Randy Executives

NYTimes ran this article,which made it to their most emailed list, and which is where I saw/found it. The piece is on Ayn Rand and her legacy - how several successful folks in higher up positions in corporate America had, in their youth, read books written by Rand and how their lives were never the same again from that moment on. That pattern (of young lives being changed irrevocably once they picked up Ayn Rand's books) is hardly unique to these guys. I first read "Atlas Shrugged" and then "The Fountainhead" while in college getting my Bachelors degree in Engineering. I identified with all her characters - both strong and weak - and, in my own way, I know I have imbibed portions of her message and rejected other portions. I daresay my life did change in some ways. I also saw others around me - around the same age as I was - who too were... well... mindf**ked a little after reading either one of the two afore mentioned books. Now, looking back, I don't really know if I couldn't have done without having read them.

The whole thing sort of reminds me of those slick military commercials glamorizing military life for recruiting/propaganda purposes. They prey on young, impressionable minds, showing them all the "good parts" of being a soldier: a life full of adventure, lots of shooting automatic rifles and acting all bad-ass, and oh yes! protecting your country from "the enemy", and finally getting your Dad to show some respect to your formerly good-for-nothing ass for once. All that just to get them to sign up and do their bidding. These kids may end up seeing the life they imagined they'd be living as soldiers, or just doing just the exact opposite - depending on whether they enrolled to shoot up people or save innocent folks, parachute stealthily behind enemy lines or dig trenches for human waste, making a difference with their lives or dying needlessly. Whatever.

Ayn Rand and her books are recruiting tools for the corporations. Some examples are in the linked article. Her books justify, glamorize and deify idealism and greed to ambitious young people who believe in personal success above everything else. Corporations want and need such driven foot soldiers who will one day push the corporate agenda near and far as a means to get to their own individual, grand successes. Just as army soldiers who one day discover the difference between early perception and ground realities though, I suspect several of these future execs never prepared themselves for the fact that when naked ambition collides with naked ambition, nasty things happen. Stuff they never planned for.

And besides - if you do take me as an example - it's clear that Rand's voodoo doesn't always work. I've yet to see the personal success she inspired the other folks to accomplish. Take that - big corporation executives!