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Ayn Rand on Sex, Love and Relationships
Posted by Jeremy Soul in Mindsets, Relationships
Powerful conclusions for dating and seduction
I’ve learnt a lot from reading Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I highly recommend it for everyone. It reinforced the way I feel about a lot of things, and explained things that I felt deeply but never really had the ability to explain.
Here are some of my favourite quotes and why they are relevant to sex, love and relationships.
Why you should never lie to the women in your life:
People think that a liar gains a victory over his victim. What I’ve learned is that a lie is an act of self-abdication, because one surrenders one’s reality to the person to whom one lies, making that person one’s master, condemning oneself from then on to faking the sort of reality that person’s view requires to be faked. And if one gains the immediate purpose of the lie – the price one pays is the destruction of that which the gain was intended to serve. The man who lies to the world, is the world’s slave from then on.
Why, if you’re a woman, you should never let others make you feel like a slut because you slept with a man you were attracted to:
Did I feel a physical desire for him ? I did. Was I moved by the passion of my body? I was. Have I experienced the most violent form of sensual pleasure? I have. If this now makes me a disgraced woman in your eyes – let your estimate be your own concern. I will stand on mine.
Why you should never “settle” for a relationship that you or her are not truly happy in:
It’s your acceptance of this place that I want. What good would it do me, to have your physical presence without any meaning? That’s the kind of faked reality by which most people cheat themselves of their lives. I’m not capable of it.
Why sex with a high quality woman will always be more enjoyable and better than that which is less meaningful:
Love is blind, they say; sex is impervious to reason and mocks the power of all philosophies. But, in fact, a man’s sexual choice is the result and sum of his fundamental convictions. Tell me what a man finds sexually attractive and I will tell you his entire philosophy of life. Show me the woman he sleeps with and I will tell you about his valuation of himself. No matter what corruption he’s taught about the virtue of selfishness, sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which he cannot perform for any motive but his own enjoyment – just try to think of performing it in a spirit of selfless charity! – an act which is not possible in self-abasement , only in self-exaltation, only in the confidence of being desired and being worthy of desire. It is an act that forces him to stand naked in spirit, as well as in body, and to accept his real ego as his standard of value. He will always be attracted to the woman who reflects his deepest vision of himself, the woman whose surrender permits him to experience – or to fake – a sense of self-esteem. The man who is proudly certain of his own value, will want the highest type of woman he can find, the woman he admires, the strongest, the hardest to conquer – because only the possession of a heroine will give him the sense of an achievement, not the possession of a brainless slut.
Soul
Interesting post yet I find it quite contradictory.
I really liked the first part in which you explain why a woman never should feel a slut only because she slept with a man she felt attracted to. I think that women have a right to enjoy sex as men, break out of the current social conditioning and – if they want to – have the same right to sleep around as guys have. In that sense I found the viewpoints in your post quite modern.
But then, in the last article it looks as if you completely fall back into old “machist” thoughrpatterns when you state that the highest-quality woman are the hardest to conquer and always give more satisfaction than a “brainless slut”. Isnt this just the old social conditioning, where difficult to conquer = high quality girl and fast to conquer = slut? Yes, I agree that we should strive for a high-quality, interesting girl with whom you can share a conversation and interesting experiences but this is absolutely not related to whether she will have sex with me sooner or later…
Love your posts, always interesting and inspiring even though I might disagree…
Cheers,
Fede
They are not my words man, but quoted from Ayn Rand. I would have suggested raising your criticism with her, alas she is now buried within the grounds of the Earth.
Fede i think you’re misunderstanding.
having sex with someone you are attracted to should be based on self esteem… not on whim alone
Ayn didnt believe in promiscuity
I have a couple points in response to the first comment.
First, the double standard with regard to men sleeping around vs. women sleeping around is logical. For a man to have sex with a woman, the vast majority of the time it takes effort, and it’s a game he must win. For a woman to have sex with a man, she simply has to say “Yes” (or not say “no”). Therefore, when a woman sleeps around, it’s viewed as a lack of self-discipline, whereas when a man sleeps around, it’s viewed as an accomplishment. In general, I have to agree with this view. Of course there are always exceptions.
Second, I don’t believe a woman who sleeps around is necessarily a slut. It depends on her motives for doing so, and the types of partners she has. If she sleeps around with many men to whom she is not attracted, and who are not good, strong men, as an attempt to affirm her sense of self-worth, which she constantly doubts, then this woman is a slut by every definition. However, if a woman sleeps around, but all of the men are intelligent, attractive, powerful men to whom she is attracted, and she seduces them as a means to her own physical and emotional pleasure, then I would not call this woman a slut.
That is all.
You deliberately took the part about a “woman should not feel like a slut…” of of context in order to fit your or make your point. Dagny said that in response to her being called out for sleeping with Hank Rearden by his wife. She was not ashamed of the affair because there was nothing to be ashamed of. Their relationship was mutual, consensual and shared between two people who admired and valued one another. It was because she just aimlessly was attracted to some guy and slept with him one day.
This was deliberate on your part and you should be ashamed of yourself for deceiving readers of this website. This is why Ayn Rand gets a bad rap…because of people like you who take misrepresent her writing s and philosophy. Thanks.
*wasnt aimlessly attracted…