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Comment by exelius | Hacker News Reader

I'm not saying I agree with them, but a common theme I hear from the alt-right is "no gods no masters" (Game of Thrones reference, ding on the pop-culture). Now, nevermind that these guys are setting up as many gatekeeping functions as they tear down; they simply justify it as "protecting real hard-working Americans" through xenophobia.

It's all built on the false nationalism of a flagging superpower, and if any of these people traveled in the least they would see that other countries are actually doing a lot of things better than we do here. We got arrogant, our politicians got greedy, and our voter base got complacent. It's only going to get worse too.

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I actually highly doubt that. Most of the "research" done by these people, or those that they rely on, are papers published by think tanks and institutions funded with money from conservative billionaires (e.g. Koch brothers). They essentially live in a different system, one where the person who commits to certain principles most feverishly is considered better. This is not unlike what we have seen in other ultra-religious groups throughout history (e.g. Spanish Inquisition: "You're not Christian enough, so we're gonna kill you").

There was an op-ed published by Krugman yesterday which argued that tax cuts wouldn't really benefit the wealthy all that much since they have already so much, but cutting benefits really impact society's most vulnerable. But Republicans continue to push for tax cuts. Why? Because they live in that alternate universe.

> "no gods no masters" (Game of Thrones reference, ding on the pop-culture)

that's not a game of thrones reference as far as I can tell. It's an old anarchist and socialist slogan. It'd be an odd fit for that part of the right. "No gods or kings, only man" is a Bioshock reference that pops up sometimes in those parts.

> "No gods or kings, only man" is a Bioshock reference that pops up sometimes in those parts.

Which in turn uses Ayn Rand's philosophy (Objectivism) as the basis of the fictional (failed) society in Bioshock.

(Compare with this quote: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/207108-at-first-man-was-ens... )

Ayn Rand and her philosophy are quite popular in right-wing circles (and incidentally, largely denounced in academic circles).

> and incidentally, largely denounced in academic circles

Not surprising. A tenured professor getting government grants for research is a villain by Randian standards.

It has been many years since I read the books, but I'm pretty sure university intellectuals were actual villains in Atlas Shrugged. IIRC didn't they say that more testing was needed before they could count the new supermetal as safe?

I remember thinking at the time that the hero was being really reckless and that advanced composites often fail in new and unexpected ways and that building an entire rail line out of the stuff before you understand how it fails is beyond risky. Of course because it was a book the metal is perfect in every way and never has a problem, but the real world is rarely so forgiving.

BB&T, through its "BB&T Charitable Foundation", spent a lot of money injecting Ayn Rand into college curricula:

https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2015/10/16/new-paper-det...

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=9010409...

Where are you hearing this? Many of them are literal monarchists.

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