The Chorus is a new French film recently released on DVD with English subtitles. It tells the inspiring story of an unsuccessful composer, Clé¥nt Mathieu, who takes a job as a supervisor in a reform school for delinquent minors. When Mathieu realizes that the boys can sing derisive ditties, he organizes a chorus and uses his music to rehabilitate the boys’ troubled souls.
Mathieu’s nemesis is the headmaster Rachin, a sadistic disciplinarian who cynically dismisses the evident impact of Mathieu’s chorus on the boys, but uses it to push for his own promotion. Rachin does not hesitate to admit a sociopathic teenager to his school in order to oblige a well-connected psychiatrist interested in conducting a “test case.”
The contrast between the attitudes of Mathieu and Rachin toward the boys extends into their overall attitudes toward life. While Rachin grumbles that he never wanted to end up heading a reform school, Mathieu finds a new life for himself as the head of the chorus.
Sometime, a negative review can capture the essence of a movie with surprising accuracy. A review on Filmcritic.com describes The Chorus as: “An embarrassingly mushy story of an ordinary guy’s yeoman efforts to change the world.” Indeed, it is, and he does change the lives of the boys, one of whom goes on to become a world-renowned conductor.
The Chorus was nominated for the categories of Foreign Language Film and Music at this year’s Academy Award.
Category: The Atlasphere
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Retail Clothing Entrepreneur Steve Shore
From a recent article in Newsday about business partners Steve Shore and Barry Prevor:
Summer 1979: Two teenage boys stand on top of a van at the Roosevelt Raceway flea market, shouting into a megaphone. They exhort customers to buy the $1 T-shirts spread out on a tarp at the foot of the van. A crowd gathers, snapping up the bargain T’s.
June 2005: Forty-somethings Steve Shore and Barry Prevor stand in the middle of their Broadway Mall store, Steve & Barry’s University Sportswear. Instead of megaphones, they advertise with graphic blue and yellow signs. Instead of tarps, the selling floor is laid with wood. Their T-shirts are now $8.
In the past 26 years, these childhood friends have quietly built a national mini-empire of stores that deliver basic clothing at what they call “ridiculous” prices. Nothing in the chain’s 70 stores costs more than $10 – from women’s boot-cut jeans to kids’ shorts to heavyweight hoodie sweatshirts emblazoned with a Top 10 college name.
The Port Washington-based company is relatively unknown here in its own backyard. That’s largely a function of strategy: Prevor and Shore keep costs down by finding very inexpensive real estate, often in second- and third-tier malls around the country. Their growth has been concentrated in Midwestern and Southern states.
But now Steve & Barry’s sits on the cusp of explosive growth, with a just-signed lease for its first Manhattan location and plans to double the number of stores over the next year. And they’re not shy about saying they’re creating a revolution in retail, thanks to a formula of rock-bottom prices and smart-looking shops.
The article continues:
Early on, they established a price ceiling of $10 and a reputation as “the good guys,” especially for budget-conscious consumers. For Shore, in particular, this is a deeply felt mission.
He leans forward, eyes shining with intensity as he discusses the company’s pricing policy. “Our slogan can’t be ‘We won’t screw you,’ because that just can’t be a slogan. But they [customers] know they can come to us and not be taken advantage of.”
Still, he and Prevor bristle at the notion that their prices spring from some sense of charity or altruism.
“I’m an Ayn Rand fan, and I don’t like the word ‘altruistic,'” Prevor said. “It’s more that we understand that our self-interest is tied in with our customers’ self-interest.”
Prevor and Shore clam up when the subject turns specifically to their self-interest. After a whispered conference, they offer a tidbit: Sales are in the nine figures, somewhere between $100 million and $1 billion.
But they won’t reveal their annual profits or profit margins. (As a private company, they’re not required to disclose that information.) They simply say they’re doing very well, thanks for asking.
See the full article for more information.
Ayn Rand Analyzed at Theory of Constraints Conf
From Atlasphere member Michael Round:
The Theory of Constraints for Education will have its 8th International Conference in Seattle, Washington, USA, August 11 – August 14.
