most people are strongly opposed to the idea of being coerced into group participations. So it would seem that our urge to consider ourselves as individualists hinges more on having the freedom to determine which groups we associate with, than any issue of true individaulism. However, even coercion is tolerated to a fair degree if it doesn't conflict to radically with our basic desires. A military draft may be considered too coercive, while the idea of getting a job or obeying the law are generally considered reasonably acceptable.



True individualism is not common and in our society is typically marked as being a sociopath. This is an individual for whom no social connections matter, and there is little ability to empathize with fellow humans.



Even the strongest advocates of individualism rarely argue in its favor as much as they argue that individuals need to be recognized and acknowledged within the larger social group. The typical argument focuses on the desire to freely choose which collective one participates in rather than arguing against collectivism. An individualist requires no such acknowledgement nor recognition, since they have no need of the social group's approval. However, the majority of people enjoy the groups they belong to and will strongly identify with many of them that share similar values and ideals. This doesn't deny our individual identities, nor does it deprive us of the choices we make regarding such group participations. In fact, it is precisely our ability to curtail our individualist tendencies that has given rise to the society and achievements we can claim as human beings.



If humans evolved as individualists, I suspect they would still be sitting in the trees or hunkered down in a savannah someplace.

read more at http://www.science20.com/gerhard_adam/individualism_and_collectivism

I disagree
The individual is usually behind the creative process and not a committee. The herd mentality dictates the norms and conformity is the price of admission. You dont need to be a sociopath to ignore the dictates of the generalized others just know how to move in and out without conflicting ones own values. The function of the gourp is homeostasis and that means the divine right to stagnate to live as others live is also to die as they do and so much the worse for those who choose to obey the dictates of their own conscience and values. See Ayn Rand and Nathaniel Brandon for a more elaborate explanation than this brief summary...

I'd like to know the definition of "collectivism" as it is used in the OP.

I am an elite member of the loner group.

You mean lonerism?

I am a true individualist and it is not that social connections do not matter
it is more that I will not sacrifice the truth or my identity for them

I still have them (social connections) but few. I prefer that over pretentions with many

I don't seem like it (to those who know me) but I'm pretty radical about some things - like truth and the difference between right and wrong, owning ones own behavior. honor and respect are everything

dishonor me and you are done (for example)

it takes me a long time (usually) to let those back in who violate my honor

As in groups that back Barry, knowing he is a token and loser, just because he belongs to a special group?

sure glad the Collective made all those breakthrough Inventions and Discoveries!

But a great Article written by someone from the perspective of a Collectivist!

and it is not true that social connections do not matter to highly individualistic people - that entire post seemed like a babbling rant to me but that statement was the worst...IMO

often the greater good of society benefits from the contribution of the indiivdual as well as the contribution of the group.

collectivism has also lead to some of the most repressive and abusive regimes in history. where the "ends justify the means" there are no "rights" to protect the individual

I think the article wsas referring to those people who those connections DONT matter too, when it refers to those people

it wasnt generalizing ALL individualistic people and I found it clear the article was more about the balance,, where even individuals feel a loyalty or membership or repsonsibility towards a subgroup,,, rather its gender, race, cultural, geographical,,,,,etc,,,

the 'highly individualistic' social path is the apathetic person who feels nobody else shoudl be a concern but themself,,,,feels no loyalty or membership to any subgroup because they are clinging so intently to their sense of individualism

concider it the 'fundamental' individualist,,

or individualist 'extremists'

http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/collectivism.html

Collectivism means the subjugation of the individual to a group—whether to a race, class or state does not matter. Collectivism holds that man must be chained to collective action and collective thought for the sake of what is called “the common good.”

Collectivism holds that, in human affairs, the collective—society, the community, the nation, the proletariat, the race, etc.—is the unit of reality and the standard of value. On this view, the individual has reality only as part of the group, and value only insofar as he serves it.

Collectivism holds that the individual has no rights, that his life and work belong to the group . . . and that the group may sacrifice him at its own whim to its own interests. The only way to implement a doctrine of that kind is by means of brute force—and statism has always been the political corollary of collectivism.

Modern collectivists . . . see society as a super-organism, as some supernatural entity apart from and superior to the sum of its individual members.

The philosophy of collectivism upholds the existence of a mystic (and unperceivable) social organism, while denying the reality of perceived individuals—a view which implies that man’s senses are not a valid instrument for perceiving reality. Collectivism maintains that an elite endowed with special mystic insight should rule men—which implies the existence of an elite source of knowledge, a fund of revelations inaccessible to logic and transcending the mind. Collectivism denies that men should deal with one another by voluntary means, settling their disputes by a process of rational persuasion; it declares that men should live under the reign of physical force (as wielded by the dictator of the omnipotent state)—a position which jettisons reason as the guide and arbiter of human relationships.


Look at today's Governments!

http://aynrandlexicon.com/lexicon/individualism.html

Individualism regards man—every man—as an independent, sovereign entity who possesses an inalienable right to his own life, a right derived from his nature as a rational being. Individualism holds that a civilized society, or any form of association, cooperation or peaceful coexistence among men, can be achieved only on the basis of the recognition of individual rights—and that a group, as such, has no rights other than the individual rights of its members.



Do not make the mistake of the ignorant who think that an individualist is a man who says: “I’ll do as I please at everybody else’s expense.” An individualist is a man who recognizes the inalienable individual rights of man—his own and those of others.

An individualist is a man who says: “I will not run anyone’s life—nor let anyone run mine. I will not rule nor be ruled. I will not be a master nor a slave. I will not sacrifice myself to anyone—nor sacrifice anyone to myself.”

The mind is an attribute of the individual. There is no such thing as a collective brain. There is no such thing as a collective thought. An agreement reached by a group of men is only a compromise or an average drawn upon many individual thoughts. It is a secondary consequence. The primary act—the process of reason—must be performed by each man alone. We can divide a meal among many men. We cannot digest it in a collective stomach. No man can use his lungs to breathe for another man. No man can use his brain to think for another. All the functions of body and spirit are private. They cannot be shared or transferred.

We inherit the products of the thought of other men. We inherit the wheel. We make a cart. The cart becomes an automobile. The automobile becomes an airplane. But all through the process what we receive from others is only the end product of their thinking. The moving force is the creative faculty which takes this product as material, uses it and originates the next step. This creative faculty cannot be given or received, shared or borrowed. It belongs to single, individual men. That which it creates is the property of the creator. Men learn from one another. But all learning is only the exchange of material. No man can give another the capacity to think. Yet that capacity is our only means of survival.

Mankind is not an entity, not an organism, or a coral bush. The entity involved in production and trade is man. It is with the study of man—not of the loose aggregate known as a “community”—that any science of the humanities has to begin . . . .

A great deal may be learned about society by studying man; but this process cannot be reversed: nothing can be learned about man by studying society—by studying the inter-relationships of entities one has never identified or defined.

"People who are very aware
that they have more knowledge
than the average person are
often very unaware that they
do not have one-tenth of the
knowledge of all of the
average persons put together.
In this situation, for the
intelligentsia to impose their
notions on ordinary people is
essentially to impose
ignorance on knowledge." --
Dr. Thomas Sowell,

When I first moved to this town I wanted to 'fit in' with a local group. But after I got to know them, I preferred not to 'belong.'

We had very little in common, they engaged in gossip and strange religious notions...

So its just me and my cats.

There is a difference between a person voluntarily joining a "collective" and a person be "assimilated" into a collective by force.

I enjoy groups I strongly identify with by sharing similar values and ideals. However, as a human race, we should all be concerned about one another.