McSweeney's Account of His Little Daughter's Randian Objectivism

One of my middle kids is perfecting the art of going to the bathroom in the bathroom, and when he does we're using standard Pavlovian techniques of rewarding him with a gummy bear for each success. Another of my younger kids saw the gummy bears and wanted one, and I told him nope, and then explained to all the kids that you only get what you earn in life and nothing more. It is a rough lesson in this 'everyone gets a prize' world, but it is an important lesson if I want my children to be a positive for society. Sometimes I think I'm going a little too far with the raising of my kids, talking to them like that and reading them the Bible weekly and stuff, but then over at Pundit & Pundette I read a similar account from Timothy McSweeney. I suggest you read the whole post, but here are my favorite parts:

When little Aiden toddled up our daughter Johanna and asked to play with her Elmo ball, he was, admittedly, very sweet and polite. I think his exact words were, "Have a ball, peas [sic]?" And I'm sure you were very proud of him for using his manners.

To be sure, I was equally proud when Johanna yelled, "No! Looter!" right in his looter face, and then only marginally less proud when she sort of shoved him. The thing is, in this family we take the philosophies of Ayn Rand seriously. We conspicuously reward ourselves for our own hard work, we never give to charity, and we only pay our taxes very, very begrudgingly.

Since the day Johanna was born, we've worked to indoctrinate her into the truth of Objectivism. Every night we read to her from the illustrated, unabridged edition of Atlas Shrugged—glossing over all the hardcore sex parts, mind you, but dwelling pretty thoroughly on the stuff about being proud of what you've earned and not letting James Taggart-types bring you down. For a long time we were convinced that our efforts to free her mind were for naught, but recently, as we've started socializing her a little bit, we've been delighted to find that she is completely antipathetic to the concept of sharing. As parents, we couldn't have asked for a better daughter.

That's why, when Johanna then began berating your son, accusing him of trying to coerce from her a moral sanction of his theft of the fruit of her labor, in as many words, I kind of egged her on. Even when Aiden started crying.

You see, that Elmo ball was Johanna's reward for consistently using the potty this past week. She wasn't given the ball simply because she'd demonstrated an exceptional need for it—she earned it. And from the way Aiden's pants sagged as he tried in vain to run away from our daughter, it was clear that he wasn't anywhere close to deserving that kind of remuneration. By so much as allowing Johanna to share her toy with him, we'd be undermining her appreciation of one of life's most important lessons: You should never feel guilty about your abilities. Including your ability to repeatedly peg a fellow toddler with your Elmo ball as he sobs for mercy.

Look, imagine what would happen if we were to enact some sort of potty training Equalization of Opportunity Act in which we regularized the distribution all of Johanna's and Aiden's potty chart stickers. Suddenly it would seem as if Aiden had earned the right to wear big-boy underpants, and within minutes you'd have a Taggart Tunnel-esque catastrophe on your hands, if you follow me.

Johanna shouldn't be burdened with supplying playthings for every bed-wetting moocher she happens to meet. If you saw Johanna, her knees buckling, her arms trembling but still trying to hold aloft the collective weight of an entire Tot Lot's worth of Elmo balls with the last of her strength, what would you tell her to do?

UPDATE: Some people are saying that the above story is a joke. As in 'it's funny to even imagine someone trying to teach their children any values other than liberalism/socialism.' As in 'for someone to do this is hilarious, but for every day in schools around the nation to indoctrinate every child with liberal values and beliefs is totally okay.' Sad, how some in our society are okay with indoctrination and messing with people's minds and values (largely against the wishes of the parents), while they are totally unaccepting of parents teaching children different values and beliefs. Your opinion of the above post only proves whether you are a joker or not.

UPDATE II: You leftist morons who continue to link to this post to mock me are still missing the point. This particular story from McSweeney may have been a satire, but what makes the satire so funny and interesting is how close to the truth it strikes. Look through the archives of my blog and you can find dozens of true experiences documenting further attempts by the left that I've personally seen and wrote about- that's the point of this blog, that liberals have used the school systems to pollute the minds of children and indoctrinate them to become liberals. It is scary that I'm a radical conservative maverick in my school because I teach kids to love liberty and freedom, to respect property rights and law, and to love and enjoy life- and it is scary that many liberals want me to not teach children any more because of those values.