The Theory of Constraints, made popular in industry by way of the novel The Goal, is an improvement philosophy based on simple yet powerful thinking processes Socratically derived in a non-contradictory manner.
The Theory of Constraints for Education applies these thinking processes to develop clarity and conceptual understanding in the student.
2004 TOCFE Virtual Conference presentations included a logical analysis of Francisco’s “Moral Meaning of Money” speech, in addition to an analysis of Anthem and Jonathan Livingston Seagull.
Michael Round
USA Director
Theory of Constraints for Education
Ayn Rand Fan Rep. Christopher Cox to head SEC
According to several news stories (Reuters, Fox News, CNN), President Bush has named U.S. Rep. Christopher Cox as the White House’s choice to head the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The choice will need approval of the U.S. Senate.
Rep. Cox wrote a favorable review of The Letters of Ayn Rand for the New York Times Book Review and is widely recognized as a strong advocate of free markets, limited government, and lower taxes. A U.S. House Republican from California since 1998, Rep. Cox has a JD/MBA from Harvard.
Celebrity Rand Fan: 'Shogun' Author James Clavell
Atlasphere member Marsha Enright sent the following note after perusing the new Ayn Rand Library auction:
I noticed that she had a book by James Clavell, Noble House! For those who don’t know him, he wrote Shogun, Taipan and a number of other wonderful historical novels. From his second novel, businessmen are depicted as adventurous, amazing heroes [e.g., see his novels Taipan, Noble House, Whirlwinds]. I always wondered if he was influenced by Rand, and his inscription to her in the book he sent her proves that!
According to the item description, Clavell inscribed the following in Ayn Rand’s copy of Noble House:
This is for Ayn Rand
–one of the real, true talents on this earth for which many, many thanks
James C
New York
2 Sept 81
Ayn Rand Matters to Ethicist Elaine Sternberg
In honor of Rand’s Centennary, Elaine Sternberg, a research fellow at the University of Leeds (U.K.), delivered an address titled “Why Ayn Rand Matters: Metaphysics, Morals and Liberty” to the Adam Smith Institute. An adapted version of Dr. Sternberg’s address is posted on the Adam Smith Institute‘s weblog, The Social Affairs Unit. With quotes from Atlas Shrugged and The Virtue of Selfishenss, Sternberg’s address is a remarkable tribute to Rand’s groundbreaking achievements in the realms of metaphysics, ethics, and politics.
Anticipating the academic preconceptions about Rand, Sternberg begins her address with an apt statement:
“Ayn Rand deserves to be taken seriously, because she was right about three things of immense importance: metaphysics, morals and individual liberty.”
The address concludes with a compact but thorough summary of Rand’s achievements:
Challenging most philosophers since Aristotle, she outlined a comprehensive, realist metaphysics. And challenging both philosophical and conventional ethics, she presented strong arguments against altruism in its various forms, and in favour of a realist morality based on happiness and rational self-interest. Finally, in drawing out the implications of her realist philosophy, and demonstrating the proper relations between morality and freedom, she provided an extremely robust defense of both individual liberty and laissez-faire capitalism.
To read the entire address, check The Social Affairs Unit.
New Auction: The Library of Ayn Rand
Via member Michael Montagna:
On June 28, 2005, tony West Coast auction house Bonhams & Butterfields will hold an auction of The Library of Ayn Rand in San Francisco and Los Angeles, possibly also NY. Materials include items from Rand’s personal library, many with her own marginalia, as well as signed first editions of Rand’s own books, signed documents, photographs and other Randabilia. This is the most important Rand auction since Butterfield’s 1998 auction of “The Papers of Ayn Rand”. The inventory for this auction appears on bonhams web site and goes from lot # 3129 to #3200. Please let collectors and admirers know about this.
Surviving a Crisis by Thinking for Yourself
The new article “Question Authorities” at Wired Magazine raises some interesting points, not the least of which is the value of thinking for oneself:
For more than four years – steadily, seriously, and with the unsentimental rigor for which we love them – civil engineers have been studying the destruction of the World Trade Center towers, sifting the tragedy for its lessons. And it turns out that one of the lessons is: Disobey authority. In a connected world, ordinary people often have access to better information than officials do.
