House as Objectivist
How Gregory House Exemplifies Ayn Rand's Philosophy
In modern society, selfishness is deemed immoral and altruism is considered the mark of a saint. On the hit primetime medical drama House, M.D., title character Gregory House would certainly fall into the realm of the immoral.
However, House is not an immoral man. Instead, he operates under his own morality, with a value system of his own.
House’s Values
Morality is an expression of values. Under House’s morality, there are several clear values, including:
- Life
- Intellect
- Reason and logic
- Being right
- Himself
The first four values appear routinely throughout the current five seasons’ episodes. For example, in the Season One episode “Control,” House confronts a bulimia patient in need of a heart transplant, demanding to know if she wants to live. “I want to know what’s right,” House says. “I want you tell me that your life is important you, because I don’t know!” In House morality, life is right.
As are intellect, reason and logic, which he uses in every episode. Being right becomes a prominent value as well as seasons pass, whether it is his determination to reach the correct diagnosis or his confession in Season Three’s episode “Son of a Coma Guy” that the one thing he wishes he could hear his father say is, “You were right.”
However, the most prominent value that viewers see House display across the board is the fifth and final: himself.
House’s Virtue of Selfishness
It would be no surprise if viewers spotted author and philosopher Ayn Rand’s The Virtue of Selfishness lining the bookshelves of House’s home, though hopefully it would not be a hiding place for his Vicodin stash like the lupus textbook in his office.
Rand is the creator of the moral philosophy of Objectivism, which values the life of the rational man and holds that selfishness is indeed a moral principle.
In The Virtue of Selfishness, Rand debunks the idea that selfishness is synonymous with evil. Instead, she emphasizes that the basic meaning of selfishness is simply a man’s “concern with his own interests.” House is unarguably concerned with his own interests above others.
Rand also proposes that a “man must be the beneficiary of his own moral actions.” House’s career as a doctor benefits hundreds of patients. However, the intended beneficiary of his actions is not the patient but rather himself. He is a diagnostician to fulfill his appetite for puzzles and challenges. Benefit to patients is a by-product.
Objectivism does not deny the opportunity for others to benefit from a man’s work, but self-fulfillment must come before fulfillment of another.
The ideal Objectivist man is a self-respecting, self-supporting individual “who supports his life by his own effort and neither sacrifices himself nor others,” Rand writes in the 1964 introduction to The Virtue of Selfishness.
This means that House should not be stealing friend and colleague Dr. Wilson’s lunch, but likewise it means that he should not perform his job for the sake of the patient or pity. Neither should he behave like the hand-holding, patient-pitying Dr. Cameron.
In other words, the brusque, puzzle-seeking, pill-popping, arrogant doctor has a moral code that his supports – and even excuses – his selfish nature. It is only through his self-driven desire to solve the puzzle and to be right that his patients can benefit.
His selfishness saves lives.
House: Still Imperfect by Randian Philosophy
Though House’s display of selfishness is rationally moral under Rand’s Objectivism, he does not achieve the Randian ideal of mankind.
Objectivist ethics and morality require a man to act in his rational self-interest. Unfortunately, House’s Vicodin addiction and tendency to conduct tests upon himself (such as inducing migraines and testing a new medication on himself in the Season Two episode “Distractions”) pushes the boundaries of “rational self-interest.”
Even so, he is the nearest example of Objectivism among primetime TV characters.
House Season 5, Episode 23,
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