The problems with objectivism are many. Rand was not taken seriously by contemporary philosophers, and really still isn't. Her dad lost his business in the Russian Revolution, and she (somewhat understandably) knee-jerked hard away from any perceived "collectivism" due to a bad experience with totalitarianism wearing a communist badge. She's popular with folks who like to advocate for laissez-faire capitalism from the comfort of a country that has many socialist protections. In my mind her fanbase are a mirror-image of the sheltered kids in Che Guevara t-shirts.There is this controversial book The Virtue of Selfishness by Ayn Rand. Basically that sometime society teach us to be too polite, that it can causes internal conflict within ourselves because there is nothing wrong with being selfish in the right situation. My favorite example is when two people are sitting outside an office waiting for their turn to interview for the same job. It was time for the next person in line, he look at the other person, offer a smile and say "Good luck!" The other personal response without hesitation "Good luck to you too!"
Why......?
You're both after the SAME JOB! If you don't talk to each other, fine, but any actions you SHOULD be taking is trying to psych the other person out by psychological warfare. But no, we are train to be 'nice' to be 'polite' even when deep down we don't really want to. You should want them to fail because it would increase your chance of getting the job. Its even worse when we aren't just being disingenuous to others, but we are brainwashed so deeply that we honestly hope for the wellbeing of anyone else beside ourselves in this situation.
"I hope you have a bad interview, I hope you throw up on the manager desk and accidentally call his wife his mom."
In a nutshell, my personal critique of objectivism it falls apart the instant that you look at how individuals in communities actually interact with each other, and doesn't fit in a world where group selection exists. (background info for the unfamiliar https://www.americanscientist.org/article/evolution-for-the-good-of-the-group)
Models that supposedly show the success of exceptional (stronger, smarter, whatever) individuals with crooked ethics are overly simplified and ignore some key facts:
- Nobody likes cheaters or tyrants. "Alpha" traits have long since been discredited. Wolf and particularly chimp groups are not run by the biggest, strongest, nastiest individual. They're run by a fairly strong individual who can play nicely and garner support of the group. Bullies usually get ganked. This is proof that
- Groups outperform individuals. It doesn't matter how smart, strong, or rich an individual is. Average ability outperforms genius ability when you roll that die 10k times.
- Groups of "good citizen" collectivists outperform groups of selfish cheaters. 10, 100, or 1,000,000 people who have a common goal and high solidarity will dramatically outperform 10, 100, or 1,000,000 individualists.
- People talk. This makes it really hard to maintain a "winning streak" when you're an *******.
Everybody notices successful assholes because they're an anomaly. Everybody forgets about the 1,000,000 loser douchebags in their hometown, or people like Martin Shkreli.