The Navy Is Disciplining Sailors With Ayn Rand (Yes, Really)
The guided missile cruiser Monterey on February 20, 1990. Image by National Museum of the U.S. Navy/Wikimeda Commons
By Talya Zax December 26, 2018
The Russian-Jewish novelist Ayn Rand’s books are many things: A surprisingly formative force in modern conservatism, the subject of the hilarious scorn of Nora Ephron, something your high school boyfriend felt, like, really passionate about, alarmingly attractive to Rand Paul and unconscionably long.
Now, as the United States Navy seeks more humane forms of discipline, Rand’s work is also being used to punish misbehaving seamen.
Well, at least by one captain. As The New York Times reports, the Navy is undergoing a shift in age-old disciplinary practice; the punishments that captains are permitted to mete out to sailors while at sea will no longer include the option of restricting a sailors’ diet to just bread and water.
That tactic has attracted criticism for being inhumane. When prescribed, sailors spend three days in the brig — a shift imposed in 1951, before which the allowed duration had = been reduced from 30 days to seven — with just bread and water and the religious texts of their choice. While bread and water has been outlawed in the United Kingdom, from whom the U.S. adopted many naval practices, since 1891, American proponents of the measure cite it as being practically preferable to alternatives like docking pay or demotion.
To avoid those punishments and their equally unattractive ilk, Captain Scott Tait told The Times he’s begun assigning book reports as punishments. And Rand — most famously the author of “Atlas Shrugged” and “The Fountainhead” — is one of his chosen subjects.
“Some people need to think about character and the consequences of their actions,” Tait told The Times. “But I don’t want it to impact their permanent record, which could hurt their chances of promotion down the line.”
What could sinning sailors learn about character from Rand? It depends on whether or not they take her seriously. If so, they will perhaps get the wrong message; the point of “The Fountainhead,” as Ephron summarized it, is that “the welfare of society must always be subordinate to individual self-interest.” Disciplinary? Not quite. On the other hand, by refusing to take Rand seriously, one comes away with something like the opposite conclusion — presumably, just what the captain ordered.
But if said captain heeds Ephron’s advice, he’ll save the Randian punishment for those not yet mature enough to be enamored by Rand’s ideology. As Ephron wrote, “The Fountainhead” is very suitable as a distraction. But as for its ideas, “it is better read when one is young enough to miss the point.”
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
