Mad Men and Philosophy

What is, is, regardless of what we believe or want to be true. There was a time when most people believed that the Sun revolved around Earth; this belief did not affect the movements of the Sun or Earth. Rand argues that we must, therefore, conform to existence; we cannot expect existence to conform to us. In season one of Mad Men, Peggy Olson did not know she was pregnant until her water broke; she thought overeating had caused her weight gain. Peggy’s ignorance of her pregnancy did not alter the fact that she was pregnant. Almost nine months after conception, the baby still came out, as it had to given the facts of female biology (and barring complications).

Human Beings Are Rational Animals³

Rand agrees with Aristotle (384-322 BCE) that “man is a rational animal. ” Like Aristotle, Rand does not mean that human beings are always rational; she means that reason is the human means of consciousness. Rand agrees with Aristotle that human beings alone possess the capacity for reason; however, Rand does not place any weight on this observation. Even if it turned out that other animals also possess reason, reason would still be the human means of consciousness. Today, reason is often equated with the capacity to calculate means to ends. Rand, however, stresses that reason is primarily the capacity to conceptualize our perceptual observations. Reason, Rand argues, is the human means for grasping the facts of reality, including our own nature and the natures of that which exists. The human capacity for reason makes possible organizations such as Sterling Cooper. Advertising is a conceptual means of communication. Advertisers sell products to consumers through means of a “product concept.”⁴ Naming Kodak’s new slide projector the Carousel (rather than the Wheel), for instance, invokes nostalgic memories of childhood, the very memories that the slides capture in photographic form. Only a conceptual being possesses the capacity to see memories of his past in the scribbling of lines on paper.

Human Life Is the Standard of Moral Values⁵

Rand argues that the fact that life is a conditional form of existence gives rise to the phenomenon of values. (Value, for Rand, is a noun, not a verb. A value is that which is of value to a living organism, not necessarily that which the organism values.) Rand observes that there’s a fundamental difference between life and inanimate matter: the existence of life is conditional; the existence of inanimate matter is not. When Betty Draper smashed a chair in “A Night to Remember” (episode 208), the chair ceased to exist, but the matter that constituted the chair remained in existence. Only the chair’s form changed. If Betty, however, had shot one of her neighbor’s pigeons (“Shoot,” episode 109), killing it, the life of that pigeon would not merely have changed form, like the material constituents of the chair; the life of the pigeon would have gone out of existence. Rand argues that life is a continuous process of an organism living in accordance with its own nature in order to sustain its existence. Pigeons sustain their existence by living in accordance with their own nature as pigeons. Similarly, as human beings we sustain our existence by living a properly human life. We could not sustain our existence by living, for instance, the life of a pigeon. Rand argues that all living organisms have values. Most organisms, however, have no choice but to live in accordance with their own nature. Human beings, by contrast, have a choice, and thus we have moral values. Unlike most other organisms, we must choose to live in accordance with our nature; that is, we must choose to live as human beings.

The Virtues Are Constitutive of Living a Human Life⁶

Rand argues that the primary virtues that sustain and nourish human life are the virtues of rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride. Rand is not claiming that these virtues are instrumental means to human sustenance, but rather that they are constitutive of living a properly human life. A person does not obtain life as a consequence of being virtuous; rather, in being virtuous, a person is living his life.

Consider the virtue of productiveness. Peter Campbell’s mother, Dorothy “Dot” Dyckman Campbell, comes from old money. She had a trust account her husband squandered on oysters and country club memberships (“Flight 1,” episode 202). Dot did not produce this wealth herself; it was bequeathed to her. Rand’s point is that Dot may be able to subsist through her ancestors’ productive efforts, but for Dot to sustain and nourish her life, she must be productive. Dot must live her own life. Dot’s ancestors cannot live her life for her. As evidence, observe that Dot does not appear capable of looking after her own affairs (“The Inheritance,” episode 210). Productiveness, Rand argues, sustains and nourishes life not only through the wealth a productive person produces, but, more fundamentally, through the very act of being productive.

