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Guest Post: Are Individuals The Property Of The Collective?
Submitted by Brandon Smith of Alt-Market blog,
Mankind has faced a bewildering multitude of self-made catastrophes and self-made terrors over the past few millennium, most of which stem from a single solitary conflict between two opposing social qualities: individualism vs. collectivism. These two forces of organizational mechanics have gone through evolution after evolution over the years, and I believe the long battle is nearing an apex moment; a moment in which one ideology or the other will become dominant around the world for well beyond the foreseeable future.
The assumption often made amongst academia is that the philosophy that appeals most to our “natural survival imperative” and caters to our desire for innovation will eventually win the day. That there is no “right or wrong” side; only the effective, and the less effective. The advanced and the outmoded. The transcendent, and the archaic.
It should come as no surprise then that most academics and prominent mainstream talking heads often sing the praises of collectivism as the inevitable champion in the war between cultural engines. Collectivism always presents itself with the flair and sexiness of the “new”, or the progressive, while individualism tends to wear the unpleasant battle scars of hard earned principles and heritage. Collectivism is the hot looking but mentally unstable bombshell blonde making promises of excitement and long term comfort she has no intention of keeping. She is so seductive not because she has any profound inner qualities, but because she has a knack for letting you believe she is exactly what you fantasize her to be. Only when it’s too late do you realize she’s a psychopathic pill popping man-eater…
Collectivism is, in fact, a bastardization of a more useful human condition; namely community. Inherent in all people is the need for meaningful connection with others, and thus, the world around them, without being forced to sacrifice their own identities and their own souls in the process. The best representation of this model is the idea of “voluntary community”, where individuals seek out each other and facilitate their own connections. However, if they can’t find meaningful connection, many people will settle for whatever they can get.
Collectivist structures thrive by shutting down free cultural avenues, manipulating public media, encouraging fear, repression, and bias, and destroying our ability to relate to others in a natural and voluntary way. Collectivism’s first goal is to distract and ISOLATE individuals from one another, so that honest community is difficult to build. Its second goal is to then offer a false community; a cardboard cutout or proxy that entices the public with fabricated and superficial connections that barely satiate our inner hunger for relationship with our fellow man (Facebook, anyone?). It uses our thirst for understanding against us, and lures us into a system of psychological enslavement where no understanding will ever be found.
Karl Marx is famous for stating that “religion is the opium of the people”, a belief that communists like Mao Zedong adopted. But, Mao was not opposed to “opiates for the masses” per say, only citizen organizations that could not be control. Mao simply replaced the various deities of the Chinese people with the religion of the collectivist state.
Like any opiate, collectivism instills addiction. The feeling of belonging to something bigger than oneself (even if it ends up being false) creates ecstatic euphoria, a euphoria that weakens as time passes unless the addict commits himself even deeper into the hive mind. Soon, every original aspect of the person’s character is forgotten and replaced entirely by his hyper-obsession with the collective. The whole of his identity becomes a shallow product of the state and he may even defend that state, no matter how corrupt, to the death. He now treats any criticism of the system as a personal attack on himself, because everything he is has been given to him by the collective. If the collective is a sham, then so is he.
Collectivism as a philosophy is a perfect tool for oligarchy. The men who dominate such systems rarely if ever actually believe in the tenets they espouse. They sell the idea of single-minded society as a nurturing light that will create group supremacy, prosperity, and perfect safety. But the truth is, they couldn’t care less about accomplishing any of these things for the masses. They are only interested in exploiting the promise to galvanize the population into a fraudulent community, a dystopia in which the citizens police each other in the name of the state, giving the elites total dominance.
The most vital aspect of the collectivist process is convincing the public that the individual citizen is not sovereign, but is actually the property of the group. Many readers have already witnessed this argument first hand in the statements of MSNBC host Melissa Harris-Perry, who believes your children are not yours to raise, but products of the collective to be molded:
But this is only a taste of collectivist zealotry at work. Here are just a few of the most prominent disinformation tactics and methodologies used by centralization cultists to twist the fabric of nations and enslave individuals…
1) The Blank Slate
Blank slate theory stems from the Freudian model of psychology and has been adopted and refined by modern mainstream clinical psychiatry. The theory contends that all psychological processes and character traits of an individual are merely products of repetition and memory derived through environmental experience. Psychiatry extends the theory into biology in the belief that all human behavior is nothing more that a series of reactionary chemical processes in the brain that determine pre-coded genetic responses built up from the conditioning of one’s environment. The foundational assertion of blank slate theory is that human beings are born empty. That we are bio-computers; soft machinery, just waiting to be programmed.
The blank slate argument is essential to the philosophy of collectivism. If every person is born without inherent characteristics or spirit, and all people are manufactured by environmental conditions alone, then, collectivists contend, there is no such thing as true individualism. Programmed people cannot act, they can only react according to their conditioning. Therefore, they have no inherent ability to choose, or to determine their own destinies.
If a society can be convinced that this theory is fact, then the inner self (the source of individualism), no longer bears any meaning. The environment is then seen as the only determinant that people should care about. Environment becomes the sole master of their lives, and whoever controls the environment, controls them.
The problem is, blank slate theory has been proven time and time again to be absolutely false. From the work of MIT professor Steven Pinker, to the psychological studies of Carl Jung, to the linguistic studies of Noam Chomsky, as well as numerous studies in mathematics, quantum physics, and anthropology; every field of science has produced more than ample evidence that human beings are not born as blank slates. Rather, they are born with the very building blocks of thought, language, mathematics, and even predispositions towards certain personality traits.
The most important of all of these discoveries though is attributed to Carl Jung, who found that moral conceptions are in fact inborn. The existence of “psychological dualities” at birth (including an unconscious sense of good and evil) means that all people come into the world with the ability to CHOOSE. Environment only determines our lives if we allow it to. This is why the worst of men sometimes come from the most sheltered and safe environments, while the best of men often come from broken and terrible homes.
