Category: Atlas Shrugged

When someone thinks back to the 1950s, they might think of a happy family or a time of prosperity before the Vietnam War. The harsh reality was the opposite; people were still segregated by race and it was the time of the “Trapped Housewife.” But despite the inequality many faced in this decade, there were societal changes, innovations, and influential books, to move the society into the flower power period of the 60s and 70s.

Fashion in America during the 1950s was based around Christian Dior’s “New Look.” It, as seen in previous decades, was based around having the perfect body. This was primarily shown with the iconic hourglass figure. Dresses accentuated this ideal with wide shoulders, tight waist, and full skirts. American companies copied this runway style and sold it to the common people as high fashion at home. Many American women were not happy with this “New Look” because, in the aftermath of World War II, women had gained some equality in fashion, mainly in the form of a more professional and less styled look. Another effect of World War II was the use of new fabrics, such as Nylon, elastic, polyester, and rayon. These could now be used because there were no longer any restrictions on the types of products that could be used (“1950s Fashion History: Women’s Clothing”). The “New Look” gave women more choices in fashion, but the new choices were more elegant and decadent, and women in the 50s were “mature, glamorous, and very put-together,” according to Vintage Dancer. The only time American women were not bound into their corsets was at home. Women’s leisurewear was much more relaxed; they even wore pants and straight-cut skirts (Reddy). While corsets are remembered as being archaic and a thing of the past, women in the 50s still wore corsets to get their desired shape, but not all women wore corsets; they wore bras promoted to be comfortable. These bras were not comfortable and were designed to show cleavage; they were very similar to corsets. Another fashion that confined women, were the new steel bottomed stiletto heels, which caused companies to have to change floors in their establishments because the heels were denting them in (Baker 44, 45).

After World War II, men’s fashion was not necessary; fashion was for women. But over time men’s fashion became diverse. Instead of wearing their typical “Gray Flannel Suits” at home as well as work, they wore brighter clothes and Hawaii’s entrance into the United States solidified the use of Hawaiian shirts (Baker 32, 33). Men’s fashion was made to be efficient with a quick wash and dry. Young men mirrored the fashions of popular James Dean and the “greasers” of the time. Children’s clothes were based on the fashions of the adults, and little girls wore dresses and were also expected to be put together, while little boys wore more comfortable clothes (Reddy).

Fashion might have been moving forward, but family values and the overall culture were not changing, if not moving backward. A prevalent example of values moving backward is the Nuclear Family, which emerged from World War II and the Great Depression. Parents, who had been children of the war, knew how short life was and wanted to have better relationships with their kids than they had with their parents. The key idea behind the Nuclear Family is that the men go to work and makes the money, while the women stayed at home and raised the children. Before this time, children were less included in the family, but now they became an actual member and were involved in family dynamics. The parents cared about their children’s feelings and worked to created good citizens and good people (Hussung). This is how people typically think of the family unit during this time but only 60 percent of families were set up this way.

On October 4, 1957, Russia launched a satellite into space and fear into the hearts of Americans across the country. United States citizens worried about a nuclear attack from space, and even prepared for it with drills in schools were students would quickly dive below their desks. Even though America was afraid, they became united against the Soviets, in part because of the Cold War and Anti-Communist feelings of the time. This event also pushed America into the space race, which the United States won when they beat the Soviets to the moon in 1969 (Capshaw).

The 1950s were a time of racial inequality for African Americans and other minorities, but the change of the government’s beliefs helped change the real-life situations that people were going through. For example, a Supreme Court case in 1956 declared bus segregation unconstitutional after Rosa Parks famously refused to give up her seat to a white man on a Montgomery bus. This personal decision started a bus boycott lead by Martin Luther King Jr. and earned her the title, “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement” (“Rosa Parks: American Civil Rights Activists”). Another Supreme Court case that changed America was the Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case in 1954. A young girl in 1951 was not allowed into any white school in Arkansas and her father sued. This case made its way up to the Supreme Court where they ruled against the old Plessy v. Ferguson case, which had previously stated that separate but equal was constitutional. The Supreme Court acknowledged that it was unconstitutional and that the schools were not equal. This extremely pleased the Nation Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), who had been working to end school segregation (“Brown v. Board of Education”). This case led to the infamous Little Rock Nine, which when nine African American students were allowed into an all-white school, Little Rock Central High School, in 1957. When the students arrived, they were met with a huge mob of white students and parents who despised them enough to curse and throw rocks at them. The Government in Arkansas was not supportive of desegregation and tried to block the students from entering the school, which led to federal government interference. President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent in his troops to protect the students from other students and Arkansas’ soldiers. All of the students graduated except for one, who had gotten into a fight and been expelled (Jaynes). This revolutionary case led to the desegregation of schools across the country.