Egoism is the ethical position that each person ought to pursue his or her own self-interest. While egoism is usually taken to be an answer to the question “What, fundamentally, ought one to do?”⁷, Rand takes egoism to be an answer to the question “Who ought to benefit from what one, fundamentally, ought to do?”⁸ In the Objectivist ethics, human life is the standard of moral values, not self-interest. Thus Peggy Olson’s nature as a human being, for instance, establishes what values and virtues she ought to benefit from; the benefit is not the standard of her values and virtues. Self-interest affirms that a person ought to benefit from those values and virtues that sustain and nourish his or her life. Self-interest does not establish what sustains or nourishes a person’s life. Other ethical principles within the Objectivist ethics address this issue.

Egoism, in the Objectivist ethics, means that each person is the proper beneficiary of his own moral actions.⁹ The key word here is moral; an individual should benefit from his moral actions, not his immoral actions. Rand is not claiming that a person should do anything that benefits himself. Rather, Rand’s claim is that a person ought to benefit from those virtues constitutive of living a human life, that is, the virtues of rationality, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, productiveness, and pride.

Consider Roger Sterling’s extramarital affair with Joan Holloway. Sterling and Holloway may be seeking their own benefit; however, this does not mean that they are virtuous by the standards of the Objectivist ethics. Rand would likely object to this affair, not because Sterling and Holloway are seeking to benefit themselves, but because they are seeking to benefit from living their lives contrary to the virtues that sustain and nourish their lives. Sterling and Holloway are unethical, according to the Objectivist ethics, not because they are self-interested, but because of what they regard as being in their self-interest. Rand defends self-interest, but self-interest is one principle within a much broader ethics. Other principles within Rand’s ethics provide the basis for differentiating ethically between the various ways a person might benefit himself.

In Kings of Madison Avenue, the author Jesse McLean implies that Draper is self-interested (in Rand’s sense) because of the “ruthless acts that he commits in the name of business or protecting his secrets.”¹⁰ However, this is not Rand’s egoism. Rather, it’s the conventional image of the egoist, ruthlessly sacrificing others to advance his own interests. Rand observes that this conventional image of self-interest is based on the assumption that we must choose between sacrificing self to others (which most people call “altruism”) or sacrificing others to self (which most people call “egoism”). Rand argues that this is a false alternative: either way someone is sacrificed, and the debate is merely over who should be the victim. Rand proposes that if human life is the standard of moral values, we should be opposed to sacrifice as such, whether of self to others or others to self.¹¹ The self-interested person, Rand states, should seek to live as a trader, exchanging value for value with the expectation of mutual benefit.¹²

Don Draper may be motivated by his own self interest, but this does not mean that Draper is completely self-interested. Being motivated by one’s own self-interest is not the same as acting in one’s self-interest. An alcoholic, like Duck Phillips, for instance, may be motivated by his own self-interest to drink immoderately. This does not mean, though, that immoderate drinking sustains or nourishes the alcoholic’s life. For Draper to be self-interested, in Rand’s sense, he must be seeking to benefit from that which actually sustains and nourishes his life. That is (if Rand is correct), he must be seeking to benefit from a life lived in accordance with the Objectivist virtues. We cannot examine all the virtues here. So let’s focus on two: the virtue of honesty and the virtue of independence.

Philosophers traditionally oppose dishonesty on the grounds that we have a moral duty to others to tell the truth. Rand, however, grounds the virtue of honesty in the primacy of existence.¹³ What is, is, regardless of what we believe or want to be true and regardless of what we persuade others to believe to be true. In Hans Christian Anderson’s The Emperor’s New Clothes, the emperor is naked despite the fact that people praise his new clothes. Rand stresses that pretending something is true is not the same as it being true: a pretend house will not provide shelter to the homeless; a pretend meal will not feed the starving; a pretend umbrella will not provide protection from the rain. Honesty is a virtue in the Objectivist ethics, and dishonesty a vice, because the nonexistent cannot sustain or nourish human life.

Consider Whitman/Draper’s relationship with his wife. Betty Draper is not married to Don Draper; she’s married to the man Dick Whitman pretends to be. Rand recognizes that human beings have a profound need to make a connection with others. This connection, Rand argues, consists in mutual psychological visibility. When we look at ourselves in the mirror, we observe our physical self. However, we cannot similarly observe our psychological self. We can only observe our psychological self through the reactions and responses of others.¹⁴ Other people are mirrors to our souls, but sometimes the reflection is distorted. When other people react and respond to us in a way that is at odds with our conception of ourselves, it can be like looking into a fun house mirror. We don’t see our expected selves reflected back, so we feel invisible.

