Lefty compares Atlus Shrugged to Cthulhu
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Atlas Shrugged is not without its issues, but the hatedom for it is fascinating. It's almost at Rand Woman Bad levels. Her ideas really bother them and I think that's because they sense some truth in them.
Seeing as Bioshock was entirely about how wrong she was, I'd say Rand Bad is a very true theory.
And yet many young people were introduced to Rand from playing Bioshock and started dabbling in objectivist-adjacent ideas like anarcho-capitalism after playing the game. I'm not sure what Ken Levine's intent with the story actually was but it came off as rather even-handed to me. Certainly not an anti-Rand author tract. The good and bad guys in the story are not good or bad because of their ideology, they just took things to the extreme.
Bioshock Infinite on the other hand...
As much as I dislike Bioshock Infinite as a game, when you stop and think about the setting in any way, it starts going all over the place. Columbia is clearly meant to be interpreted as 'bad', because the game is telling us that if we go ultra-nationalist and enslave brown people, we'll get flying cities as done by Norman Rockwell.
...
Also, the lady in question leading the under-dog revolution is an unlikeable, horrible person who'll murder kids without hesitation. Who's also black.
...wait, which side are we supposed to be rooting for, here?
Yes, I know, we get a forward flash to the future where zepplins are razing New York City to the ground and this is supposed to be a bad thing, but... wait a minute...
So, yeah. Bioshock Infinite is certainly... something.
Kind of like Man In The High Castle. It basically said that if the axis had won and oppressed everyone who isn't white or Japanese, we'd end up with a clean, crime-free utopia that has technology and luxury decades ahead of its time. And the lesson we're supposed to take away from this is "it's a good thing the allies won".
A glimpse into the mind of a leftist can be as fascinating as it is confusing.
Bioshock Infinite having slavery made no sense anyway, since they have fully functioning robots by the time the story of the game starts. They just wanted to do "racism bad" and included slavery in a story where slavery would also be obsolete.
I think Fontaine is bad because of his ideology. He is an unabashed parasite who happily ruins lives and kills just for his own minuscule gains. The more lore reveals about him, the less likeable he becomes, in stark contrast to Ryan who becomes more understandable the more you know.
Fontaine alone being there and being so gleefully evil balances out every single other criticism of Objectivism by saying "well its right about this guy."
Pretty much described the Covid riots even down to the reasoning. Nobody saw it that way though.
Infinite was fairly even handed until the second DLC. Then they made Daisy Fitzroy only do horrible things because she was told she had to for the timeline to be fixed.
:3c
Bioshock 2 managed to also say utilitarianism and collectivism were bad with the same vitriol, while also proving "Some Rand Good."
Probably one of the many reasons why many called it "bad" at the time.
It was so “bad” that Ken Levine stole the father and daughter plot point.
And did it so much worse.
Elizabeth wasn't a character. She was a fake try hard "cute" thing to force you to get attached to her because the entire story fails if you don't love her. She is annoying to deal with, and her combat potential is only bandaiding the god awful setpieces.
Eleanor grew on you over the course of the game. She went out of her way to help you despite the risk, and sincerely loved you. And when you free her, she basically solos the rest of the game for you.
If your takeaway from Bioshock was "objectivism bad" and not, according to Ken himself, "something else", you took the bait.
I'll listen to it tonight.
This video will eliminate all previous notions that the Bioshock games were good. Highly recommended his channel on Odyssey.
Andrew Ryan did nothing wrong
Try reading her non-fiction. Start with The Romantic Manifesto, art criticism seems to be an easy way into a philosophy's theories.
I'll look into that.