New inventions also changed America and its opinions by giving people new ideas to live their lives by. The Pill, for example, helped destigmatize sex by making to okay to have sex without having to be ready for a child and it was officially available to but in America in 1960. Planned Parenthood, which was created by Margaret Sanger in the 50s, provided needed medical care for women (Layman).

During this decade and in the decades before, the polio epidemic was running rampant in America and across the world, with 25,000 to 50,000 new cases per year. No one was immune to this disease and even famous people like Franklin D. Roosevelt were susceptible. One person who was dedicated to trying to solve this problem was Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin who both worked hard to create vaccines, which eradicated “paralytic poliomyelitis” from America (“Jonas Salk and Albert Bruce Sabin”).

Other medical innovations that changed the world were the kidney transplant and the discovery of the double-helix structure of DNA. The kidney transplant was a landmark invention because it was the first successful long-term organ transplant, with the patient living eight years after the surgery (“History of Kidney Transplantation”). The discovery of double-stranded DNA, which was discovered in 1953, led to screening for genetic diseases, the creation of GMOs, the identification of human remains, treatments for disease, such as AIDS, and it made it possible to test physical evidence to link criminals to their crimes. All of these new uses were important to the world we now live in, which is evident since the discoverer, James D. Watson, won the Nobel Prize in 1962 (“Watson and Crick”).

Other nonmedical inventions changed our world, for example, the UNIVAC and the Hovercraft. The hovercraft is not commercially used and many people do not know that it exists. By 1994, only 2 hovercrafts were being used and only in Britain, because the creator, Sir Christopher Cockrell, refused to give any information to the Americans. The hovercraft, now, is only used to transport goods across the English Channel (“Sir Christopher Cockrell”). The UNIVAC, or the Universal Automatic Computer, was invented in 1951 and was the very first commercial computer sold. It cost 1.6 million dollars, so only 46 computers were built and were mainly donated to colleges like Harvard. In the modern-day, it is hard to imagine a computer this old, it took 30 minutes for the computer to boot up and it took up over 35 square meters of floor space (Sack). These features were other reasons that the computer was not sold, even though the main factor was the cost.

Literature in the 1950s, as in other decades, was influenced by the world around it. The literary movement became known as the Beat Movement because everyone felt beaten down by the world, in part because of the ongoing wars, such as the Cold War and the Vietnam War. This movement was particularly influenced by free speech and was coined by Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William Burroughs, who were friends in New York (Carlise). The Beat Movement influenced liberation of all kinds: sexual, gay, African American, women, Native American, and against government censorship. It helped decriminalize drugs and advocated for the environment. Many of the writers were anti-military and wanted to change the culture of the youth and the average middle class (Ginsberg). It influenced many of the movements of the 70s.

This movement could have influenced many more people if the literacy in America was higher. In the 50s the illiteracy rate was 2.4 percent of the population, which might not seem like a large group but it was mainly in Southern states and in states like Hawaii where they spent a lot of time farming. Although there were only three million illiterate people, there were eight million function illiterates, which is described as someone who completed less than five years of schooling (“Estimates of Illiteracy”).

Books like ‘The Invisible Man’ and ‘Atlas Shrugged’ helped teach Americans and informed them of other people’s points of view. ‘The Invisible Man’ by Ralph Ellison discussed what it meant to be African American in a hostile world and was influential in the upcoming civil rights movement. ‘Atlas Shrugged’ by Ayn Rand depicted the government and capitalism as corrupt. It moved people further against a strong government and influenced the anti-military and war feelings of the 60s and 70s (“Books that Shaped America”).

The era of the 1950s was influenced by innovations, profound literature, and new fashions, even though people of color and women were still oppressed mentally and politically. When thinking about the 50s, which is not often for younger generations, happiness typically comes to mind, even though the 50s was a time of segregation and racial and gender inequality.