Collectivists have struggled desperately for ages to deny or destroy the concept of inherent individualism. They want us to believe that everything that we have was “given to us” by them. As long as we know they have given us nothing, they can never truly win…
2) Individualism Is The Same As Selfishness
Collectivists repeat this lie Ad nauseum. The suggestion is simple – even the smallest individual actions “affect everyone”, thus, everyone is culpable for the problems of the whole. And, if everyone is responsible for the problems of the whole, then everyone must take responsibility for everyone else. The job of society then, at least in the opinion of collectivists, is to keep every individual member of that society in line. One unruly cog could bring the entire machine to a halt. Anyone who refuses to submit to the directives of the group is bound to hurt the group, and is, therefore, selfish, or even criminal.
The insanity of this way of thinking should be obvious. First of all, it assumes that the directives of the group are always logically and morally sound. It assumes that because the majority of people have come to a particular conclusion, that conclusion must, by default, be correct. The fact is, history has shown that at any given moment the majority is wrong about something, if not most things, and these mass trespasses against reason and conscience always end up being stopped by a minority of individualists. The greatest social achievements of mankind are the result of the ingenuity and courage of individuals who in turn inspired others.
Perhaps the best possible thing is for the machine to be sabotaged at times by “selfish individuals’. Perhaps individuals are actually more necessary to the survival of the group than the group is to the survival of individuals…
3) The Family Unit Cannot Be Trusted To Raise The Next Generation
In the quest for a collectivist system, all competing interests must be debased. The individual must have nowhere to turn for guidance or comfort but the system itself. Children become a highly sought after target, because their inborn personalities are easier to oppress, and because they are always dependent on someone for their survival already. The collective (usually in the form of government) desires to be that “someone” the child depends on, and so, the role of the parents has to be diminished.
Collectivists in the U.S. use the “It Takes A Village” approach in order to marginalize the family unit and paint parents as secondary figures in the development of their own offspring. Under this philosophy, each subsequent generation is seen as a kind of “commodity”, a resource that belongs to the group and that must be “protected” from the damaging ideologies of the parents. One has only to examine the extreme politicization of American public schools today to see this process in action. The goal is to push the idea of family into obscurity, while forcing children into indoctrination factories that instill specific behaviors through fear, shame, and propaganda.
No one, and no entity, however, has the capacity to care for any child more than that child’s own parents. Some parents do fail in their responsibilities, but what kind of role model does government really make in their place? Governments lie, cheat, steal, rape, murder, and mass murder in order to get what they want. Government has nothing worthwhile to teach anyone, including our children.
4) Global Problems Will Be Solved By Collectivism
I find in my examinations that the opposite is true. Most global problems are CAUSED by collectivism, not solved by it. The greater good is always subjective. The group will always be an abstract illusion held together by nothing more than the whims of the individual. And, in the grand scheme of things, only individuals make any difference in the course of human cultural development. The collectivist strategy requires the suppression of individualism, otherwise, they cannot obtain power. That means, the very bedrock of their philosophy is a threat to the security of the future. In their obscene quest to control tomorrow, they ensure that tomorrow dies.
They promise community, and they give you isolation. They promise prosperity, and they give you servitude. They promise safety, and they give you a land of perpetual terror. They promise purpose, and give you insignificance. They promise peace, and they foment war after war after war, reaping turmoil all around us, as well as within us.
Our only hope is to maintain the integrity of our heart, and our will. The proclamation that the individual is subject to the necessities of the collective is a con. There is no such prerogative. In the end, there is no power over us but that which we give away. The state doesn’t matter. The group doesn’t matter. The “greater good” doesn’t matter. All that matters is the life of the individual. Each individual. For when all men rediscover their individualism, only then will we be able to move forward as a whole.
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For some reason, I think you just said something.
I have utterly no idea what it was, though.
nm, now you got me pissed too-the cock sucken fuckers can all collectivly suck my dick...
or more eloquently...
http://jonrappoport.wordpress.com/2013/04/09/mind-control-the-shell-game-and-the-stealth-gods/
Mao thought the collective would thrive during "The Great Leap Forward". They had collective canteens and child care as the "collective" went to the fields to produce. They had 24/7 iron smelting and everyone pitched in. The problem was that folks would go to their different centrally planned work zones. As soon as the bosses were out of sight, the workers would basically stand. They had hidden gardens at home they conserved their energy to tend. Each person was allotted 3.5 oz of meat, 3.5 oz of oil and 19 lbs of rice PER MONTH, they soon found that it was not enough and because they had everyone more invested in babysitting fields and finding random iron to smelt, 45 million people died of starvation between 1958 and 1961. People ate their babies, became cannibals and died in the streets. Mass suicides were common. Yeah, that's your fucking collective. You can fucking keep that shit. What these leftist cocksuckers don't understand is that these "theories" have no understanding of basic human nature. MOLON FUCK YOU LABE.
Where is our dear Chinese troll, George A.A. Dishwashington, to defend the glorious Communist legacy of recent Middle Kingdom fabled past? On the other hand, though, he has never actually tried to do so --- because he can't.
I'm currently studying it. It was a fuckin mess until Deng Xiepeng came in and did what our country used to do. Yep, Dear Leader Mao vicariously killed more than pretty much anyone ever from these fancy thoughts. Why would we want to emulate proven failure that ultimately leads to horrible ends is beyond me. I'm just hunkering down at this point....
I read Hungry Ghosts: Mao's Secret Famine a while back.
I disliked government before reading it, afterwards I despised it more than I thought possible.
Four hundred million people killed by government in the 20th Century.
Yep, Democide. Your chances of being snuffed out by your own government are greater then being killed by a terrorist but that would be incorrect since the state has a monopoly on terror and in effect are one in the same, lets go with being hit by lightning.
Duplicity is a surname for Chinese citizenism citizens. Putting in some doses of reality now and then is rather enjoyable.
Ah, ah, but the propaganda bits! Repeations of this, also that and some other things, form the baseline of Chinese Citizenism.
