is no fault of his own), it does not create an automatic obligation for anyone else to pay for it. Depending on the exact circumstances, I might be willing to voluntarily donate my own time/money to help him out. For example, in my capacity as a physician, I have personally waived my own professional fee more times than I can count out of voluntary charity for patients whom I've thought were worthy recipients. The same is true for nearly every other physician I know. And in general, Americans have been extraordinarily benevolent about voluntarily donating their time and money for innocent victims of natural disasters, disease, and man-made harms (such as 9-11 or the Oklahoma City bombings). So if someone developed a bad disease that would cost him $100k, and either didn't get insurance or couldn't get insurance, then he essentially has to rely on the voluntary charity of others. His need (genuine as it may be), does not create a right to someone else's property or time. This isn't limited to health care. The same would be true if an unfortunate homeowner didn't or couldn't purchase flood insurance, then his house was completely destroyed by a freak 100-year flood. His hardship does not constitute any sort of automatic claim on others' assets. Again, I (and many others) might be willing to be offer voluntary charity to help him out. But if no one is voluntarily willing to help him out, then he loses his house. Furthermore, the very fact that such examples tug at the sympathies of normal decent Americans also means that those Americans will be forthcoming with voluntary charity. And I fully support giving to charities that are consistent with my values and priorities. Q5) Isn't the purpose of a government to promote the common welfare of all citizens? A5) No, the purpose of government is to protect individual rights - specifically to protect individuals from the predations of others who would use force to deprive men of their rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. This includes protecting honest men from external enemies who would wage war on us as well as internal criminals who would use force to steal, murder, commit rape, etc. Hence the purpose of a government is to create and enforce conditions where men and women can freely and voluntarily exchange ideas, goods, and services to the mutual benefit according to their best rational judgment, without fear that someone else will try to forcibly rob them of those benefits. Man's essential nature requires that he uses his reasoning mind to create the values necessary for sustaining his life. Hence, protecting his right to the free use of his mind (and the right to voluntarily trade with others for the products of their thought and effort free from compulsion) is the basic function of a government. When a government ceases to be the protector of individual rights and instead becomes one of the chief violators, then it undermines the very reason for its existence. It's akin to a government claiming that "we need to protect the freedoms of Americans from enemies abroad", and then imposing a military draft on young Americans to fight in a war (and violating those draftees' freedom and rights in the process). Q6) Your position is very harsh and Darwinian. If you were dying of cancer and could not afford treatment, would you really say to yourself, "Oh well, this is my random bad luck, no one has an obligation to treat me and so I must die"? A6) Yes. My life is my own responsibility. Others may choose to voluntarily help me if am in need, but they should not be legally required to do so (i.e., they should not be forced by the government to help me against their will or punished by the government for failing to help me.) If I needed $100,000 for a life-saving cancer treatment but couldn't afford it, I would of course do everything legal and moral to try to live. I might borrow money from friends and family, I might ask for charitable contributions, I might sign up for clinical trials of experimental drugs, etc. But I wouldn't hack into my neighbor's bank account and steal that money from his kids' college fund. Or steal $100 each from a thousand of my neighbors. Or ask the government to take it from my neighbors by force. Similarly, if my next-door neighbor was the only possible matching bone marrow donor to cure my rare disease but he didn't want to donate a sample to save my life, I wouldn't strap him down and take it from him by force. If I had a brain tumor that required a delicate operation in order for me to live, and the only neurosurgeon with the necessary skill was unwilling to do the procedure, I wouldn't force him to perform the surgery at gunpoint (or have the government force him). That's not being Darwinian -- that's just being moral. Of course, I would prefer to live rather than die of a terrible disease. But I wouldn't want to live if it costs me my integrity and my self-respect. A man can't "save" his life at the price of sacrificing his morality, since morality is the very means that a man survives as a man. Q7) Isn't it my social obligation to subsidize the health care of those who can't afford it? A7) No, you have no positive binding obligation to help others although of course you have the voluntary choice. Nor is this limited to health care -- it's an application of a more general principle. If I saw a child drowning in the ocean, in all likelihood I would try to save him if I thought I had a