Work Cited

1. “1950s Fashion History: Women’s Clothing.” Vintage Dancer. Vintage Dancer. 13 June 2016. www.vintagedancer.com/1950s/1950s-fashion-history/. 21 October 2019.
2. Baker, Patricia. Fashions of a Decade: The 1950s. Facts on File, Inc., 1991.
3. “Best Books of the Decade: 1950s.” Goodreads, Goodreads, Inc. www.goodreads.com/list/show/22.Best_Books_of_the_Decade_1950_s. 25 October 2019.
4. “Books that Shaped America: 1950-2000.” Library of Congress. www.loc.gov/exhibits/books-that-shaped-america/1950-to-2000.html. 24 October 2019.
5. “Brown v. Board of Education.” History.com. 6 September 2019. www.history.com/topics/black-history/brown-v-board-of-education-of-topeka. 23 October 2019.
6. Capshaw, Ron. “Sputnik Ignited Fear that an Unprotected US Would be Annihilated from Space.” Daily Beast, The Daily Beast Company LLC. 26 November 2017. www.thedailybeast.com/sputnik-ignited-fears-that-an-unprotected-us-would-be-annihilated-from-space?ref=scroll. 24 October 2019.
7. Carlise, Chuck. “The Beat Movement.” Oxford Research Encyclopedias: Literature. https://oxfirdre.com/literature/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190201098.001.0001/acrefore-9780190201098-e-664. 23 October 2019.
8. “Estimates of Illiteracy, By States: 1960.” 12 February 1963. https://www.census.gov/population/socdemo/education/p-23-08.pdf. 27 October 2019.
9. Ginsberg, Allen. “Allen Ginsberg’s Definition of the Beat Generation: From the Poet’s Lecture on how a Generation got its Name.” Literary Hub, Grove Atlantic and Electric Literature. 20 April 2017. https://lithub.com/allen-ginsberg-definition-of-the-beat-generation/. 29 October 2019.
10. “History of Kidney Transplantation.” Renal Medicine Associates, Renal Medicine Associates. https://renalmed.com/history-of-kidney-transplantation/. 27 October 2019.
11. Hussung, Tricia. “The Evolution of the American Family Structure.” Concordia University-Saint Paul, Concordia University, St. Paul. 23 June 2015. https://online.csp.edu/blog/family-science/the-evolution-of-american-faimly-structure. 24 October 2019.
12. Jaynes, Gerald D. “Little Rock Nine.” Encyclopedia Britannica. www.britannica.com/topic/Little-Rock-Nine. 23 October 2019.
13. “Jonas Salk and Albert Bruce Sabin.” Science History Institute. www.sciencehistory.org/historical-profile/jonas-salk-and-albert-bruce-sabin. 22 October 2019.
14. Layman, Richard. “Oral Contraceptives.” American Decades 1950-1959. Detroit: Gale Research Inc., 1994.
15. Reddy, Karina. “1950-1959.” Fashion History Timeline. Fashion Institute of Technology. 11 August 2019. https://fashionhistory.fitnyc.edu/1950-1959/. 21 October 2019.
16. “Rosa Parks: American Civil-Rights Activist.” Encyclopedia Britannica, Encyclopedia Britannica, Inc. www.britannica.com/event/Montgomery-bus-boycott. 24 October 2019.
17. Sack, Harald. “Behold the First Commercial Computer (in the US)- the UNIVAC 1.” SciHi Blog. 14 June 2018. scihi.org/first-commercial-univac/. 22 October 2019.
18. “Sir Christopher Cockrell.” The Telegraph. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/7634774/Sir-Christopher-Cockrell.html. 22 October 2019.
19. “Watson and Crick Discover Chemical Structure of DNA.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, LLC. 28 July 2019. www.history.com/this-day-in-history/Watson-and-Crick-discover-chemical-structure-of-dna. 27 October 2019.

Morality is the yardstick with which we judge our actions to be right or wrong. It is also the code of values to guide man’s choices and actions (Rand, 1957). There are two main views to morality; objective morality and subjective morality (Novella, 2013). Objective morality holds the belief that there are universal set laws that determine the rightness and wrongness of an action or choice while subjective morality believes that there are no set laws and that judgement of right or wrong should be based on circumstances, cultures and traditions. For the purpose of this essay, I will be focusing on objective morality.

