Social Responsibility Was Not Written into the Constitution
by John Lawrence
The French demanded Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite in their revolutionary Constitution. Fraternite, social responsibility, was left out of the American Constitution. So now there are people who feel no social responsibility to get a vaccination so that they won't spread COVID to others, let alone protect themselves. A pandemic requires social cohesion, something that is unheard of in American society. Americans are extremely selfish and self-centered, something encouraged and exemplified by Republican Presidents like Donald Trump, Ronald Reagan and George W Bush and also by Ayn Rand and her advocates like Republican leader Paul Ryan and Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan. Greenspan, who served 4 terms as Federal Reserve Chairman, was a devoted Ayn Rand fan. He even took a six foot high floral arrangement shaped as a dollar sign to her funeral. Rand’s conception was to create an individualist morality. Rand took traditional Christian morality, which said it was good to act in the interest of others—not in your own selfish interest—and she flipped that. She said selfishness is a virtue, and the goal of life is to grow and develop as an individual, and that a moral social system supports the rights of the individual above all. One of her books was called "The Virtue of Selfishness."
Service to our fellow man has been redefined in military terms. You serve American society by joining the military and killing other people who are not Americans. There is no conception of serving American society by joining the Peace Corps or AmeriCorps or doing anything that helps the weakest and most vulnerable among us let alone to plant trees or do anything to forestall climate change and benefit the environment. This culture of militarism, as the only way to exhibit patriotism, is what led to the January 6th insurrection. Militarism promotes the waving of flags and jingoism of "we're number one." Not only is there no conception of service to our fellow Americans, there is no conception of service to our fellow man. There is only pride in domination over those who are not American and people who are suspect of being weak or not American like Barack Obama, for instance. Dominance and selfishness are considered to be paramount virtues. Ask Donald Trump. Being number 2 or 3 or whatever is seen as being weak. Being a loser is weakness personified.
Long before Ayn Rand developed her ideas, Friedrich Nietsche set out more or less the same philosophy. His was about "the emergence of the superman." Nietzsche’s idea of the superman and its religious implications, was an attack upon and a rejection of Christian religion. His attack on religious moral ideals, using the concept of the superman, sought to strip humanity/man of his religious nature. Nietzsche’s superman represents the highest principle of the development of humanity and the affirmation of man’s full potentialities. He posits the superman as a critique on Christian religion and the crisis of modernity. This is because, according to him, the Christian morality stifles the development, freedom and creativity of humanity/man, as well as making him dependent on faith. Consequently, he advocates for the total rejection and abolition of the Christian moral ideals in order to make way for the freedom of humanity/man and consequently the emergence of super-humanity. Both Hitler and Donald Trump (an Ayn Rand superfan) represented the superman that both Nietsche and Ayn Rand argued was the highest form of humanity. The January 6 insurrection illustrated how far some will go to place their superman in power. The antivaxxers represent how far some will go to maintain that they have no responsibility to their fellow man, only to themselves.