reasonable chance of success. And nearly everyone I know would feel similarly. But if a different passerby chose not to make the attempt for whatever reason, then that's his choice to make and one which I have to respect. He has the right to decide whether he wishes to try or not. Conversely, the drowning child cannot demand that a random passerby must help him as a matter of right -- only out of voluntary charity. If it turned out that a passerby was a strong swimmer but refused to help because he was a total jerk, then I might hold him up to public moral censure -- maybe he'd lose his friends, his job, and the respect of his peers. But the government should not send him to jail for failing to take a positive action that could have saved the child's life (assuming that he wasn't the cause of the child's drowning in the first place). Just as a passerby should not (and currently does not) have a legally binding positive obligation to help a drowning child even if he is capable of doing so at no cost to himself, he should not be obligated by law to pay for my cancer treatment. There's a crucially important difference between him having the negative obligations not to steal from me or not to deprive me of freedom of speech (i.e., to respect my rights), and any purported positive obligations to pay for my health care or save me from an accident. Again, my right to free speech implies only a negative obligation on his part not to violate it -- it does not require a positive action on his part. On the other hand, any alleged entitlement rights such as a "right" to health care is essentially a demand by me for some forced positive action from others. Q8) I agree that health care is not a "right", but isn't it moral for the US government to raise taxes to improve the overall welfare of the nation? Universal health care (ideally administered through a free-market mechanism to the greatest extent possible) would be a good use of that power. A8) If we agree that there is no "right" to health care, then by what right does a government force one citizen to pay for the care of another citizen? That's what any system of "universal care" essentially amounts to. What you consider a moral use of government power is something I consider deeply immoral. And the experience of other nations shows that any attempted system of universal care ends up destroying the free market that makes quality health care possible. At a practical level, if I needed major medical care and couldn't afford it, I'd much rather rely on a pure free market plus voluntary charity from my fellow Americans, than a British-style system of government "universal care". Although critics of the free market regularly claim that it would lead to "people dying in the streets", this would not actually happen unless Americans were far more impoverished and callous than they are today. The free market is our best protection from that scenario. And if Americans ever became that impoverished and callous, then no system of government-run universal care would be sustainable or even possible. On the other hand, the nationalized health systems routinely deny care to people who have theoretical "universal coverage". Those patients *do* end up dying because of the allegedly "compassionate" government system. Labels: Activism, Health Care  E-mail Paul
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| Sunday, May 11, 2008 | |
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My Health Care LTE in New York Times
By Paul @ 1:00 AM
The May 11, 2008 New York Times printed my LTE in response to their earlier article from May 4, 2008, "Even the Insured Feel the Strain of Health Costs". My letter is the fourth one down on this page, and they included a mention of FIRM:To the Editor: Labels: Activism, Health Care E-mail Paul
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| Friday, May 09, 2008 | |
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Changing the Wind: The Opposition's Perspective
By Paul @ 1:14 AM
At FIRM (Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine), we may or may not necessarily win the battle over any specific piece of legislation. But as Lin Zinser has pointed out, that's a secondary goal. Our main goal is the promote the idea of free market health care and to make it part of the mainstream discussion, so that policy makers and the general public regard it as a serious alternative to the status quo.Or to borrow a point from Richard Ralston of AFCM (Americans for Free Choice in Medicine), "Don't worry about changing the politicians. The politicians will wear their fingers to the bone sticking them in the air to test which way the wind is blowing. Instead, work on changing the wind. If you change the wind, the politicians will follow." One indication that we are having the desired effect comes from our ideological opposition. A few months ago, Michele Swenson, an advocate of Canadian-style "single payer" health care for Colorado posted the following on the weblog for ProgressNow.org, which is one of the "progressive" leftist advocacy organizations in Colorado. She was complaining about the horrible media bias towards free market health care, and the appalling lack of coverage for her beloved single-payer "solution". Here's an excerpt: Open Letter to Denver Media: The information blackout by the Denver Post and Rocky Mountain News regarding Single Payer health care reform - their bias toward 'free-market' solutionsOur opposition definitely knows that we are out there. And they are clearly feeling a bit on the defensive. So we must be doing something right if the statists are demoralized over what they believe to be a media bias towards the "predominant 'free market' view"! Of course we still have a long ways to go. And there will be inevitable ups and downs throughout the process. But I believe that we can take heart from our opponents' statements and recognize that we are changing the direction of the wind. Labels: Activism, Health Care E-mail Paul