Objective morality or objectivism was first expounded by Russian-American novelist, Ayn Rand in her ‘Atlas Shrugged’ (Duignan, 2014). According to the book, the four main pillars of objectivism are reality, reason, self-interest and capitalism. Reason and rationality are synonymous words that depict the rejection of emotions and feelings in order to make accurate moral judgements (Examples of Objectivism, n.d.).

After Rand, different philosophers continued her work and now, there are several degrees of moral objectivism:

1. Moral universalism: this holds that some ethics and values can be related comprehensively to almost everyone in every situation. It considers general truths about man to conclude that ethical judgements are devoid of human opinion.
2. Moral realism: this believes that logic and reason can be used to depict the morality of an action.
3. Moral absolutism: this belief concludes that there are general rules that are inviolable. For example, killing a human for self-defense is still considered a wrong (Moral Objectivism, n.d.).

This theory can be sorted into two ethical groups; deontologism which holds that judgement should be based on the kind of action committed and consequentialism which holds judgment based on consequences to the general public (Moral Objectivism, 2017)

In order to properly explain the qualities of objective morality, the shortcomings of the relativist way of morality will be enunciated.

• A relativist believes that there are no objective truths because of a difference in opinion. They believe that all human opinions are equal and therefore deserve to be respected. This way of thinking is its major flaw. Not all human opinions are equal in rationality or content. For example, Jon believes that 1+1=4 and Beth believes that 1+1=3. Both believe themselves to be right and the other, wrong. But the objective truth remains that 1+1=2. In the same vein, if a fundamental objective truth has been violated, the relativist argument that it is right or wrong based on situations is effectively void.
• Relativists also believe that one’s morality should adjust to society’s traditions and culture. That is, if a particular society condones killing of females at birth and another society frowns upon the practice, depending on the location of the person at the time, he or she can practice killing or not. This is ethically wrong. The murder of an innocent is an objective wrong but relativists do not believe in universals so they can act in such manner. Furthermore, the subjectivism of their morals will definitely be a problem when they have to make ethical decisions.
• Societies exist within societies and as different societies might have different customs, this poses a problem for relativists. For example, a family has the value of not accepting abortions in their household but the government of the country they live in has legalized abortion. The youngest daughter has gotten pregnant and is considering abortion. As a relativist, she is posed with a serious dilemma but as an objectivist, the choice is clear. Abortion is murder of an innocent, therefore it is a wrong (Massey).

There are certain truths that are acceptable wrongs in the objectivist theory: murder of an innocent, intentional harm of another human being, lying or deceiving, the act of cheating, deprivation of another human being’s freedom (Massey).

And there are certain rights according to moral objectivism: keeping of promises and honoring contracts, treatment of people justly because of human dignity, helping other people, especially when the cost is minimal (Massey).

References

1. Duignan, B. (2014, December 10). Objectivism. Retrieved from Encyclopedia Brittanica: https://www.britannica.com/topic/objectivism-philosophy
2. Examples of Objectivism. (n.d.). Retrieved May 8, 2019, from YourDictionary: https://examples.yourdictionary.com/examples-of-objectivism.html
3. Massey, D. (n.d.). Moral Objectivism and Ethical Realtivism. PHI 105: Introduction to Ethics. Iowa, United States of America: Indian Hills Community College.
4. Moral Objectivism. (n.d.). Retrieved May 8, 2019, from Philosophy Index: http://www.philosophy-index.com/ethics/meta-ethics/realism.php
5. Moral Objectivism. (2017). Retrieved from Philosophy Index.
6. Novella, S. (2013, January 11). Objective vs Subjective Morality. Retrieved from NeurologicaBlog: https://theness.com/neurologicablog/index.php/objective-vs-subjective-morality/
7. Rand, A. (1957). Atlas Shrugged. Random House.

What does it mean to do the right thing? Follow three rules: do the right thing, do the best you can, and always show people you care, this a powerful statement of my mother that I will always keep in my mind. Doing the right thing is a beautiful stating point but I am going to define it in a wonderful way according to what different philosophers have stated about it. This essay will express the ideas and statements of three famous philosophers: Jean Paul Sartre, Ayn Rand, and Thomas Hobbes.