Proof can be found in the 298-page draft report issued in April by the National Institute on Standards and Technology called Occupant Behavior, Egress, and Emergency Communications. (In layman’s terms, that’s who got out of the buildings, how they got out, and why.) It’s an eloquent document, in many ways. The report confirms a chilling fact that was widely covered in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. After both buildings were burning, many calls to 911 resulted in advice to stay put and wait for rescue. Also, occupants of the towers had been trained to use the stairs, not the elevators, in case of evacuation.
Fortunately, this advice was mostly ignored. According to the engineers, use of elevators in the early phase of the evacuation, along with the decision to not stay put, saved roughly 2,500 lives. This disobedience had nothing to do with panic. The report documents how evacuees stopped to help the injured and assist the mobility-impaired, even to give emotional comfort. Not panic but what disaster experts call reasoned flight ruled the day.
Keep reading for more info. Found via InstaPundit, who also has additional thoughts of his own worth reading.
New Zealanders Come to Shania Twain's Defense
From a press release by the New Zealand Libertarianz:
RMA Surely Don’t Impress Shania Much
“Shania Twain’s proposed home doesn’t impress Queenstown’s busybodies, but their personal views should not be the business of law,” says Libertarianz spokesman to deregulate the environment, Peter Cresswell. “Unfortunately the RMA has given them that power. It doesn’t say to property owners ‘Come on Over,’ instead it screams ‘I’m Gonna Getcha Good’!”
“The Resource Management Act (RMA) has given unelected power to busybodies who now consider they have rights over other people’s property,” says Cresswell. “It seems nothing will allow Twain’s house past Andrew Henderson, the planning stickybeak from CivicCorp who rejected the application and Julian Haworth, head busybody from the Upper Clutha Environmental Society, who between them have decided that ‘the complex would not be in harmony with the surrounding landscape,’ and ‘man-made mounds to screen the house’ were ‘not appropriate.'”
“I guess even a camouflage net wouldn’t have satisfied these meddling arseholes,” says Cresswell. “Remind me again how the RMA is “permissive” as Owen McShane has called it, and “far-sighted environmental legislation” as Nick Smith has described it. The RMA is neither,” says Cresswell. “It has destroyed property rights in this country, and it is time that the RMA itself were now destroyed.”
As author Ayn Rand once observed, when the productive have to ask permission from the unproductive in order to produce, then you may know your culture is doomed. “Time to put a stake through the heart of the RMA,” concludes Cresswell.
The Libertarianz advocate abolition of the RMA, replacing it with common law protection of property rights and the environment.
Ed Hudgins Reviews Revenge of the Sith
In an e-mail op-ed for the Objectivist Center, Ed Hudgins provides this review of the new Revenge of the Sith movie. I’ve not seen the movie, but the review makes some interesting points.
With Revenge of the Sith George Lucas faced the same problem as did the classical Greek playwrights. Their audiences already knew the stories and myths on which their dramas were based. Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides had to make their plays interesting, enlightening or instructive, usually by offering lessons about hubris, unchecked emotions or moral failing.
While the Greeks were not keen on happy endings, Lucas has already given one with the first Star Wars trilogy and we know what to expect in the prequels. We know that Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker becomes Darth Vader, apprentice to the evil emperor; that Vader’s son Luke joins the rebellion; that the Empire is overthrown by pro-Republic heroes; that Vader saves Luke from the emperor, abandons the Dark Side of the Force, and before dying, is redeemed.
To make the prequels interesting Lucas offers us political and moral lessons, but with mixed results.
In Sith Lucas continues the story of the fall of the Republic. Chancellor Palpatine — secretly the evil Sith Lord Darth Sidious — accumulates power in the name of fighting a long war against separatists — a war that he himself is secretly behind. Curiously, we are told that the Senate of the Republic is corrupt and in the text crawl that starts every Star Wars film we’re told that in the war “There are heroes on both sides.” Lucas seems to be backing away from the clear-cut black-and-white, good-vs.-evil themes that so characterized the original trilogy. As he obscures that distinction he also obscures his theme.
Continue reading “Ed Hudgins Reviews Revenge of the Sith”