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| Tuesday, April 22, 2008 | |
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Leonard Peikoff's Podcasts
By Diana Hsieh @ 1:21 PM
Back in January, I finally listened to Leonard Peikoff's first six podcasts. He has posted a bunch more since then, but I've not yet heard those. While I knew I'd find them interesting, I didn't listen to them sooner because I'm on mostly break from studying Objectivism while writing my dissertation. They are definitely worth a listen or two, as the questions are almost always well-chosen and well-answered.In the sixth podcast, Dr. Peikoff discusses the pitfalls of discussing Objectivism in online discussion forums. I won't repeat his comments here, but I largely agree with his concerns that such online debates risk divorcing a person's ideas from his values and promote disintegrated examination of ideas in isolation. It's also true that many self-described Objectivists arguing with confidence online are completely clueless, rationalistic, or even outright dishonest. I would add a few points, based on extensive experience reading and posting to such discussion forums over the course of about 15 years. (For the record, the only public discussion forum that I regard as remotely Objectivist is ObjectivismOnline. The contributors can be far better than found elsewhere, but I still think the forum suffers from the standard problems of that medium.) First, thoughtful and productive discussion is a rarity on most discussion boards, whether supposedly Objectivist or not. Mostly, the threads consist of discombobulated streams of unjustified assertions, ill-considered opinions, nasty remarks, ignorant assumptions, and outright dishonesty. To participate in those discussions is, at best, a huge waste of time. The fact that someone has said something particularly stupid in some online debate is not a good reason to spend hours arguing with that person and his fellows. Second, the capacity to beat the pants off some random opponent in online debate doesn't mean that you know what you're talking about, that you're thinking clearly, or that you're right. Unfortunately, people often suppose that argumentative might makes right. And so they seek the thrill of victory in online debate with all the fervor of a crack addict. In fact:  If you wish to seriously test your ideas in debate, the proper approach is to carefully study and think about some issue of personal interest to you, then discuss it in private with someone whose knowledge and judgment you trust, whether in person or e-mail. Third, if Objectivists want to change the culture for the better, they ought not waste their time and energy by arguing with other Objectivists -- even on the better forums. To actually change the culture, Objectivists need to present their ideas to people unfamiliar with them. That's often harder -- but far more rewarding in the long run. (That's precisely why I created my OActivists mailing list.) However, even with people unfamiliar with Objectivist ideas, lengthy online debates will likely be a waste of time. (If the person is someone known to you in real life, then the situation is somewhat different. Then long-running debates can have some value.) With strangers, the goal should be to clearly and briefly make a point or two that might intrigue an reasonable reader and perhaps point him in a new direction. That's often all that the better people require. In general, with any protracted online debate, I recommend asking oneself: Could I be spending my time in a more productive or enjoyable way? If so, then do go that other thing! If not, then get a life! And yes, that includes protracted arguments in the NoodleFood comments. Labels: Activism, Objectivism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Tuesday, April 01, 2008 | |
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Moving the Crowd
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:47 AM
An interesting tidbit from Paul, originally posted to the "activists" mailing list of FIRM (Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine:In the physical realm, a small group of people who know what they want and are willing to act in a concerted fashion to accomplish their goal can shape the direction of the rest of the crowd. Here is some interesting research.Why does Paul mention state (rather than national) politics? Because national politics is flooded with well-funded people attempting to move the crowd, almost always toward greater statism. In local and state politics, it's far easier for a small group of people to shift the wind of public opinion. And if enough people are moving their respective states in a better direction, then that will help move the nation. Labels: Activism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Wednesday, March 12, 2008 | |
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Washington Times Letter