The Mobius Strip of Insanitation requires constant feeding of same old tired offuscations, denialism and bigotry to remain in motion. Possibility of self-indiction would accrue in the otherwise.
This must be avoided at all the costs.
Responsibility and guilt must be blobbed-up and forced to the exterior. Just as post-wok Kitten McNuggets must be forced through the posterior onto the roadside.
One could hope for some reality to inturde into Chinese Citizenism monologues, this would be a hopeless hope though. It may not be seen until river pigs sprout wings.
When hypocritizenism is the keystone, do not expect the stonedmason to remove it.
That would be asking for some serious 'chinese' citizenism trouble.
We have enough as it is.
"Where is our dear Chinese troll, George A.A. Dishwashington, to defend the glorious Communist legacy of recent Middle Kingdom fabled past?"
Probably fly fishin for some floatin, bloatin, free to the collective pork.
FISH ON Troll Bitcheez...........
.
Flies indeed much very big component to fish for river pig pursuit.
"Caught a quarter ton river pig on twenty pound test, fish on..."
I swear, by my life and my love of it, I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another man to live for the sake of mine. --John Galt
true artists that reject all the norms are the anti-collectivist
they create from their inner derived thoughts
very few people fall in this catagory.
they are easy to recognize
total free thinkers
and they don't give a fuck what you think, wear or eat or drive...
I've been reading & meditating in Habakkuk today (a minor prophet). The prophet basically grieves that iniquity abounds and God seems to do nothing. In describing the Chaldeans' cruelty, both in his day and one to come, when men will be "as the fishes of the sea, as the creeping things that have no ruler over them." Who should be their ruler? Perhaps it's the Son of the Morning, Lucifer. He was in the garden as a serpent.
Also Solomon speaks to this in Ecclesiastes 9:12:
As we get closer to the end of the age, froward men will take to fishing and will catch multitudes.
Banks Are Actually Just Software Companies and the Same Can Pretty Much Be Said for Health Insurance Companies As Well-5 Unspoken Reasons Tech Projects Fail
I commented heavily on my post on this idea and the original author is right and guess what, he's an incognito banker from Wall Street and will have to say that way with articles like this, but I agree with him. How much data do companies really need...data selling is an epidemic...we are hostages of our own tools and infrastrucutue. He told me to keep writing and said I had tons of facts on my blog posts, as I talk a lot of code and math mechanics that gets us to where we are now.
http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/04/banks-are-actually-just-software....
Ever wonder why your insurance policies are so high? Someone has to pay for all that data that Blue Cross buys to analyze and see if you are buying clothing that is one size larger...yup that's the best they could come up with for an explantion and keep in mind they get all the rest of your Master Card/Visa purchases too.
http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/03/insurance-companies-are-buying-up...
Even the IRS is buying data it appears so I guess they are trying to use predictive behavior analytics to predict who will file and pay their taxes now?
http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/04/irs-using-facebook-and-twitter-as...
Insurers sell data too and make millions if not billions in profits all put together...See what United is doing, actually competing with that the FDA Sentinel program is set up to do as United can make a buck at it.
http://ducknetweb.blogspot.com/2013/04/more-data-for-sale-soon-with-shar...
this has probably appeared on ZH more than once, but I think it bears repeating...
“Now I will tell you the answer to my question. It is this. The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from the oligarchies of the past in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just around the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know what no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means; it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now you begin to understand me.”
1984.
The end does not justify the means. The means you choose will become your end.
Socialism + Stealth Mercantilism = The Future [Communitarianism = The death of the individual @ a profit disguised as a sacrifice for the "Greater Good" (i.e. the Stealthy Corporate State counting the profits)]
Fascism...suddenly back in style!
The Black lady is making the case that Whites need to buckle down and lift the blacks up and make them equals in this society. She believes government should be the instrument of this. To do this she thinks government should take lots of money from whites and give it to blacks. She believes the hell hole inner cities and their hell hole schools are the fault of whites not paying enough taxes.
Look, I am not young anymore. I have heard her argument since I was a kid in the late 60's! All these decades and the blacks are right where they were when they started. A few have turned their backs on black culture and Hip Hop bullshit, gotten an education and lifted themselves up. Very few, but they at least show that the Ku Klux Klan ain't gonna turn up and burn them out of a middle class lifestyle if they have earned it. Those days are over.
The black lady want white money, lots of it. That is what she is all about. Christ does this get old, I bet any black kid who says fuck drugs and hip hop and decides to actually study in school and apply for a state college can get in and do well, and find a job afterwards if they study in a good field. Hell, they can stop taking crack for five minutes, join the Army, and if they apply themselves, they can make good. I have seen it myself. I have seen inner city blacks make good careers in the military when I was in the military. It is possible.
But lets get the honky's money, lets spend it on crack, and have lots of teenage babies, then blame the funck'n honkey! Get Whitey!
They would get the honky's money if they were in the military, too.
But lets get the honky's money, lets spend it on crack, and have lots of teenage babies, then blame the funck'n honkey! Get Whitey!
*************
The results of political correctivness..they have never let us gel together in our own ways-
The problem is, most of the Austrian school libertarians assume the flaws of collectivism only are found in the form of a public government and never in the form of a private business. Plenty of employers treat their employees as property and discourage individualism in them. Plenty of businesses run de facto company towns and bully everyone into submission. But the Austrian school folks just look away when the tyrants are in the form of a so-called free enterprise.
Quit and go work somewhere else.
You could say the same thing about any country you might be criticizing for imposing a collectivist tyranny. Why not just move somewhere else? Even if a citizen or worker has the ability to simply leave and go somewhere else, that fact in no way justifies an immoral form of governance whether that governance be of an office, a factory or a country. Might does not make right. Just because someone can get away with taking advantage of another does not make doing so ok.
Morals? Whose morals, yours?
The marketplace sets your value to your employer, not your sense of your supposed 'innate worth'.
His job is to get you to work for less, yours is to lobby for more. Obviously, you have arrived at a meeting point if you are working there, so what's the problem? You can't blame the employer if you're a shitty salesman when selling your time / skill.