Jean Paul Sartre was one of the most important and best philosopher of the twentieth century. His work was focused in a philosophy that has to do with existence, known as existentialism. Existentialism emerged from the slogan that existence leads to essence, meaning that when we remove all preconceptions about what does it mean to be a human, we find ourselves alone in the world.

Sartre’s belief was that people are forced in everything they do, like to choose what they will become in their life or to define themselves by their action that means: “all that is given is that we are, not what we are”. For Sartre everyone in this world have no essence. People exist encounter themselves, grow up in this world, and define themselves afterwards. If we recognize our freedom in every step of our life, or that we are the source of all values, we must also recognize our responsibility in what we do.

We are responsible for everything we do in this world. People have the right to choose, they have their subjectivity so this means that we are completely in control of our existence. Anyhow of what is right or what is wrong, what is good or what is bad and anyhow if these are absolutes or not, things are always as people decide them to be. So what happens, happens and humans are absolutely responsible for what it does. Sartre famous saying “We do not know what we want and yet we are responsible for what we are – that is the fact” shows us that he really was a humanist who wanted us to break free of our self-fastened fetters and attain our potential. He wanted people to acknowledge their freedom, not to be restricted by the popular definition of their reality and to live life as they wanted to live it.

And in spite of people uncovering several imperfection in the way he presented his ideals, his ideals themselves are certainly worth considering.

Ayn Rand was one of the most successful novelist of the twentieth century. She became well-known for her philosophy she called ‘Objectivism’. Rand said that everybody is a being of self- made soul. She believed that humans are not born in sin or with ruinous desires; nor do they necessarily acquire them in the course of growing to maturity. Instead humans are born morally but through different choices and actions one acquire one’s character traits and habits. Fundamentally, humans live in reason. According to Rand’s views, clarified in her work ‘Atlas Shrugged’, capacity for reason is what enables us to pull through and flourish. We are not born knowing what is good for us but we learn it throughout our life, as we grow up and understand what is the right thing to do and what is the bad thing we should not do. We learn how to achieve something that is good for us, so this is something we learn throughout our life. Rand also believed that by the use of reason we take into account all of the factors people can identify, we also estimate the consequences of actions, and then we adopt principled policies of action. These principled policies are otherwise called virtues. Virtue is a moral excellence, is a quality that has to be morally great and is valued as a base of principle great moral being (Rand, Ayn. ‘Atlas Shrugged’. Random House,1957).

Like Sartre, Rand also believed that people have their own life and they are responsible for sustaining and strengthening. It is up to them to determine what values their lives require, how best to achieve those values and for sure everybody should try and act to achieve those values. What she else stated was that leaving humans to pursue their own interests implies in turn that only a capitalist or free market economic system is moral. Free individuals will use their money, time and will interact with others just for mutual advantage.

Thomas Hobbes was an English philosopher best known for his political thoughts. One of his main concerns was about how can people live together in peace avoiding the threat and panic of conflicts. Hobbes developed a conception that it is natural and rational for people to give up some liberty in order to gain security for themselves or self preservation. This condition where people give up some individual liberty for some common security is called “the Social Contract”. Hobbes defines this contract as “Enforced Cooperation’ otherwise ”the mutual transferring of right’.

“The Social Contract” is an agreement by which individuals decide to cooperate with each other just because they know they will have a long term self-interest. Hobbes believed that actions and what we do in this world are preferable. He stated that all individuals are naturally equal and that every person is free to do what he/she need to do to live and get through. He believed that what people should do, depends on the situation in which they find themselves. So where political authority is lacking, the elementary right for everyone is to save their life, and where political philosophy exist, the duty of people is to follow those in power.

Hobbes theory was that, morality is not a permanent feature of the nature of things, but it is just a conception of the social contract. Notions of right and wrong, justice and fairness are worthless. Shortly Hobbes theory is based on the pre-political state of nature for people, and this is a condition of mutual conflict that contains no objective moral values. Hobbes also believed that we achieve peace by cooperating with each other, so mutually agreeing to give up our rights to harm one another. And to ensure conformity, people create governments that punish those people who break the rules. As we can see Hobbes is a moral skeptic as he states that moral principles have no objective foundation independent of human society (Godwin, Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793), 3.2).