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:01 AM
Hooray! My letter to the editor in praise of Dick Armey's moral defense of intellectual property was published in The Washington Times today:Sing a songNormally, I prefer to focus my activism efforts on local papers, but that was too good an opportunity to pass by. Paul also published a letter to the editor on health care in The Christian Science Monitor last Friday. Hooray FIRM! E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Monday, March 10, 2008 | |
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How OActivists Can Help ARI Promote Cultural Change
By Paul @ 7:00 AM
How does the formal work of the Ayn Rand Institute fit in with the informal work of the OActivists list in their mutual goal of promoting Objectivist ideas? Although the two entities are separate and independent, I'd like to sketch out one possible way that both groups could work to their mutual benefit.Yaron Brook mentioned in last year's "State of the ARI" address that one of his eventual goals was to have Ayn Rand's ideas circulating everywhere. Those ideas might not necessarily always be associated with her name or the name "Objectivism", but they would become part of the background cultural climate. So this would mean that an average thoughtful person would get exposed to Ayn Rand's ideas if he walked into his local Starbucks and overheard other customers discussing foreign policy. Or if he started talking politics with his coworkers at lunch. If he opened the newspaper, he'd see a letter to the editor taking an Objectivist position. If he read a blog post about a current events topic, he would see someone in the comments section offering an Objectivist perspective. Even if those ideas weren't always associated with the names "Ayn Rand" or "Objectivism", they would still have an effect. And of course, once an honest and open-minded person started doing some investigation, he would quickly find out where they came from. For instance, if he asked his co-worker at lunch where he heard that interesting take on Middle East politics, his friend might say, "My cousin mentioned it to me last week, and he said it came from Ayn Rand". Then he might read an OpEd in his local newspaper from the Ayn Rand Institute. Then his daughter might tell him that her high school English class was covering the theme of independence and individualism in their reading of the Ayn Rand novel, The Fountainhead. A leftist local politician whom he disliked might say something snarky about Ayn Rand while advocating another bad government program. Each repetition of those ideas would continue to reinforce one another, and soon the average honest person would recognize that there was an interesting body of ideas out there, from Ayn Rand under the name of "Objectivism" -- a body of ideas that had application to real-world issues that were important to him. If we got to that stage, then we would be in pretty good shape. As Ayn Rand's ideas became widely circulated in the culture and recognized as such, then they would be (correctly) regarded as part of the mainstream of public discussion. From there, it would be much easier for Objectivists (either at the Ayn Rand Institute or outside of it) to have opinion pieces published regularly in major outlets such as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Investors Business Daily, etc., with an explicit affiliation to "Ayn Rand" and/or "Objectivism". Similarly, Objectivsts would be appear regularly on television and radio programs. News editors would want to know the Objectivist position on important public issues, just as they currently seek out the environmentalist viewpoint or the feminist viewpoint or the religious conservative viewpoint on a variety of issues. At that point, I believe that the quality and clarity of Objectivists ideas compared to those of the opposition would become increasingly apparent to all reasonable people, especially because it would resonate with the fairly good "sense of life" still held by many Americans. They would learn that there was an explicit philosophy that matched their implicit sense of life. And once we established a self-reinforcing "virtuous cycle" where the advocacy of our ideas inspired others (Objectivists and non-Objectivists alike) to express support for similar ideas, then we would be well on our way to victory. So how does the OActivists project fit into all this? I believe that we can be very helpful throughout this process, but especially in this critical first phase of getting the ideas seeded and circulated in the culture. Everyone who has an interest in some sort of activism can proceed in whatever fashion suits his or her own goals, interests, and desires. This should not be a painful duty or chore, but something that one actively enjoys. For instance, I like to write, but I don't have much time for or interest in public speaking. Others might enjoy going to a high school class and presenting the basics of Ayn Rand's ideas to students. Others might enjoy sending letters to public officials or speaking at community meetings. Others might be willing to leave a brief comment on a non-Objectivist blog post, even if it's just a link to an ARI webpage that summarizes the Objectivist position on that topic or to a relevant The Objective Standard article. Others might enjoy informal discussions with co-workers, friends, and family. All