Having been an employer, one thing I know for certain is substandard wages guarantee substandard quality workers.
Life was much simpler when you could just shanghai em and chain em to the oars.
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Beautiful!
This is why come to da Hedge.
More! More! More!
•J•
V-V
"In the end, there is no power over us but that which we give away." Amen.
My family is free.
My children are free/ They don't belong to me...they belong to themselves but my heart belongs to them and I will protect them forever).
Otherwise - the only groups we belong to are those we voluntarily join.
We will never be part of any socialistic collective and especially not on U.S. soil.
The collective literally does not exist. The reason humans are screwed is, they don't understand this, and endless other fictions. Try to consider this slowly.
A single man named "Max McPhobos" lands on Mars. He is the only sentient being on Mars. He is an individual.
10 years later, another man (or sentient alien) lands on Mars.
There are two sentient beings on Mars, two individuals. There is no third entity that landed or popped into existence when the second being landed on Mars.
A plural is just some number of ones. Period. The plural doesn't exist. The plural isn't something. It has no mass, energy, shape, color, size, odor... or any other properties. It is just one of thousands of other abstract mental units that humans [and other sentient beings] form in their brains. So even legitimate, utilitarian abstractions like "dog" have no existence outside the brains of sentient beings. If there happen to be 8,765,432 animals on the planet that a human wishes to classify as "dog", all that is real are the 8,765,432 dogs.
Now, one might say, "but the mental-unit dog exists, in the brain of those sentient beings". And whoever said that is correct. Though that mental-unit is just a configuration of the brain that was already there, that mental unit does indeed exist --- it is a real configuration in a real, physical brain.
But what is a fiction? Answer: a real mental-unit in one or more brains that does not refer to something in the external world. For example, the mental-unit "SantaClaus". That mental-unit sure is real, and it certainly motivates a whole slew of kids to take all sorts of actions. 7-billion humans have a "SantaClaus" mental-unit, and 1-billion or more humans believe that "SantaClaus" mental-unit refers to a real fat man in a red suit in a toy factory at the north pole who delivers toys to kids all over earth on a reindeer-driven sleigh one day per year. That doesn't make "SantaClaus" exist. That makes the mental-unit FICTION. The mental unit is real, but what it purports to identify is not real (does not exist).
To be sane, humans must understand the state or status of every mental-unit they think with. Sadly, near zero humans invest the time and effort to consider and assign status to every mental-unit they hold. Thus near zero humans today are sane. That's just a fact. And make no mistake, the inability to distinguish real from fiction is the single most fundamental form of insanity. That's why the classic image of a crazy human is one trying to catch non-existent butterflies swarming around his head.
To simplify the possible status of mental-units a bit, let's consider those we alread mentioned.
The "SantaClaus" mental unit is fiction, because the mental-unit refers to nothing [that exists]. All the elements of that fiction exist (fat men, red suits, north pole, reindeer, factories, toys, etc), but the aggregate the mental-units means does not exist.
The "dog" mental-unit is a legitimate abstraction. But be careful, all that exists are the 8,765,432 animals that each qualify as "one individual dog" (or "one individual canine", or "one individual mammal", or "one individual animal", or "one individual lifeform", or "one individual physical object", etc). There is nothing else the "dog" mental-unit refers to. Importantly, there is no "dogness" in reality (Plato was nuts).
That individual man who landed on Mars ("Max McPhobos" assuming that was an accurate statement of events above) is a plain-old valid mental-unit. It refers to a real, physical existent --- a specific man, a specific animal, a specific mammal, a specific lifeform, a specific physical object.
The last category of mental-units are not difficult to understand or apply. Each refers to a single, individual entity that exists.
The first category of mental-units should not be difficult to understand or apply. Each is a mental unit that does not refer to anything real (anything that exists).
The middle category of mental-units (abstrations) are those that most humans have no freaking clue how to hold in their consciousness, how to assign a state or status to, or how to manipulate in thought processes. Maybe this isn't surprising, since humans are the first animals to manipulate abstract mental units on a wide-spread basis.
The mental-unit we name "dog" (in English speaking countries) is a very simple abstraction. Nonetheless, it is extremely important to understand that "dog" has no existence, no meaning, no reality beyond... all individual entities that are similar enough for us to classify as "the same kind of existent", namely "dog".
Note that this category "dog", and all other mental-unit categories are utilitarian. They are not passed down from deity, and they are not quite somehow "the fundamental nature of reality". We must decide whether we shall include those critters we commonly call "fox" and/or "wolf" and/or "coyote" in the "dog" category or not. Depending on our degree of knowledge, and what is more utilitarian for our purposes as human beings (or aliens from the 6th planet around Beta Cygnii), we may are may not include each of those subsets.
What is important to note is, "dog" is a collection of sorts, a collection that has no existence whatsoever beyond those 8,765,432 individual critters. This abstract "dog" is only a mental-unit. A perfectly legitimate and useful one, but only if we understand what it means, and how it means it. If we start thinking that "dog" has some significance on its own, over and above the 8,765,432 similar critters, we are certain to end up talking about the "collective of dog"... just as humans talk about the "collective of man".
But there is no "collective of dog", and there is no "collective of man". The whole notion is flat out insane, on the face of it. This can be proven in a great many ways. But here is a fun one.
A man is a monkey.
A man is a mammal.
A man is an animal.
A man is a lifeform.
A man is a physical object.
A man is an existent.
So, does this make the mass of a "man" 6 times greater? Does it make the gravitational attraction of a "man" 6 times greater? Or does the above make the mass or gravitational attraction of ALL men 6 times greater, just because we have inserted him into 6 different utilitarian categories? Obviously not! Those categories are mental units.
Put another way, when "Max McPhobos" landed on Mars, one individual sentient being was on Mars.
When the second sentient being landed on Mars, do we have "two individual sentient beings", or THREE ?
I refer, of course, to:
1: Max McPhobos.