Conclusion

So, as we can see our three most outstanding philosophers of the twentieth century have stated that doing the right thing refer to how to live ethically and we are totally guilty for what happens in the world. Otherwise doing the right thing according to philosophers means to make a choice amidst possibilities in favor of something the cooperative wisdom of humanity knows to be the way to act. To conclude every single word , my personal opinion would be that, kindness is doing the right thing , for the right reason, at the right time, rooted in love, respect and peace.

References

1. Alexvermeer.com (1986). Machine Intelligence Research Institute.
2. Rand, Ayn. Atlas Shrugged. Random House, (1957).
3. Godwin, Enquiry Concerning Political Justice (1793), 3.2.

All along he knew that his family was taking advantage of him, but felt responsible to help them, thus employing self-sacrifice. He did so once again with his affair with Dagny. He knew that he should divorce his wife, but he chose to let her determine the future of their relationship and complied with her decision, which was against his objective perspective. He went against his judgment and allowed himself to be exploited. This breach of integrity however is observed only in his personal life. He did not allow his professional opinion or business decisions be influenced by the looters and once he realized his mistake, he took responsibility for it and took the needed actions to successfully reinstate his integrity.

Another case of a breach of integrity can be observed in Robert Stadler. He is not a bad person, he values knowledge and science, just like the protagonists. He had a close relationship with Galt and shared most of his views. However, he chose the wrong battle. The fought to save the institute in order to keep science alive and he did do it following his own interest, as he is the head of the institute. So far so good. But his mistake was choosing to remain ignorant when he saw the fault of the government. He thought that having political connections would help him develop science and bring knowledge. Like Dagny, he knew that Rearden Metal was the best performing material on the market; he knew that it was safe and more durable, but he chose to ignore the truth. In attempt to preserve knowledge for society, he betrayed it. He succumbed to the threats of the looters and accepted the fake reality that he was being fed, disregarding his own consciousness and objectivity. He repeated his mistake once again, when he signed off on Project X against his better judgement.

He later realized that the government exploited him and wished to leave, but as a result of these breaches of integrity he was left with no place in the world. He was half a striker and half a looter, not both, but neither, and he knew it. He shared the values of the strikers, he wanted to be loyal to knowledge and help society. He wanted to be productive and to create, hoping that by complying with the governmental pressure would help ease the oppression of the thinkers by advancing science. But in betraying his integrity, he lost the trust of the people who could make a difference, leaving him with no place in either world.

The difference between Stadler and Rearden, was that Hank never compromised his professional integrity. He refused to sell to the looters and fought against the exploitation of the mind and even went to trial defending his judgement and decision. He refused to succumb to pressure even if it meant to risk going to prison and losing his metal. Even if he strayed from the virtue of integrity, he fought and stood behind his moral principles.

A modern businessperson could learn a lot about the importance of integrity by observing all of these characters and a good businessperson already knows the lessons which they teach. Having integrity as a leader, means being guided by your own judgement and knowledge, which makes you trustworthy and permanently successful. If you know that someone acts with integrity, you know that they will do what is best for the business and by extension the people. They will gain more customers, more contractors, and more professional employees (Williams). As we can see in Atlas Shrugged the people with integrity like Wyatt, Dagny, Hank, Francisco, etc., choose to follow Galt instead of trying to survive in the corrupt world of Mr. Thompson, James Taggert, Mouch and the other looters. Integrity inspires trust between a leader and a follower, an employer and an employee, a company and its customers. And trust is the foundation over which a relationship is built. When there is trust, employees know that the employer has good intentions and are more inclined to be dedicated and productive.

An example of a leader, who practices integrity is Elon Musk. On many occasions he has made decisions, which have been criticized by the public and media. However, he has always stood behind those decisions and followed his own knowledge and judgement, and this has made him one of the most successful men in the world. He advocates for thinking rather than blindly following process and another quote from him states: “Other advice I would give is to not blindly follow trends. Question and challenge the status quo. Make sure you understand the fundamental principles of what you’re trying to do before you get into the details, otherwise you could be building on faulty ground” (Elon Musk Leadership). This is a quote directly interconnected with Rand’s definition of integrity.