of these efforts can have an impact. No single bit of writing or speaking needs to be overly deep and profound. It just has to be clear and relevant. The constant repetition and exposure to these ideas will add up in the average readers' and listeners' minds faster than one might realize. In particular, repeated exposure to our ideas will have a good effect on two noteworthy target audiences -- public officials and news editors. An editor might not print the first letter supporting free market health care or supporting America's right to self-defense against Islamofascism, but if he gets 7 or 8 of them, then he'll start thinking that this should be a legitimate part of the debate. The same is true with politicians. No single drop of water will wear a hole in a stone, but given enough time a steady drip of water will wear through any rock. If only 15-20 active people could shape the course of the debate of an important political issue (health care) in the state of Colorado, think of what 500-1000 motivated Objectivists around the country could do, if they each pursued avenues for activism that they found satisfying and enjoyable. Personally, I'm getting tired of hearing the same old garbage from the leftists, the environmentalists, the multiculturalists, and the religious mystics, and feeling that my ideas are always under attack. I think it's about time for us to go on the offensive promoting our ideas in the culture, and let them start worrying if their ideas will become a beleaguered minority. But to accomplish this, one thing needs to change: Ordinary Objectivists need to begin actively advocating their ideas publicly. There may be many reasons why this isn't already happening to a greater extent. Some may want to do something, but not know what to do or how to do it. Others may think it's hopeless, and hence not worth their time. Some may think that this is the job of the ARI. Others may be wasting time in fruitless online arguments with other Objectivists, rather than directing some of that energy towards the outside world where it could have a much greater payoff. (This is not meant as a criticism of online Objectivist discussion groups and mailing lists per se, but only of the sorts of endless back-and-forth internet debates that generate more heat than light.) Of course, there is no self-sacrificial "duty" for anyone to engage in any sort of intellectual activism. But I believe that many (if not most) Objectivists would find that they would greatly enjoy this kind of activism, and that they would also recognize that it was in their self-interest. Some tangible benefits of engaging in this sort of activism include deepening one's understanding of Objectivism, concretizing the ideas more firmly in one's mind, watching others change their minds in response to one's arguments, gaining a sense of efficacy and optimism by seeing one's words have an impact in the culture, and meeting like-minded Objectivists. I personally have experienced all of these benefits because of my past year of involvement with the Colorado FIRM activists. This sort of informal activism dovetails nicely with the formal efforts by the ARI to spread Objectivism through their "Education Funnel" of introducing high school kids to Ayn Rand through their Free Books Program, teaching the motivated college students more about Objectivism through the OAC (Objectivist Academic Center), and helping them get placed in influential positions as scholars, writers, teachers, journalists, politicians, and community/professional leaders after they've completed college and graduate school. In a few years, these writers and thinkers will help feed the growing demand for Objectivist ideas in the culture as well as create more demand. The OActivists can play an important role by seeding the ground and "softening the culture" for these ideas, thus making people receptive towards and interested in learning more. And as the culture continues to become more friendly to Objectivist ideas, we'll be able to build on our earlier success with even more grass-roots intellectual advocacy, thus feeding the virtuous cycle. For those who are familiar with chemistry, the OActivists can function as the equivalent of a "catalyst", i.e., an agent that helps speed up a chemical reaction. Of course, in chemistry a catalyst speeds up a chemical reaction that would have happened anyways, just more slowly. In intellectual affairs, there is no such guarantee that the ARI's efforts to affect cultural change will automatically pay off; people have free will to accept or reject any idea. But the OActivists can help increase the likelihood that good intellectual change will happen, and we can help increase the speed with which it occurs. Given that there are other powerful intellectual forces driving the the culture in bad directions, we may not have much time to spare. Hence, the OActivists could save precious time and could conceivably even make the difference between victory or defeat. If the ARI and the OActivists remain active and committed, then I predict that we will see significant cultural change for the better within 15-20 years. We have a legitimate and realistic shot of winning. But whether we do so depends on whether we have the willingness and courage to take tangible action to actually promote our ideas -- in other words, whether we are willing to act to turn our goals into reality. To join OActivists, visit: http://www.olist.com/oactivists. Labels: Activism E-mail Paul