2: Man Number Two.
3: The collective of man (or sentient beings).
Anyone who things the answer is 3... is clinically insane. Sorry folks, some of you are. I'm not trying to offend, I'm trying to help you understand how badly your parents and teachers have screwed up your brain, your habituated way of operating your brain.
If you're still a bit suspect, what if the second dude on Mars was a sentient alien. Is that now a "collective of sentients"? What if a 3rd being lands, and that's another human. Now what do we have? One collective of humans, plus one collective of sentients? And if the 4th lander is another alien, does another collective land with him (the collective of aliens)? Can you see how literally absurd and crazy this line of thought is?
It is indeed quite useful to form and hold abstract mental-units. It is indeed sometimes quite useful to mentally consider similar individual existents as being "similar" (in the same category) for many kinds of thought processes. But we must be careful, because most individual existents can be included in dozens, hundreds, even thousands of categories, so we hvae to be very careful about such manipulations (abstract thought). Indeed, whenever we finish performing any abstract thought we must review our thought processes carefully to check for over-generalization and many other kinds of false processes, all of which [can and often do] lead to false conclusions.
So we see, "collective" is one of the most dangerous mental-units, but also perhaps the most fundamental. Why? Because every abstraction is a category, and every category is a collective of sorts.
But in every case, no matter what we are thinking about, all that exists in reality is the individual existents in those categories (and their actions and configurations). AND, the individual existents in each category are different from each other. They may be similar in some respects, even many respects, but they are ALL DIFFERENT --- every single one. Therefore, technically speaking, abstract thought is always overgeneralization. So we are stuck with the fact that "generalization is a very useful mental process" and "we must always be clearly aware we are overgeneralizing" and "we must invest significant time, effort and care before we apply our abstract thought to specific individual existents". Because the individuals are all that exist. Those collectives are merely mental constructs, as useful as they may be.
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A few nitpicks on the article.
The assumption about "tabula rasa" is completely wrong, even though he comes to the correct conclusion. A human and computer both have a "hardware aspect" and a "software aspect". If you erase all memory locations to zero, the computer is "tabula rasa". However, the CPU will still perform the same operations, the CPU still has the same capabilities, the CPU will still add, subtract, multiply, divide, and, or, xor, etc.
The bottom line is, "choice" is possible whether the being starts out "tabula rasa" or not. To a large extent, humans do start out "tabula rasa", at least at the level of consciousness we usually associate that term with. Yet nobody will deny that the built-in hardware of human peripheral nerves interact with the nerves in the brain in a way that is "pain" and "pleasure"... from birth and almost certainly before birth too.
The assumption echoed by the author about characteristics being caused by the environment is almost universal --- and blatantly wrong on an extremely fundamental level that should be obvious to everyone! I mean, the error is so obvious! The environment has effect on the individual because the environment and individual are both made out of physical matter, who can deny that? However, the conclusion always drawn from that observation is ABSURD... on the face of it. Why? Because... DUH... the individual is also made out of physical matter (as already pointed out), so if the physical matter of the environment can impact the character, behavior and nature of the individual, then the physical matter of the individual can ALSO impact the character, behavior and nature of the individual.
What's more, the individual is impacted by a wide variety of the outside world, yet the individual himself is always part of every interaction and impact. So the part of the process that is consistent, always there, and thus dominant (or potentially dominant) is the individual, not the external environment (though consistencies in the external environment certainly do matter).
Furthermore, due to the fact the individual is always part of the processes that happen to the individual, there are all sorts of accumulation processes, feedback processes, learning processes and other complex processes that can and do occur in the individual human --- that do not occur in the largely randomized external environment. In fact, only a few sophisticated configurations of matter (like neural nets and certain advanced inorganic systems) are capable of supporting most of the characteristics, behavior and nature that we call "consciousness".
To claim the dominant (much less entire) source of character, behavior and nature is in the external environment... is patently absurd on the face of it, for the reasons I itemized above, as well as others.
-----
The family unit is a red herring - part of falling into the "false alternative trap" the collectivist pig in the video foists on weak-minded fools. As widely practiced, the family is simply one more collective, and mostly harmful. Probably less harmful on average than turning infants over to any "official body", but harmful nonetheless. The fact is, humans are not property, humans are not slaves. Humans are not property of parents, humans are not property of the state, humans are not property of any collective, humans are not property PERIOD. Though a very young child is in a real bind, in the sense it cannot keep itself alive through its own wits and efforts for a dozen years or so. Nonetheless, every human is free from the day he is born. Period. And in many cases, a kid is wise to leave his parents at age 4 or 5, and attempt to find more rational, benevolent beings to feed him, and allow him to achieve sufficient wisdom and skills to become fully independent.
-----
It is amazing how many modern arguments simply don't exist once humans learn to operate their brains correctly. Humans spend trillions of man-hours arguing about the most absurd topics. Take "government" for instance. No such thing! How can people argue about "government" and "what the constitution sez" and endless other topics, when "government", "authorities", "laws" and so many other concepts are BOGUS. There are no "governments". None. There can not be "governments". The concept itself is inherently absurd. Anyone who understands how to operate their brain understands this. They don't even need to learn that all organizations are called "fictitious entities" in fundamental law. They simply ask themselves questions like the following...
If 2, 5, 10, 25 or 100 people sit at a table and decide to create a "corporation" named "Sugar High Bakery", or a "government" named "These United States of America" (or "the galactic empire")... does anything real POP into existence? Obviously not. Obviously all that happened is the participants reconfigured their brains slightly to form mental units in their brains with those names attached. A rational child of 4 years old can understand this if you explain slowly and clearly.
That anyone who reads ZH actually believes that they are subject to the arbitrary whims of a bunch of predators today, because a few dozen perverts sat around a table and signed a piece of paper that declared a fictional "government" 234-ish years ago... is absolutely, completely, utterly and clinically insane. I mean, this is as obvious as anything can be. Any number of groups of perverts sat around tables and created all sorts of fictions 2, 23, 234, 2345, 23456, and 234567 years ago... and every year between. And every single one of them created NOTHING REAL.
