Ayn RandThinkers

Abortion is a moral right insofar as a potentiality is not the equivalent of an actuality... a human being's life begins at birth.

Abortion is a moral right on the grounds that an embryo has no rights insofar as rights pertain only to an actual being, not to a potential.

Abortion is a moral right on the grounds that man is a rational animal, and as such, no one would ascribe the status of 'person' to a few human cells.

Abortion is a moral right on the grounds that no one can justifiably dictate to a woman what disposition she is to make of the functions of her own body.

Abortion is a moral right on the grounds that to ascribe rights to the unborn is to obliterate the rights of the living: The right of young people to set the course of their own lives. The task of raising a child is a tremendous, lifelong responsibility, which no one should undertake unwittingly or unwillingly.

Abortion is legitimate in that, for the ambitious and struggling, but poor, pregnancy is a death sentence: Parenthood would force them to give up their future, and condemn them to a life of hopeless drudgery, of slavery to a child's physical and financial needs.

Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned.

Capitalism is a system where physical force cannot be resorted to to obtain values from others.

Capitalism is a system whose moral justification is that it is consonant with man's rational nature. The altruistic claim that it is the best way to achieve 'the common good' is only a secondary consequence.

Capitalism is, along with egoism, simply what results when the supremacy of reason is recognized and applied.

Capitalism is, in its best and purest form, a separation of state and economics, in the same way and for the same reasons as the separation of state and church.

Capitalism is often called a system of greed, yet it has raised the standard of living of its poorest citizens to heights no collectivist system has ever begun to equal, and no tribal gang can conceive of.

Capitalism is often called a system of selfishness, yet it is the only system that drew men to unite on a large scale to cooperate across national boundaries while all the collectivist, internationalist, one-world systems are splitting the world into balkanized tribes.

Capitalism is often called cruel, yet it brought such hope, progress and general good will that the young people of today, who have not seen it, find it hard to believe.

Capitalism is often called nationalistic, yet it is the only system that banished ethnicity, and made it possible, in the United States, for men of various, formerly antagonistic nationalities to live together in peace.

Capitalism does not permit anyone to expect or demand, to give or to take the unearned.

Capitalism does not preach passivity, humility, resignation, but independence, self-confidence, self-reliance.