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| Friday, March 07, 2008 | |
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Yaron Brook on Optimistim
By Paul @ 7:28 AM
At a public Q&A session, Yaron Brook, president of the Ayn Rand Institute, was asked why he was optimistic that Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand, will have political influence in the near future:(Just remember that some people have trouble following Yaron's "Brooklyn accent"...) Update from Diana: If you wish to help ARI spread Objectivism in the culture, you might consider joining the OActivists list. Labels: Activism, Objectivism E-mail Paul
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| Saturday, March 01, 2008 | |
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The Morality of Capitalism
By Diana Hsieh @ 5:18 PM
WSJ's blog "Deal Journal" posted the following inquiry under the title "Is Capitalism Immoral?" yesterday:Here's a question to think about over the weekend: Is capitalism immoral?My apologies for posting the entry in its entirety, but I wanted to include the mention of Ayn Rand, since that included the false claim that the US isn't anti-capitalist. Here's what I posted in the comments: "What would be the ideal U.S. textbook entry addressing the morality or immorality of our globalized capitalist system?"The comments so far are mostly horrid: either openly anti-capitalist or pragmatist. So I'd encourage people to post something arguing for the morality of capitalism. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Thursday, February 28, 2008 | |
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OActivists Subscriptions
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:34 AM
The new OActivists mailing list has been up and running -- with a lovely flurry of posts -- since Tuesday. If you tried to subscribe but you've not gotten any messages, that's probably because a spam filter ate the confirmation e-mail from the list software. In that case, please send an e-mail to diana@dianahsieh.com requesting that I subscribe you. I'll do so manually. The list has 130 members, but I want more!Labels: Activism, Objectivism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Wednesday, February 27, 2008 | |
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A Quick Letter on Abortion
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:49 AM
Here's a quick letter to my state representatives that I wrote in early February on a proposed bill to restrict abortion by requiring ultrasounds:From: Diana Hsieh <Diana.Hsieh(at)Colorado.edu>Ari Armstrong has more details in this blog post. E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Sunday, February 24, 2008 | |
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The Undercurrent
By Diana Hsieh @ 12:20 PM
The Undercurrent now has a regularly updated blog. I've added it to my blogroll; it looks like it will be worth checking regularly. (Unfortunately, it doesn't show the full post on the main page. I find that annoying, as it's almost always easier to scroll past a long post that's not of interest than to click through to posts that are of interest. But oh well.)For those of you unfamiliar with The Undercurrent, here's how they describe themselves: The Undercurrent is a student-run newsletter. Its content is written primarily by (and for) college students across the country, with additional articles from the Ayn Rand Institute op-ed program and other writers.Just FYI, any regular blogger for The Undercurrent is more than welcome to join my OBloggers mailing list. Labels: Activism, Objectivism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Saturday, February 23, 2008 | |
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OActivists: An Easy Deal
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:00 AM
The new OActivists list -- my informal private mailing list for Objectivists committed to fostering positive cultural change by effective advocacy of Objectivist ideas -- will open for business on Tuesday. It already has over 80 subscribers, but I want to offer an easy deal for anyone interested in subscribing yet hesitant to make a commitment to engage in activism.As you might recall from my original post, the list requires that subscribers meet two conditions. First, subscribers must be Objectivists, meaning that they agree with and live by the principles of Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism. Subscribers should also support the mission and activities of the Ayn Rand Institute. Second, subscribers must be committed to engaging in intellectual activism to promote Objectivist ideas in online or print forums on a semi-regular basis. The first criterion is pretty straightforward. But what does satisfying the second require? I'm willing make that very, very easy. Basically, at least once every six months while you're on the list, you must post at least one comment advocating the Objectivist view on some news article, op-ed, or non-Objectivist blog. That comment doesn't have to be long: just a few sentences will do. You could even just link to or quote from an essay by Ayn Rand or an op-ed from ARI. You'll be alerted to plenty of opportunities to engage in that kind of minimal activism via the OActivists list itself. In fact, you could even get started by posting a friendly comment on this positive review of The Fountainhead by a blogger. Of course, I will encourage subscribers to do more than just the minimum: they can write letters to the editor, publish op-eds, speak to local groups, write to their representatives, and so on. In fact, I hope that a person's experience with a wee bit of activism will embolden more. However, that wee bit -- just one comment in a public forum every six months -- is all that's required to subscribe to the OActivists list. Basically, that's five minutes of time every six months. That's not asking much in exchange for the value of subscribing to the list, I don't think. If that sounds like a fair deal to you, you are more than welcome to subscribe to OActivists via its web interface. Labels: Activism, Objectivism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Wednesday, February 20, 2008 | |