Whitman/Draper is invisible to his wife. Mutual psychological visibility is only possible between two (or more) people who genuinely see each other. Betty Draper cannot make a connection to her husband because the man she’s reacting to and responding to does not exist. For Betty to make this connection, she must see the man her husband in fact is, not the man he pretends to be.

Psychological visibility reaches its height in romantic relationships; however, Rand’s observation applies to all our relationships. (An elevator operator, for example, can experience invisibility if he’s treated like a machine rather than a person.) Observe that Whitman/Draper does not appear to have any genuine friends. This is not surprising. Whitman/ Draper’s clients and colleagues are reacting and responding to Draper, not Whitman. Whitman/Draper has to move through his days invisible to all those around him. As evidence, observe that the one person Whitman/Draper appears to have a genuine connection with is Anna Draper, widow of the real Don Draper. With Anna, Whitman/Draper appears relaxed, even happy (“The Mountain King, ” episode 212). Whitman/Draper is able to make this connection to Anna because Anna is the only person who sees Dick Whitman. Anna is reacting and responding to him, not the man he pretends to be.

In “A Night to Remember,” Betty Draper accuses her husband of having an affair. Betty knows Don has been lying to her, though she does not yet know the extent of his dishonesty. Betty is angry at Don’s betrayal of their “perfect marriage.”¹⁵ Yet Don and Betty never had a perfect marriage. Betty believed she was married to Don Draper, a faithful husband and hard-working advertising executive. But what is, is. Betty believing her husband to be Don Draper does not alter the fact that he’s Dick Whitman, a philanderer, who spends many of his days either drinking alone in a bar or in the beds of his mistresses. Betty discovering the truth cannot end that which never existed. Draper’s betrayal does not consist in ending their “perfect marriage” but in having built their marriage on a foundation of lies.

Rand’s argument for honesty places no weight at all on the dishonest person being found out. Rand does not appeal to a cost-benefit analysis, in which she weighs the chances of being caught against the benefits of being dishonest. Rand’s point is that such a cost-benefit analysis is not possible, as there are no benefits to be derived from dishonesty; one cannot weigh possible costs against nonexistent benefits. Nonetheless, Rand observes that the likelihood of being found out is inherent in the nature of dishonesty. The dishonest person has to come up against one immovable obstacle: facts. What is, is, so pretending otherwise will not alter relevant facts. No matter how skilled a liar someone is, he cannot rewrite the facts of reality, and so every lie must constantly come up against facts that contradict, and thus threaten to blow, his deception.

Facts are a constant threat to the dishonest person. Draper takes the train to work, and someone recognizes him as Whitman (“Marriage of Figaro, ” episode 103). Draper’s photo appears in the newspaper after he wins an advertising award, and Adam Whitman recognizes the half-brother he thought dead (“5G,” episode 105). Draper is sent a parcel of Dick Whitman’s mementos, but Peter Campbell receives it instead and learns Draper’s true identity (“Nixon vs. Kennedy”). Draper has dinner with one of his mistresses, and on the way back to her apartment they have an accident (“The New Girl,” episode 205). The honest person has nothing to fear from being recognized on a train, or having his photo appear in a newspaper, or having a parcel mistakenly delivered to a colleague, or being in a car accident. For Draper these ordinary events of everyday life pose a constant threat.

From a Randian perspective, Draper necessarily finds himself in the position of having to take ruthless acts to protect his secrets, because he’s in a constant battle with reality. From spurning his younger brother (“5G”), to firing a secretary who failed to cover for him (“The Benefactor,” episode 203), Draper’s ruthlessness is a product of his own vices. Rand would argue that this is a battle Draper cannot win, as whatever lengths he goes to protect his secrets, he cannot alter the fact that what is, is.

