Student Created Questions Writing Assignment
What are the similarities between Ayn Rand’s ideology and the ideology of today’s political system?
In today’s political scene it is obvious that the two prominent parties disagree completely on many issues. The book, Anthem, has caused me to ponder which political party Ayn Rand would belong to or most likely agree with if she were alive today. While Democrats typically have a liberal view on politics, Republicans have a generally conservative stance. The issue most directly brought up in Anthem is the role of government in society. This is a question that has been debated for the history of our country.
In her book, Ayn Rand stresses that the government in this dystopia of a society is bringing down the strong, by creating equality among all men. She believes that a person cannot reach their full potential if the government, or Council of Vocations in the case of Anthem, becomes too large, even to the point of forcing everyone to be the same. In today’s politics we see this debate of government forced equality through the supreme healthcare legislation coined as Obamacare. Conservatives view supreme healthcare as another step towards government takeover that costs citizens tax money. Liberals view these new healthcare laws as a way to give every American the right to good health, no matter what social class.
Neither view is right or wrong, because it is all opinion, but I am very certain that Ayn Rand would favor the conservative stance, because she believes that people should help themselves and not burden everyone else in the country. She would believe that by using the government to give everyone fair treatment, or equality, it would take away the individualism of our country. As an egoist she wouldn’t believe in helping others unless it directly benefited herself. If Ayn Rand were to be assigned to a political party in today’s politics, she would most likely be put into the conservative based Republican Party.
Advanced Research Topic
Is Anthem a realistic
portrayal of life in a totalitarian society? Compare the fictionalized society
in Anthem to a real dictatorship, past or present. Some options are Nazi
Germany, Soviet Russia, Cuba, China, Cambodia, etc.
When Adolf Hitler
rose to power, claiming to be able to restore Germany to its former glory, he
took control quicker than any other dictator in history. Germany took terrible
losses from the First World War and was desperate for a leader who could gain
control of the economy again. There was no better candidate than Adolf Hitler,
a well spoken, intelligent, and most of all charismatic man. As Hitler took
control of the country everything changed for the worst. The country that was
once a country of thriving wealth was now a country of equality controlled by
the fascist government of the Nazi Party.
One group of
Nazis that Hitler put in charge of law enforcement was the Gestapo. If people
did not do what they were told, the Gestapo had the power to throw them into
jail, or even kill them without real reason (sunnytim). The Nazis are, in a way,
very similar to the Council of Vocations, in that they tell each citizen how
they will live their lives, or else face severe punishment.
While Hitler did
use techniques such as propaganda to brainwash citizens, his most successful technique
of leading was using terror to scare everybody into doing what he wanted them
to do (sunnytim). In Anthem, all of Equality’s brothers are afraid of
going against what the government has told them to do, and some have even lost
the will to care about being controlled and having no freedom.
In communist governments it is absolutely
against the law to talk bad of the government. In Nazi Germany a person would
be put to death for bad mouthing the government, and in Anthem, no one
even dared to say anything bad because they were so afraid (sunnytim). The only
other person mentioned in the book that talks bad about society other than
Equality is the Saint of the Pyre. All we know about the Saint is that he was
burnt at the stake for speaking the unmentionable word, which is ego. The
government was afraid that if people knew this word they would become
independent thinkers and over throw the councils.
Adolf Hitler had
a hatred for people of Jewish heritage, and to make their lives very difficult
in he passed a set of laws known as the Nuremburg Laws (sunnytim). These laws
forced Jews to live in fear, and in hiding. All of their rights were taken away
from them, just because the leader didn’t like them. Hitler eventually decided that he wanted to
get rid of all of the Jewish people in Europe. This directly compares to how
society and the council wanted to get rid of all independent thinkers by
creating many laws to prohibit it, such as making the street sweepers, the
smarter demographic, live in a room of gray to keep them from creatively
thinking. The government in Anthem, didn’t want anybody to think own
their own because it could threaten the government. The council was willing to
go to any means of getting rid of independent thinkers, just as Hitler was
willing to going to mass extermination of all of the European Jews.
Ayn Rand’s
portrayal of a totalitarian society is right on the spot. She created a society
that was ruled by a government that feared independence. They feared freedom,
because they feared human nature. A government that formed originally to keep
peace and create equal opportunity for everyone turned into a society where
everyone was equally bad. Through this black and white society she has shown
that total government control is bad, and will be the fate of mankind if we
don’t start to accept the uniqueness and individualism in everyone.
Work
Cited
Sunnytim.
"How Did Hitler Keep Control of Nazi Germany." BBC News. BBC,
20 Apr. 2005. Web. 14 Nov. 2012. <http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/39/a3921239.shtml>.
Creative Writing
Rewrite the scene
about the Saint at the Pyre from the Saint’s perspective. What did he want to
communicate to Equality?
All the men and
all of the children of the city are standing in the square with their eyes
fixed upon me as I am carried out into the open by my captors. Strangely
enough, I’m not nervous about my departure from this world of man. All these
people screaming and cursing at me, but for what,? All I did was give a little
bit of truth back into this world that has been taken out by the men who claim
to rule us. And because of this, my face will remain the calmest, and happiest,
of all men present here today. And while I take pride in knowing that I am of a
species of man that is capable of thinking independently, my captors take pride
in clothing my body in this heavy chain, which in a way represents the
handicaps that society places on us who are stronger and superior to our
brothers. As the flame of my foes rises underneath me I look not down, but up
to the city around me. I can taste blood in my mouth, probably from the beating
I received just moments ago. I am dying for this city. This city, and all of
the cities on the earth, and all of the men who inhabit them. This thought
alone brings joy to my soul and a smile to my face, but not because I will be
remembered as a martyr, but because in my heart I know that I am dying for a
civil society that once inhabited this land, a society that was ruled by free
men, who lived to satisfy themselves. I
search the crowd calmly, looking for one person who is like me, for I know that
I cannot be the only one. And then it happens. A boy, no older than ten years
old locks his eyes with me, and I don’t break contact with him. I need not to
use my mouth, for my eyes can tell more than I could ever speak. I pray that
the boy can understand the message I am trying to convey to him. For the sake
of mankind he must understand. And all of a sudden, like a burden being lifted
from me, I know that he understands. He understands the word that allowed men
to be free and that will lead man kind to freedom once again. The word, the
unspeakable word…Ego.
