The Spirit of Radio: Ayn Rand, Troi Torain, September 11, 2001, and the Power of the Airwaves

In May of 2000, my sixth grade class received the chance to go to Ellis and Liberty Islands not far from New York City. While we didn’t enter into Manhattan to experience the skyscrapers, especially the World Trade Center, I yearned for the day where I would be able to visit the Twin Towers.…

For all the ink that has been spilt to discuss all of the blood that was shed on the morning of September 11, 2001, my memories of that day coincide with the fact that I am now an Objectivist and will be for life. I recall when my eighth grade class was driven out of school like confused cattle to witness a slaughter. When I boarded the school bus for home in Newark, Delaware, the most eerie, flat words blared through the speaker system. At thirteen, it was like nothing that I had ever heard before that day, and have never heard since. The newscaster almost whispered the information and it came in pieces and bits of information. The whole experience chilled me cold on that sunny summer morning.

It took four years after that for me to be introduced to the groundbreaking, revolutionary philosophy of Ayn Rand. Once again, the experience occurred through the radio. This time, it was an upbeat, yet serious, informative, fun, rollicking, and smart New York City radio program syndicated to a nearby Philadelphia station called the Star and Bucwild Morning Show. This show mixed Hip Hop nonsense with discussions of the Copernican Revolution, Judy Pace, Josh Gibson and Arthur C. Clarke references, and considerations of Project HAARP. But through all the critiques of rap world buffoonery and thoughts on the band Rush and movie sound clips from the Planet of the Apes (1968-1973) series, Amistad (1997), Roots (1977 miniseries), and audio from Mario Savio, a snippet of a woman with a heavy Russian accent seeped through the speakers of my headphones through my CD/radio player.

What I heard remained the inkling of understanding, adapting, applying, and integrating an entire, radical morality. The voice that I remember was taken from the The Mike Wallace Interview show where I only caught, “Let me explain it as briefly as I can... objective reality.” That was it. Then, radio luminary Troi “Star” Torain came back on the air and explained that the speaker was an American writer and philosopher named Ayn Rand. I listened until the man behind the show, broadcaster and philosopher Mr. Torain, received a pink slip from the station over a spat with a rival down the dial. I am now business partners with Mr. Torain and enjoy his YouTube show that airs as of this writing. But the words from his former show stayed with me.

In 2007 I visited the library to find one of Miss Rand’s books. The first book that I ever read by the original Objectivist herself was The Virtue of Selfishness (1964). I became a literary carnivore, reading voraciously every sentence that she and former associate Nathaniel Branden had written. And then I thought... I can’t be the president of the youth choir at my church anymore. So, I became an atheist. Then I thought I can’t have a passive if not subjective and vicious view of America based on my race... I’ve got to become a defender of the United States Constitution. I’ve got to become a Marine.

As I sped through Anthem (1938) (to date, I’ve read it twenty-two times) a glowing sense of what Miss Rand expressed through her art resonated with me. In 2008, I discovered one of Miss Rand’s masterpieces, The Fountainhead (1943). In this tome, the wings of my mind flew ever higher than they had with Anthem. And one particular passage stood out to me:

“I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of New York's skyline. Particularly when one can't see the details. Just the shapes. The shapes and the thought that made them. The sky over New York and the will of man made visible. What other religion do we need? And then people tell me about pilgrimages to some dank pesthole in a jungle where they go to do homage to a crumbling temple, to a leering stone monster with a pot belly, created by some leprous savage. Is it beauty and genius they want to see? Do they seek a sense of the sublime? Let them come to New York, stand on the shore of the Hudson, look and kneel. When I see the city from my window - no, I don't feel how small I am - but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body.” pg. 447 Signet Edition

My mind lurched. I thought about that day in September seven years prior. Often, Miss Rand is cited as a prophetess for her monumental work Atlas Shrugged (1957). But here, she in poetic brilliance, demonstrates the spirit of a man who would do anything in his power to protect the minds and bodies and of course the buildings in the event of a vicious attack. This was fifty eight years before the events of September 11, 2001. In her soul, Ayn Rand could sense that the ingenuity, the radiance, the glory of New York City could be threatened and attacked one day. And not to mention, we must remember the events of the February 26 bombing of the World Trade center in 1993.

Shanksville, Pennsylvania and the Pentagon ought to be held in solemn reverence as Americans perished and were injured in these places, too. But Miss Rand’s accurate idealism of how New York exudes a strong vulnerability shines through on the page. Like a gorgeous woman who’s assaulted for her beauty, Ayn Rand viewed the capacity for the city of New York to be possibly marred one day. I experienced shock, sadness, anger, and finally release. I knew that this American woman had affected my very essence for the better.

September 11, 2001 left me numb, though. But since then, I’ve been able to gain strength intellectually through analyzing what the day actually meant. Jihadists from Islam did not pervert the faith, they lived up to and carried out its message of carnage. The planes, the skyscrapers, the Pentagon, are all out of the framework for the vicious figures who executed these offenses. They didn’t have the wherewithal to construct gleaming towers. They didn’t use their own jetliners to strike those buildings. They didn’t come from a country that has the most robust defense headquarters in the world. All of Ayn Rand’s words melded into my mind and I began to draw my own conclusions about that terrible day.

Miss Rand allowed for me to realize that mysticism, collectivism, and altruism are the real evils in the world. These two-bit Al-Qaeda operatives were just low-rent thugs who demonstrated nothing short of cowardice. And the now-deceased plotter behind the attacks, Osama bin Laden, was a (barely) walking contradiction. He hated America, but used (among other inventors) Edison’s carbon microphone to transmit his twisted ideological vomit. Bin Laden loathed America’s way of life but proceeded to record what Vladimir Kosmich Zworykin had envisioned for television broadcasts. The ironies would be laughable if the events lacked their nefarious nature. Ayn Rand championed the men of the mind and for life. She espoused that the sole purpose in one’s life is the attainment of happiness. Close to three thousand Americans were denied their right to live happily on 9/11/2001.

In her works, Ayn Rand is not negative in her approach. She speaks of the positivity of reason, individualism, and capitalism to defeat the aforementioned evils that precipitated the events of September 11, 2001. She didn’t fight against religion; she advocated for rationality. She didn’t fight against groups pulled together by non-essentials; she defended self-esteem. She didn’t fight against altruism; she promoted free markets.

Miss Rand permitted me the opportunity to view that day all those years ago as a reminder to be self-interested, be independent, be rational. The selfish heroism of the first responders, firemen, and police will not be forgotten. To honor those men and women who served to preserve life ought to be commended. It is not their sacrifice or selflessness that should be viewed here but their commitment to safeguard the survivors and recover those who perished.

In Atlas Shrugged, a certain radio address spans three hours. Encompassed in this declaration is the essence of the book and of Ayn Rand’s life and of her philosophy as a whole. It is the role of man’s mind in society that counts. It is not the amount of terrorists who wish to do good people harm. It is not the ongoing wars that have arisen in the wake of the attacks. It is the capacity for each man, woman, and child to think.