So to hold conversations about "rights" and "laws" and such is clinically insane. Worse, it is obviously insane. It is a similar kind of mistake as falling in the false alternative trap of saying "parents own kids" instead of "the collective owns kids"... and not noticing that "nobody owns kids" or that "the so-called collective cannot and does not exist in the first place". Being sane renders all insane arguments pointless. Even better, being sane renders all insane arguments clear (in the mind of sane folks, at least).
Before you hop off your seat, there is no question that "predators-DBA-government" are real. Oh, you bet the predators are quite real (while government is fiction), and the behavior of those predators is indeed the behavior of predators. And predators are damn dangerous. So this is a reasonable line of thought, and a reasonable basis for conversation and strategy formation. And indeed, if most humans did think in a sane manner, the vast majority of human predators would be eliminated in days. So don't say "being sane is irrelevant". The fact is, the only reason the atrocities of modern times are possible is because humans are insane. Sanity is the solution, quite possibly the only solution.
Very good.
And you certainly have a mechanistic 'mind', rather than a mentalistic one.
Mentalism and Mechanism - the twin modes of human cognition by Christopher Badcock:
http://www.thegreatdebate.org.uk/MentalismCB.html
Thanks again Honestann
It is always interesting reading your posts.
Always food for thought
Hon,
It's pretty obvious the term 'collective' is used in a figurative sense rather than a literal one.
Unless, of course, the person is crazy.
(or a far lefty)
But that's not how people actually think. Most people, most of the time, treat abstractions like "collective" and "ownership" like they are real. And they take the whole ball of inference that others insert into those terms, and accept them without much or any reflection.
You are basically correct, "unless the person is crazy". But my point is, at least 99.9999% of humans clearly are crazy, clinically insane.
Though "lefties" have their own way of perverting these concepts, the "righties" do also. The "righties" just as much support and take-seriously most fictional authoritarian abstractions. Hell, they believe in the "great emphasize the great, ultimate authority in the sky", and usually those human predators who promote themselves as agents of that authority. They then go out and burn people at the stake, start and fight various forms of "holy wars", etc. And they absolutely support authoritarian "government", just as much as "lefties" do. With slightly different emphasis of course, but certainly they are authoritarian, and certainly they are fundamentally collectivists. I mean, find me a "righty" who doesn't believe "government" exists (and performs a great many "legitimate" forms of assault against humans who never harmed anyone, but merely didn't follow the arbitrary rules their authorities set down).
The fact is, most "anarchists" are just as insane as the "lefties" and "righties". Most of them accept that "government exists", but just say "we prefer not to have any". They're sorta like vegitarians. They don't doubt that meat exists, they just don't want to eat any themselves. But sure, probably a few "anarchists" are sane, and understand that "government" is a fiction, and take their position on the basis of "sanity" rather than preferrence.
If a human clearly understands "collective" to be a figurative term, he will probably/hopefully not think or do anything crazy or harmful to others. But anyone who claims "government" exists, and has any kind of legitimate right to force people, steal from people (tax), or harm people... buys the notion of "collectivism" just as completely as a "crazy lefty".
Why can't we keep things simple here - fuck the collective.
Benjamin Franklin quote: "You have a republic mam, if you can keep it"
.... I don't think we have kept it.
Melissa Herry-Perry is a monster.
What is the European Union and the Euro other than collectivism? It robs national sovereignty of the nation and it's citizens, all in the name of "peace"?
In the U.S. the collectivism is more subtle; the false dichotomy of two parties that are essentially the same, the non-stop propaganda that we have free markets, rule of law, and a government that isn't trying to destroy the middle class.
You know, the anthem of the EU is "Alle Menschen werden Brüder" or "all men will become brothers" (comrades if you will). What the European crisis makes painfully clear is that people and countries are different. The EU tries to solve the crisis by trying to impose one economic model for all countries and they try to make one European demos (population). That is destined to fail. Many tried and failed. What they will achieve is creating unity among Europeans in their mutual hatred of the EU.
The US started with a blanks slate and created a common culture. But people there are waking up to that notion or social construct as well. Interesting stuff.
Damn, this is a good article. I am still reviewing it and digesting it but it is good.
I liked that the article said that the first thing that collectivist systems do is to isolate individuals from others (and TV and popular culture of capilist society works also like that: you run the risk of being ostrisized when you do not watch 'dancing with the stars').
Not everybody is born equal so any system of collectivism will eventually lead to neurosis, psychosis and other mental illnesses of the population, not to mention dangers to physical health. People need other people for sure to provide themselves with security and physical and mental wellbeing. But like the article says, that must be done in the community, not in the collective.
I regret reading this article as all it contained was disinformation. This writer completely overlooked the basic role of individualism which is to hide the role of systemic power in society. He also overlooked the view offered by social constructionism which is that our reality is socially constructed, as this implies individualism is illusory, As social constructionism has become the dominant paradigm in social science and he referred to numerous socai scirntists he should have known this.This article was probably paid for by the ruling elite.
Interesting notion. In 1) the blank slate he says that collectivists reason that people are born blank and that people are formed by their environment, the social construct. But he disproves that later in the paragraph. You are suggesting that individualism is also a collectivist social construct to take attention away from the ones who really are in power, , a bit of a Matrix if you will. So people are screwed either way. That is a rather defeatist and hopeless way of looking at the world. Individuals have a benefit over collectivists in that the former are more aware of the social constructs in the world, deception of collectivists systems and on who are really in power than the latter do. Whether or not they can do something about it is another matter.
The question is, what is more important in life: truth or hapiness (as promised by the collective, whether they'd be socialist or capitalist). To sound a bit corny: which pill do you prefer?