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Opportunity for Comment
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:58 AM
Via my "Ayn Rand" Google News Alert, I found this lovely little opportunity to post a positive comment supporting ARI's opposition to the proposed Mississippi law "that would revoke the business license of any restaurant that serves food to fat people." It's an OC Weekly blog post that explicitly mentions and quotes from this ARI press release. In the future, I'll be posting these kinds of opportunities for comment on the OActivists mailing list. Update: Here's my comment: This proposed law is really too stupid for comment, but it's exactly what opponents of blaming tobacco companies for smokers predicted.Comments do not appear immediately, by the way. Labels: Activism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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| Monday, February 18, 2008 | |
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A New List: OActivists
By Diana Hsieh @ 8:38 AM
A message for Objectivists:We Objectivists often lament the sorry state of the culture. Too often, faith and emotion are lauded as superior to reason, the individual is merely a means to some collective, service to others is deemed more noble than personal happiness, and rights are nearly forgotten in politics. Yet we're also inspired by the unexpected inroads forged by the Ayn Rand Institute over the past few years, particularly by the wild success of their program offering "Free Books for Teachers." However, the Ayn Rand Institute cannot change the culture on its own, not even with our financial and moral support. It's just too big a task for a few dozen professional intellectuals. Objectivists must effectively advocate their values in the the forums open to them, if they want to see substantial and enduring change in the values of the culture. Thanks to Lin Zinser's FIRM (Freedom and Individual Rights in Medicine), I'm now convinced that so much more is possible than most people imagine when like-minded people join forces in a loose, ad hoc way. In those ongoing efforts, FIRM's "Activists" mailing list for people committed to promoting freedom and individual rights in medicine in Colorado has been of surprising value. It enables us to quickly and easily alert each other to opportunities to advocate good ideas, to discuss effective methods of argument, to praise and encourage the work well done, to report on our own accomplishments, to marvel at our impact on the debate, to inform others of useful sources of information, to brainstorm about venues for advocacy, to announce upcoming events, and more. I've realized that a mailing list modeled on similar lines -- but specifically for Objectivists committed to fostering positive cultural change -- could be of similar value. So I've created OActivists @ OList.com. Here's the basic list description, including the requirements that all subscribers must satisfy: OActivists is an informal private mailing list for Objectivists committed to fostering positive cultural change by effective advocacy of Objectivist ideas. Its basic purpose is to facilitate communication about matters of mutual interest to Objectivist activists, such as opportunities for advocacy, methods of persuasive argumentation, announcements of upcoming events, useful sources of information on issues, examples of advocacy, and the like.If you meet those criteria, please subscribe via the web interface. If you have any questions about the list -- including whether you qualify -- please e-mail me, the list's owner and administrator, at diana@dianahsieh.com. Subscribers will be expected to respect the purpose of the list. Those who prove themselves disruptive to its basic aims will be removed. To give people time to subscribe, the list will not open for discussion until Tuesday, February 26th. Finally: OActivists is not an Objectivist discussion list. Objectivists (including myself) have wasted far too much time and energy arguing amongst ourselves about minutia in far-off corners of the internet. We can do better. We can defend our values from attack in debates that matter. We can refute the standard strawmen of our philosophy. We can introduce people to rational, principled philosophic ideas. We can do all that more effectively if we communicate. That communication is what OActivists aims to make easy. Update #1: OActivists has 55 members in just 24 hours. Excellent! Update #2: Now it's 72 members in 48 hours. Even better! Labels: Activism, Announcements, Objectivism E-mail Diana Hsieh
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