Bertram Cooper makes Draper a partner in order to restore faith to their clients after Roger Sterling suffers a second heart attack. Draper insists that there be no contract. “Beware the nonconformist,” says Cooper. He turns to leave. “I’m going to introduce you to Miss Ayn Rand. I think she’ll salivate” (“Indian Summer,” episode 111). Presumably, Cooper believes Rand to be a defender of nonconformity. However, Cooper is mistaken. Rand defended the virtue of independence. The independent person is primarily oriented to reality, rather than to other people.¹⁶ Such a person is independent in the sense that he has a first-hand grasp of the facts. His primary concern is with what is true, not with what other people think is true. The conformist and nonconformist, in contrast, are primarily oriented to other people, rather than to reality. The conformist conforms to what other people think is true. The nonconformist is concerned not with what is true, but with reacting against whatever other people think to be true. The independent person will sometimes swim against the current, like the nonconformist, because his concern is with the truth. Unlike the nonconformist, however, he does not swim against the current because it’s the current.

Rand stresses that independence is the means by which one grasps the truth, it is not the standard of truth. A person must grasp for himself the basis in fact of his ideas and convictions. He holds to them, not because they are his ideas and convictions, but because they are grounded in the relevant facts. Thus the independent person will hold to his ideas and convictions in the face of opposition from others, yet he will just as easily abandon his ideas and convictions if others offer a basis in fact for thinking him mistaken. The emphasis, for the independent person, is not on what he thinks to be true, but on what is true. In “The Hobo Code,” Draper explains how he deals with reluctant clients: he seduces them, then forces them. An independent person does not force others to accept his position. He respects their independence by appealing to their rational capacity to grasp the same facts he does.

Rand contrasts the independent person with the second-hander. The second-hander is second-hand in the sense that he has a second-hand grasp of reality. Consider Peter Keating, from The Fountainhead. Keating is living a second-hand life. Keating did not want to become an architect. He would have preferred to become an artist, but his mother thought architecture a more respectable profession. Keating rises through the ranks of the architectural profession, not on the basis of his talent (he has little), but through schmoozing and scheming. Keating rejects the woman he loves in order to marry a woman he does not, so as to advance his career. Rand describes Keating as “a perfect example of a selfless man who is a ruthless, unprincipled egotist.”¹⁷ (By “egotist,” Rand here means “egoist.”) This sounds like an odd claim. How can a person be a selfless egoist? Rand’s point is that Keating is an egoist because he’s seeking to advance his own interests, yet he’s nonetheless selfless because others dictate his interests. He has no real self. Keating’s primary orientation is to other people, not to reality. He seeks greatness in other people’s eyes. He does not want to be great. He wants others to think him great.¹⁸

Most, if not all, of the characters in Mad Men live second-hand lives. Betty Draper is a housewife and mother, not because this is her chosen profession (she would rather be a model), but because this is what was expected of women in 1960s America. Harry Crane’s wife, Jennifer, is pleased her husband has become the head (and only member of) the television department at Sterling Cooper, not because this is good for him, but because this will impress her friends (“The Benefactor”). Peggy Olson smokes a cigarette and drinks beer while on a blind date, not because she likes cigarettes and beer, but in order to look “Manhattan” (“Indian Summer”). Peter Campbell thinks he’s qualified for the position of account manager, not because he would do the job well, but because he has the right social connections (“Nixon vs. Kennedy”). Perhaps most tragically, Salvatore Romano is a closeted homosexual man married to a woman. As a result, he regularly makes macho remarks in order to persuade others of his heterosexuality. These characters are conformists. If Cooper is correct, Draper is a nonconformist. However, Draper and the other characters of Mad Men are united in their rejection of independence. They are all primarily oriented to other people, not to reality. In a sense, they are all Peter Keatings.

Rand argues that the independent person grounds his self-esteem in his objective estimate of himself, not in others’ estimate of him. Self-esteem is a person’s appraisal of his own moral worth; a positive self-appraisal is the reward for having lived a virtuous life.¹⁹ The independent person is concerned with being good, not with others thinking him good. When the independent person receives praise from others, his estimate of the other person goes up; his estimate of himself does not change. The independent person recognizes that his character is what it is independent of what others think of him. Contrast this with Harry Crane’s reaction when he discovers that Ken Cosgrove earns one hundred dollars a week more than him (“The Benefactor”). Crane’s self-appraisal is based not on his actual job performance, but on how his paycheck compares to someone else’s.