My view is that if people become aware of the power structures around then then they can start to challenge them when they see power being abused. For example in 2011 it was discovered that a secret power structure existed that owns and controls 80% of the world's wealth (Vitali, Galtfelder and Battiston). This is something that represents a serious threat to us all and that was hidden thanks in part to individualism. Exposing this power is a position of hope for a better future rather than being defeatist. I fall within the blank slate camp as it has actual research backing it up, such as the Milgram experiments.
While I have a problem with individualists, I also have issues with collectivists and favour a middle path, collaboration, where people resspect each other and power is shared.
I never heard of the study by vitali glattfelder and battiston so you could be right! ;-)
Thanks, I will look into this.
I would argue prains that it is exactly the collectivist mindset that has been indoctrinated into the "sheeple" of today's society that is the root reason why more people aren't outraged at what is happening today. The left/right paradigm, the education system that no longer teaches people to think for themselves, the rampant consumerism that will consume this nation; all of it stems from a glazing over of the mind and an acceptance of a collective sense of American exceptionalism.
. I would argue that the very foundation of the western dominance of the last 500 years has at its very core the notion of individual liberty and the individual sovereign rights of man. It is true that western society was and is far from perfect but you must also concede that the very ideas of liberty and consent of the governed has allowed for wrongs to be corrected. Its still not perfect. Life on this planet never will be, but as long as the foundation of society is freedom and liberty at an individual level then I believe there is hope for humanity.
. however if you look at the much younger history of collectivism. Look at Marx, linnen, Stalin, Hitler, Mao, and all the others who use a collectivised philosophy to snatch power from from the whole of the free people of a society that the results time and again have been horrendous. Death, imprisonment, starvation, servitude, slavery, and countless other descriptions are the hallmarks of a top down collectivised system. People are motivated for their own and their immediate family or social groups self interest. Someone who demands sacrifice for the whole really wants servitude of the one. They may call themselves repubs, demoncats, socialists, Nazis, their game is all the same. We are in this mess because the collective " progressive " ideology has snuck into our society over the last hundred or so years.
as long as individuals pay taxes they are the property of the collective
Free yourself, STARVE THE BEAST!!!
Collectivism means I did not build me?
FUCK collectivism, I was born this way and damn proud of it. I am tired of people trying to herd me to a common good. I KNOW what is GOOD for me!!! I do not need others in a nanny state telling me what is good for me.
Collectivism has already become the dominant philosophy.
It is most commonly expressed as voting and democracy ... the concept that your neighbours get to decide what is best for you.
Voting is the perfect expression of the collectivist' mind, made all the better because most of us don't recognise it for what it really is.
so O and Michelle have their kids in ULTRA private schools, I'm sure the clown in the video does the same while living in a exclusive neighborhood. Funny how it's for your kids not their's
Why make a simple topic so complex?
The one issue throughout all of history has been one persons desire to dominate the will of another.
That is as complicated as it gets.
You have voluntary cooperation or war. Those are the only two types of human relations that exist.
All the rest is obfuscation and distraction.
We are living in a world of overproduction,one day technology will eliminate the need for human employees,collectivism is a fatality.
-Alt-Market blog ...Put some libertarians on a island and they will create a governement without knowing it. What a Bunch of Lunatics!
...collectivism is a fatality...
Yup, and we call it "civilization".
Every civilization has its social networking with a pyramidal structure of power and command and a set of rules called "canons"; since time immemorial.
Capitalism is no exception and "individualism" is a state of perpetual utopia that often is exploited by the elites to feed dystopia in collective purges; wars and inquisitorial pogroms.
Double edged sword : fighting a power structure inside a "civilization" meme with a knee jerk that has no head nor tail.
'Cos the day it aquires a head and a stinging tail it becomes an alternative power meme within civilization.
No getting away from it; thats History.
Individualism is a stepping stone to a new collective meme and a new social network.
Ask Jesus on the Cross...or Caesar at the Rubicon.
Aye,
the sticky parts of this human organizational tendency is the power to restrain and the power to levy taxes.
These areas are where we tend to run amok.
Carl Jung;
"The psychology of a large crowd, inevitably sinks to the level of mob psychology."
"The mass is swayed by participation mystique, which is nothing other than an unconscious identity. .....if this condition increases, one literally feels borne along by the universal wave of identity with others. It may be a pleasant feeling ....one sheep among ten thousand."
"The mass psyche inevitably becomes the hypnotic focus of fascination, drawing everyone under its spell. That is why mases are always breeding grounds of psychic epidemics, the events in (Nazi) Germany being a classic example of this."
Jung: "Four Archetypes."
I'm amazed that an irrelevant media cesspool like MSNBC actually thinks it has the right to provocation like this. Why has their provocation even been raised here? For a second time?
Serious question about this site.
You see it as provocation, they see it as logical and sensible.
I don't react to their right to express opinion. I'm American, and that's how we roll.
I will react to it's implementation.
Next time I'm in a crowded theater I'm going to shout 'Fire' or 'There's that crazy fucking Batman shooter from Colorado'.
You can deal with the implementation.
Don't you ever wonder why someone like this can get on corporate owned news media television to talk nonsense? It can't be an accident.
The founding fathers believed in individual rights over collective rights, however, collectivism has become the new progressive ideology to contain an unruly population. Religions and empires are built on collectivism and guilt. Freedom is built on individualism.
The bottom line to me is collectivism is nothing more then the elite exerting control over the many. The many will fight amoungst themselves. The real problem is they want each citizen to turn on one another if they do not think like everyone else. They want people mind fucked and if you take the red pill you are a trouble maker, a malcontent, or whatever label they can apply to you. Critical thinking will die on the vine and throughout history these civiliztions collapse because they become stagnant.
Critical thinking and thinking outside the box is innovative. Yes sometimes people get lucky but most of the time a society where these two skills are frowned upon eventually withers and dies. Kings and Queens and the rest of us directed by them is not my cup of tea.
"no man is an island." and no island is a man.
though there is an isle of man?
man is born not a man but evolves or matures into
man and then an individual. the individual is an
evolved or matured self, sometimes is does not
happen but there seems to be no alternative.
.
April 11, 2013
To Be, or Not to Be...