In his book Winners Never Cheat, Jon Huntsman writes – “There are no moral shortcuts in the game of business or life. There are, basically, three kinds of people, the unsuccessful, the temporarily successful, and those who become and remain successful. The difference is character” (Tracy). Atlas Shrugged confirms this. The unsuccessful, are those who do not even try to be successful. The temporarily successful are those like Jim Taggart, who choose corruption and people pleasing over ethics. Who become successful at the expense of their integrity, but once this becomes evident, their glory days are cut short. And those who become and remain successful are the thinkers – the Dagny Taggarts and the John Galts. The strikers, who live by their own judgement, who follow their own moral codes, who remain loyal to knowledge, and have the courage to stand up for themselves and take responsibility for their decisions. Those who perceive reality and refuse to comply with the false notions of society. Those with integrity.

Integrity is one of the main identified and extensively defined virtues in Atlas Shrugged, along with rationality, honesty, independence, productiveness, justice, and pride. It is a fundamental quality that any person should acquire and develop, regardless of their field of work. However, when it comes to business and leadership, integrity is essential if you want to ensure success. In Atlas Shrugged, we can observe many situations in which the main protagonists have maintained their integrity. We can also identify cases in which, some of them have failed to do so and the effect it has had on them and we also have a fair share of characters, which had no integrity to begin with, which is why this book provides an interesting learning opportunity. As readers we get to see the thought processes of the characters, their decisions, and the consequences of their actions, both positive and negative, enabling us to extract valuable lessons about the relationship between business and ethics, which we can apply to our own lives and practices. And integrity, is a virtue, which can be easy to overlook for businesspeople, as it requires the courage to choose the more difficult path and stand by it. But as we see in Atlas Shrugged it is also a virtue, which predetermines success.

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, integrity means “firm adherence to a code of especially moral or artistic values,” but in her philosophy Ayn Rand broadens the definition by including that you must act in accordance with your own moral values, derived by your own rationality and objectivity. It means “loyalty to one’s knowledge” (Becker 157). The truth should be held at the highest esteem and that which is unreal should be disregarded. This includes being impervious to social opinions, convictions, or pressures, as you cannot fake your own consciousness or reality. A person should not sacrifice himself for the desires of others but fight for his own goals and achievements. To understand this notion, it is important to define what sacrifice is. Helping others is not a sacrifice, as when you choose to help the ones you love, you do so because of your own values, which is the essence of integrity. However, helping others because you are pressured into feeling responsible for those who have less is sacrifice, as you act in accordance with social pressure to share what you have earned yourself.

The most vivid example of integrity can be observed in the face of John Galt. He is the first character, who realizes the threats of a society governed by looters and decides to stand up for his moral values. When the reform of Twentieth Century Motor Company starts, he concludes that the only way to stop the exploitation of those who think and create is to show society what the world without them would look like, or as he calls it – “to stop the motor of the world.” Ever since this realization, he has been fighting to achieve this goal, driving the story from behind the curtain. He managed to convince all thinkers to stand alongside him and strike and this is where it gets tricky. As integrity means acting based on your own rationality and morality, some might argue that those who joined the strike, betrayed their integrity, because they let themselves be influenced by someone else. However, that would be a false inference, because Galt does not recruit thinkers randomly. He observes them and waits until they are ready, until they have seen the practical reality and come to the same realization on their own. That is the moment, when he approaches and as they agree to join the strike, he makes them swear to serve themselves and no other, thus maintaining both theirs and his own integrity.

Galt is the embodiment of all seven fundamental virtues. He acts rationally, seeks truth and justice throughout the entire book and refuses to be guided by emotion for the expense of reason, even when the truth is unpleasant. An example of that is his relationship with Dagny. Although he loves her, he knew that she wasn’t ready to leave the world she knows and join the strike, so he let her go and waited. If he had made her stay or let her return before she was ready, he would have compromised the integrity of the strike and of himself, as Dagny is not yet a supporter. If he had compromised his integrity, the strikers wouldn’t have the same faith and trust in him. As a leader he has to set an example and honor his commitment to the cause, which brings about a clear focus for those who follow him and more efficient results. Like in this case the strikers follow Galt because they trust him and his judgement and admire his achievements.