Thursday, October 29, 2009

Again With This Degenerate

Back in 1961 Gore Vidal typed a review of Ayn Rand's For the New Intellectual. The review was published in Esquire Magazine, which has made it available online. Vidal's main complaint against Rand (and this guy is chock-full of complaints) is her rejection of Christian ethics and defense of rational self-interest. As he rattles on,

To reject that Christ is to embark on dangerous waters indeed. For to justify and extol human greed and egotism is to my mind not only immoral, but evil... Ayn Rand’s “philosophy” is nearly perfect in its immorality, which makes the size of her audience all the more ominous and symptomatic as we enter a curious new phase in our society.
Well, well, he has really set me straight on how to practice the golden rule. Certainly, I can take Vidal at his word. He knows what's right and what's wrong. Clearly, we have here a man who considers himself above the herd. A herd in desperate need of Gore Vidal's moral acuity and judgment.

On the matter of Rand's popularity, the 84 year old Vidal must be concerned about the renewed interest in Rand and her works. While his books appeal to a small segment of readers, Rand's decades old novels continue to sell in record numbers.

Still America's moral arbiter presses on. In an interview posted today on The Atlantic's website, Vidal again demonstrates why he is the literary Left's moral compass. Upon being asked to comment on the arrest of Roman Polanski for raping a 13 year old girl, Vidal replied thus:
I really don’t give a fuck. Look, am I going to sit and weep every time a young hooker feels as though she’s been taken advantage of?...The media can’t get anything straight. Plus, there’s usually an anti-Semitic and anti-fag thing going on with the press – lots of crazy things. The idea that this girl was in her communion dress, a little angel all in white, being raped by this awful Jew, Polacko – that’s what people were calling him – well, the story is totally different now from what it was then.
Okay, thanks for the moral clarity Gore. Thanks for sharing your moral sewer where 13 year old girls not wearing communion dresses are "asking for it." Gore continues his unhinged rant by stating that Polanski was targeted for prosecution for not subscribing to American values such as "lying and cheating." It's difficult to know which is sadder, Vidal or the liberal media and intelligentsia's ("American literary and cultural icon") patronizing of such a repulsive creature.

Crossposted at The Dougout

3 comments:

revereridesagain said...

Gore Vidal genuinely earns the description, "too mean to die". In fact it is getting so the only people more repellent than Polanski are his "defenders". Vidal is a bitter, hypocritical, obscene little perv who would make half the villains in Rand's novels cringe.

Of course, I suppose he only goes after 13-year-old boys, so what would he know about it.

Pastorius said...

It is highlarious to read Gore espousing Christian morals.

He's made a career out of being an agitator. ..

and that's the whole of it.

Epaminondas said...

What a completely lost, whacked out response.

He embarrassed his own, self propagated, intellectual elitist persona.

Buckley had him right.

Debating during the 1968 conventions ..

Vidal called Buckley a "pro-crypto-Nazi," a modest slip of the tongue, he later said, because he was searching for the word "fascist" and it just didn't come out. Inflamed by the word "Nazi" and the whole tenor of the discussion, Buckley snapped back: "Now listen, you queer," he said, "stop calling me a crypto-Nazi or I’ll sock you in you goddamn face and you’ll stay plastered."

He is sliming squirrel with no solid sense of value, 'queer' or not, he needed to get and stay plastered.