"Man is made by his belief. As he believes, so he is."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
.
http://verbewarp.blogspot.com/
.
"I am what I am and that's all that I am"
Popeye
popeye made it !
Public school gibberish.
STARVE THE BEAST!!!
look in the mirror and see the beast, not for your eyes?
No Man Is An Island
No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee.
John Donne
You do realize that this is romantic rubbish, don't you?
Thousands of people will drop dead today and unless you personally know a few, it won't make a damn bit of difference.
The Earth still will rotate.
read it again and think about what made you u.
or who are u? and where does that come from?
yes, the earth will rotate but does that translate
into the human race/s using language or technology?
read it again. .....
Totally agree with Brandon on this.
The growth of camouflaged socialism has been pernicious across Western societies for decades. What we see today is the consequence of it. And like all socialists in the past, when socialism fails, they call for more. Enter: QE for example.
Is it not amazing that despite the growth of collectivism with all of its phony banners preaching "fairness", "equality", "social justice" and a whole lot more garbage, there is always a strict vertical hierarchy of elites that emerge. Not to practice what they preach, but to grab power for themselves and their cronies and comrades.
How equal was the Soviet Union when its masters lived in luxury with Western goods readily available to them and their obedient cronies in special shops, which were not available to the general population. And the so-called well maintained 'party-lanes' along which the masters were driven in luxury cars to avoid the traffic jams when travelling from one politburo blatherfest to another. It goes on. And we now see this same sickening & corrupt socialism emerging across the West, after spending decades ostensibly trying to defeat it in the East.
It goes almost without saying that collectivism finds the existence of strong national constitutions completely anathema, because they generally seek to protect individuals from the power of the State and place a line in the sand over which the State must not tread.
Collectivism is the "Progressives" camoufloged version of slavery. Instead of the lash for not doing what you are told you are fined or imprisoned or ostrasized. While not being forced to pick cotton for the man all day you are told by the "elites" how to think, what to think, and even your learning is controlled. They permit learning as long as it fits within their doctrine. The "individual" is denounced and in fact criminalized and cast out as a subversive and lunatic. If I'm not mistaken this is a parallel doctrine of what a certain dictator used in creating a "good Nazi".
Speaking of collectivism... your taxes are due monday. Just FYI. : (
Stop financing your own impoverishment and participating in world-wide mass murder by Ovomit and his Oligarchs.
STARVE THE BEAST!!!
"Your children, you didn't make that! The government screwed you first!"
“We are the Borg. Lower your shields and surrender your ships. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own. Your culture will adapt to service us. Resistance is futile.”
where is Marla?
Jerry Garcia & Merl Saunders - Positively 4th street (1973) Live
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BSwbhZFBkA&NR=1&feature=endscreen
Well said! I agree with everthing you wrote.
STARVE THE BEAST!!!
She may have made her statement in the wrong way, but I understand the sentiment of communities taking responsibility for the education of its children.
If we look at the other side of the coin, because its seems the Randian idealist only looks at black and white, we have Individualism as the correct path. I have to wonder if the people who see Individualism as such a great choice over Collectivism think that kids having to go deeply into debt to get an education and the hope of landing a job that pays a living wage is such a wonderful goal? Maybe if we were back in the pioneer days such a ideology could seem possible, but how does survival of the fittest work in the modern world? We see the oligarchs piling up their spoils while austerity, budget cuts, and "liberal" Democrats dismantling the social safety net are to be the necessary medicine for the freeloaders. The Randians jump on anybody who dares to speak of the need for public education as a Marxist. Maybe the woman overstated the responsibility to the point where it engaged the "police state radar", but it does not diminish the need for a good, low cost public education.
Like health care, we can look around the rest of the developed world and see how public education should work. Finland is often presented as an example for the rest of the world to look at.
"Teachers in Finland spend fewer hours at school each day and spend less time in classrooms than American teachers. Teachers use the extra time to build curriculums and assess their students. Children spend far more time playing outside, even in the depths of winter. Homework is minimal. Compulsory schooling does not begin until age 7. “We have no hurry,” said Louhivuori. “Children learn better when they are ready. Why stress them out?”
It’s almost unheard of for a child to show up hungry or homeless. Finland provides three years of maternity leave and subsidized day care to parents, and preschool for all 5-year-olds, where the emphasis is on play and socializing. In addition, the state subsidizes parents, paying them around 150 euros per month for every child until he or she turns 17. Ninety-seven percent of 6-year-olds attend public preschool, where children begin some academics. Schools provide food, medical care, counseling and taxi service if needed. Student health care is free."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/feb/15/us-education-reform-lessons-from-finland
So, please give me an example of your Randian utopia that is better than the Finnish system? Theese libertarian Utopias are all smoke an mirrors for the oligarchs.
Freedom is the only thing that works, at least for the little people. Everything else is a form of slavery and the only thing that matters then, is who holds your chains.
Nice sound bite. Now about the real world...
Your "utopian" collective in europe is going to fall flat on its ass because it was [and is] unsustainable.
With a hat tip to Jack Nicholson [As Good as It Gets], take your leftist wack-a-doo BS and failed socialist policies to a different country – “Sell crazy someplace else, we're all stocked up here”.
About Greater Goodstm, "former" nazi to former Hitler's personal secretary, on why they did it: "we knew it was wrong, but we thought it was for a 'greater good'..." - need explaining?
the flesh is not the individual, it is the connectivity
involved that makes the individual man/woman. that is not a "thing"
and is not something that can be called property or be
owned. one might claim copywriter authority over it but
that could never be established so there it is. not only is it
a fiction and irrelevance to propose the "collective"(whatever
that might be?) could own the individual, it is also a fiction
and irrelevance to propose that the individual could "own"
itself. it just is and nothing in the realm of property rights
has any place or relevance in the discussion. imho
And who isn't a sucker for "blonde bombshells"? http://shutupnsing.wordpress.com/2013/04/13/the-universities-of-radicalism-collective-professors/