The Government's job is to protect rights.


Man's state in nature, where all men are allowed complete discretion in the use of force, according to the laws of the jungle, is nothing more than a state of anarchy -- perpetual civil war and gang warfare. To place the retaliatory use of force under objective legal control -- under clearly defined laws that are logically based on the principle of rights -- a society of men delegate to government, their right to retaliate against those who initiate force.

Government is an agency which has a monopoly on the use of physical force.

This legal power -- to use physical force -- only may be used for one purpose: to retaliate against those who initiate force, according to objectively defined laws.

Never is this power to be used to initiate force, but government is only permitted to retaliate and defend against those who initiate force.

My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute.

— Ayn Rand, Appendix to Atlas Shrugged


Ayn Rand believed:
1. That man must choose his values and actions by reason;
2. That the individual has a right to exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing self to others nor others to self; and
3. That no one has the right to seek values from others by physical force, or impose ideas on others by physical force.

"A is A. To be, is to be something: finite, limited, and non-contradictory."



Reality is that which exists. It is absolute.
It is the standard of the true, the false, and the arbitrary.

Things are what they are, independent of our or anyone else's feelings, ideas, wishes, desires, and emotions.

"I swear -- by my life and by my love of it -- that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for mine."



Such is the credo of the rational egoist -- the independent mind -- who recognizes no authority higher than his own judgment of the truth. Such a moralist recognizes that man's life is the standard of value -- that which supports man's life is the good, and that which destroys his life is the evil.

Individualism is not opposed to man living in society. Individualism is opposed to man living in society as a slave.

A human society is one in which each man holds as an absolute: that every man is an end in himself, and that other men are not his pawns, nor is he theirs.

Man is a rational animal, and reality dictates that to survive, man must be rational -- by choice.

Man is a being of free will. Man can choose to think, drift, or evade -- but choose he must. His thoughts determine: his character, his values, his emotions, and his actions, and so his thoughts determine his destiny.

As reason is solely the attribute of an individual, and man's thinking determines his choices and actions, then each man is the master of his own destiny. The individual sovereign.

To live rationally in society, man requires only one thing from his fellow men: freedom of action. Freedom of action does not mean freedom to act by permission, which may be revoked at a dictator's, or a democratic mob's, whim, but the freedom to act as an absolute -- by right.

Man requires rights to those actions necessary to support his own life, the most fundamental right being the right to life, from which all other rights, including the right to liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness, derive.

The initiation of physical force renders a man's mind useless.

In a political context, freedom has only one meaning -- freedom from the initiation of force by other men.

Only by the initiation of force can a man be: prevented from speaking, or robbed of his possessions, or brutally murdered. Only by the initiation of force can a man's rights be violated. Only the initiation of force against a man can stop his mind, thus rendering it useless as a means of survival.

It is for this reason -- that force renders a man's mind useless -- that every man has the right to self-defense -- the right to use force to retaliate against those who first start the use of force, but never may one morally initiate it.

The use of force, in and of itself, is not evil; but, to initiate (start) force is evil. To use force in retaliation -- in self- defense against those who initiate it -- is not a moral option, but a moral requirement. A moral man has nothing to gain when a man tries to kill him, but he has much to lose if he does not defend himself. For this reason it is right, just, and proper to use force in retaliation and self-defense. Contrary to the vile doctrines of the pacifists, force used in self-defense is a species of the good.

Can you imagine what would be the result of a society where the initiation of force is banned from all relationships?


It would not make every man moral, nor would it prevent every injustice. But, think what it could do:

It would result in: a society of good will and benevolence, where each man sees his neighbor not as part of a gang ready to rob him, but as a potential trader, from which he can gain immense values.

A society where each man is prepared to judge and be judged -- not by the color of his skin, but by the content of his character.

A society where each man can worship his own god, in his own way.

A society of free-thinking and free- acting individuals, and not a society of one muddy collective, ruled by a despot who has monopolized the title of the "voice of the people."

A society where each man is free to pursue his own happiness, wherever it may take him.

A society where one man's gain is never at someone else's sacrifice, but is to the mutual benefit of both.

A society where art is not a disorganized pile of scratches, scribbled by a drug-induced hippie with his eyes closed, but is an enlightening masterpiece, showing man as he could be and should be: a hero.

A society where being an "individual" is not some superficial trait, such as wearing your pants backwards, or having five rings through your nose, but refers to something important: to being a producer, a creator, a thinker -- a moralist.

A society where the evil is not rewarded, but punished, and the good is admired, and praised. A society where virtue is not a weakness, but a strength.

A society where a life of imaginable riches and wealth, is a possibility -- for everyone who is willing to think.

A society where any man can rise as a high as his will, and ability, may take him.

A society where each man's air, water, and property, are as pure as he wishes to make them.

A society where education is not a state-induced brainwashing, but truly becomes a "mind-expanding" experience.

A society where men will have little need of drugs to escape reality, because there will be no reason to. A society where the cost of living decreases, as incomes continually rise.

A society of peace, prosperity, and happiness -- where all men deal with each other not as master and servant, but as traders, exchanging value for value by their own free will, to their mutual benefit. And in time, a society of men living in harmony with reality, guided by the process of reason.

Capitalism is the progressive ideal, because it is the only social system that that leaves man free to pursue -- and achieve -- his own happiness.

Capitalism is the ethical ideal, because it is the only social system that leaves man free to be moral -- to live by the use of his own mind.

Capitalism is the objective ideal -- because it is the only system that is true, both in philosophical theory and in economic practice.

Capitalism is the unknown ideal...until now.

School wouldn't be about learning what you had to, just to pass an exam or two. School should really be truly mind-expanding. Everyone wants to learn something and specialize in one or more fields. Why not let them, instead of trying to put them 'inside the box'?

The Unknown Ideal!

Prejudice is strong vs Capitalism.

Recommend reading: Capitalism - the unknown ideal, by Ayn Rand.

A society where the following is the rule; "the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute."

When humanity understands that trading is the best way to communicate, war will seize.
Force of weapons shall only be used to defend ones homecountry.