The second-hander bases his self-appraisal not on what he is, but on how others see him. Whitman/Draper is living a second-hand life, not because he took over the real Don Draper’s identity, but because he did so in order to manipulate others’ perception of him. Whitman/Draper had a horrific childhood. He was the son of a prostitute and a drunkard. His mother died in childbirth, so his father and his father’s wife raised him. Those raising Whitman/Draper (I’m loathe to call them his parents, as they did not live up to that position) referred to him as the whore-child (“The Hobo Code”). Whitman/Draper was not responsible for his mother’s profession or his father’s infidelity, and to hold him responsible was clearly unjust. A child lacks the intellectual maturity to evaluate himself rationally. As Whitman/Draper matured into an adult, however, he was in a position to make this assessment (or, if there was too much emotional baggage to overcome, to seek professional help). Instead, the adult Whitman/Draper accepted others’ evaluation of him as the standard of his own self-worth, and so sought to manipulate how others saw him by taking on another man’s identity. Draper’s self-appraisal is based on others seeing him as the successful advertising executive in his Coupe de Ville, rather than as the whore-child of his youth.

Usually, liars lie for financial gain. Draper lies for spiritual gain. Rand would argue that Draper’s attempt to improve his self-esteem through deceit is futile for all the reasons dishonesty is a vice. In some respects, Draper is placing himself in a much more precarious position than the run-of-the-mill liar, as his self-esteem, rather than merely his financial position, depends on him maintaining his deception. In attempting to improve his self-esteem through manipulating how others see him, Draper has placed his self-esteem in opposition to reality. The facts that threaten the financial gains of a run-of-the-mill liar threaten Draper’s self-esteem. Draper’s constant battle with reality is not just to protect his secrets, but, more fundamentally, to protect his self-worth. It is little wonder that Draper oscillates between ruthlessness and drowning his consciousness in whiskey, as he engages in an ultimately futile attempt to maintain a self-esteem under constant threat from the ordinary events of everyday life.

Don Draper claims that “the universe is indifferent” (“The Hobo Code”). Rand disagrees. She argues that the universe is benevolent. Rand is not suggesting that there’s a divine presence that intervenes in the workings of the universe so that everything turns out for the best.²⁰ Strictly speaking, concepts such as “indifferent” and “benevolent” do not apply to the universe. Rand’s claim is that the universe is benevolent in the sense that the universe is intelligible, and so if we adhere to reality we will likely be successful in sustaining and nourishing our lives.²¹ We are not doomed by our own nature to suffer. Rand does not deny that there are tragedies and disasters. Her point is that these are exceptions, not the normal state of human affairs.

Rand would not be surprised that Draper finds the universe indifferent. A benevolent universe is indifferent to those who attempt to act in defiance of the facts of reality. Cooper thinks that Draper is completely self-interested, but there’s nothing self-interested in banging one’s head against an immovable obstacle. What is, is, and Draper attempting to pursue his self-interest in defiance of the facts will only doom him to a series of tragedies and disasters of his own making. In “Marriage of Figaro,” a guest tells Draper that Madison Avenue must treat him well, as this is as good as it gets. Several hours later, Draper is sitting in his car, alone, in front of a railway crossing, staring vacantly into the distance. Draper appears to have achieved everything society could offer. This success is illusory, though, as he’s living a second-hand life built on a shoddy foundation of deceit.

NOTES

11 Peikoff, Objectivism, 235-236. Rand was sometimes asked why she used the word selfishness to denote virtuous qualities. Rand recognized that self-sacrifice and other-sacrifice entail each other. If there’s someone making sacrifices, there must be someone collecting them. Selfish, Rand argued, is what conventional egoists call those who refuse to be altruistic and sacrifice to them. Rand was notorious for her opposition to altruism. Her position, however, is often misunderstood. Rand was opposed to the use of altruism by conventional egoists to morally disarm their victims. She was not opposed to helping others. Thus Rand wanted to reclaim the word selfish, much in the same way as homosexuals would later reclaim the words gay and queer.

Objectivism 101: A Brief Introduction

Existence Has Primacy over Consciousness²

Human Beings Are Rational Animals³

Human Life Is the Standard of Moral Values⁵

The Virtues Are Constitutive of Living a Human Life⁶

The Virtues Should Benefit Their Possessor

Don Draper Is Not Don Draper: The Vice of Dishonesty

A Night to Remember

The Nonconformist

The Whore-Child

The Universe Is Not Indifferent

NOTES