Individualism and Ahimsa

Individualism is fundamental to modern culture. It is a guiding principle in our social and political life and difficult issues are often discussed only in terms of individual rights, to the exclusion of any other plausible consideration.

Does individualism always make sense? Clearly, the near-sacralization of gun rights has led to great harm. Of course, if you sell a gun to someone, they probably won’t use it to rob and kill. But if you sell enough guns to enough someones, then you end up with more murders than you would otherwise have had. The question isn’t merely whether an individual has a right to buy an AR-15; we also have to consider whether society can protect itself from mass shootings. Obviously the social need is more important than the individual right in this case, unless you inflate individualism to an absolute value.

If individualism is an absolute value, then we are saying that human life isn’t sacred, but that individual impulses are. We fall into a narcissistic despair, which we can see all around us.

But let’s look at individualism itself more closely. There is clearly a wide range of opinions about what individualism is and what it’s good for. Some see individualism as primarily resistance to the demands of society:

“The word ‘We’ is as lime poured over men, which sets and hardens to stone, and crushes all beneath it, and that which is white and that which is black are lost equally in the grey of it. It is the word by which the depraved steal the virtue of the good, by which the weak steal the might of the strong, by which fools steal the wisdom of the sages.

What is my joy if all hands, even the unclean, can reach into it? What is my wisdom, if even fools can dictate to me? What is my freedom, if all creatures, even the botched and impotent, are my masters? What is my life, if I am but to bow, to agree and obey?

But I am done with this creed of corruption.

I am done with the monster of ‘We,’ the word of serfdom, of plunder, of misery, falsehood and shame.

And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride.

This god, this one word:

‘I.’”

–Ayn Rand, Anthem

Note that Rand doesn’t talk about the specific demands that society makes on the individual. And I might add, how often are individuals in deep conflict with the society that raised and educated them?

On the other hand, individualism can be seen as a matter of alienation and isolation:

“For everyone now strives most of all to separate his person, wishing to experience the fullness of life within himself, and yet what comes of all his efforts is not the fullness of life, but full suicide, for instead of the fullness of self-definition, they fall into complete isolation.”

–Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov

And then there’s individualism linked to the broader society:

“Remember always that you not only have the right to be an individual, you have an obligation to be one.”

–Eleanor Roosevelt

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/individualism

To whom, or what, do we owe that obligation? A narcissist might say “to oneself,” but that’s clearly not what Roosevelt meant.

Instead, she is hinting at a key issue: individualism wouldn’t exist without a culture that socializes people to see themselves as individuals and to act accordingly; individualism is created by society, which had its reasons for doing so. Hence, individualism must include obligations to the society that created it.

And chief among those obligations, as she points out, is to become an individual—-to conscientiously follow that social norm.

So, being an individual is not effortless, and in fact it must be a process, because this obligation cannot be fulfilled overnight. Education, experience and maturity all play a role. You don’t get to be an individual simply by claiming that you are.

Rand, Dostoyevsky and Roosevelt each have their own version of individualism. Of these three which is the most nuanced and balanced? Which is the most realistic? Which is the most sustainable?

And that’s not to deny that sometimes individualism results in a damaging degree of isolation, or that society can sometimes oppress the individual. Dostoyevsky in particular makes a good point.

But still, what is individualism? It is a focus on individual experiences, feelings and thoughts; it is the assumption that adults can make many decisions for themselves without their families or society having veto power; individuals can choose whom to marry, what religion to follow and what education to pursue. They can decide on their diet, their clothes and what music they listen to. They can decide what they value and what they reject.

And note that I said, “many decisions.” Not all—there are limits even to individualism.

Although individualism is pervasive, it is more welcome in some areas than others. It is natural for storytellers and poets to focus on individuals, but organized religion is more problematic. Although free will is part of orthodox Christian belief, Christianity claims to be the final arbiter of value, the ultimate judge of good and evil. This inevitably collides with individualism.

If you think about it, this is an unusual situation. You might suppose that the normal function of religion is to define the values of society, including its ethical system, sexual mores, gender roles, et cetera. Certainly, the people who run Iran think so, and they’re not the only ones. I’m not in favor of such an expansive role for religion, but I can see the Ayatollah’s point: Islam determines what Iranian society values, because there’s no alternative that has any legitimacy, at least to the pious.

With individualism and organized Christianity, we are witnessing the aftereffects of the religious wars of the seventeenth century and the Enlightenment of the eighteenth. We socialize our children to be individuals partly so the West will never again be torn apart by religious wars.

And individualism goes back even further than the Thirty Years War; it has an ancient history. The Iliad is not about the clash of peoples but about individuals: Achilles, Patroclus, Diomedes and Hector. And the Odyssey is at its center the story of a man who cannot find his way home.

And this individualistic bent was not limited to ancient Greece. What could be more individual than the grief of Gilgamesh or Jacob’s vision of the angels?

Without this archaic version of individualism, the archetype of the Hero would be impossible.

But ancient heroes did not take up arms against society or the state religion. It is only when we reach Socrates, who is practically modern, that we encounter an individual in direct opposition to society, particularly at his trial.

And his example is important. In ancient times heroes could fight with monsters or struggle against fate, but as society became more cohesive and perhaps oppressive, the individual emerges in opposition. By late medieval times the shift is complete. We can easily imagine a figure like William Tell fighting a dragon a thousand years earlier, and likewise for Robin Hood. But as much as they resemble their rugged predecessors, they are social rebels. The content of their individualism has changed.

But for other medieval and early modern figures, individualism was rooted in the life of the spirit: Joan of Arc, Meister Eckhardt, Luther, and of course Faust.

For Protestantism, the relationship of the individual to God, unmediated by any human institution, was paramount; the content of individualism was God’s grace and guidance. This strengthened the individual conscience against collectivism (particularly the collectivism of the Roman Catholic Church) and fostered a stronger sense of responsibility.

And building on that, the Enlightenment saw the content of individualism as Reason, moderation, and a devotion to justice. Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin are examples—as were Lincoln and FDR.

The idea that individualism has content implies that individualism isn’t necessarily a “good thing,” as Martha Stewart would say, and people in many eras and cultures seem to have preferred collectivism. Fascism and communism both attempted to control or de-emphasize individualism, especially the Enlightenment model of individualism. The control was accomplished by indoctrinating the individual with values decided on by the party or the ministry of propaganda. Here individualism was co-opted by the collective.

There is a ticklish problem of distinguishing between the socialization people receive in an open, democratic society, which necessarily involves shared values and beliefs—hard work, the rule of law, duty to one’s country, and so on—-and the indoctrination that occurs under fascism and communism, which also includes an emphasis on duty, obedience to the law, and industriousness. The difference can be subtle, but democratic socialization also includes truthfulness, integrity, and our common humanity.

And democratic socialization is something we decided on ourselves, over many generations; it wasn’t designed by a dictator or a destructive political movement.

Several years ago, I heard a spokesman for the American Conservation Union (ACU) say that the rights of the individual are the basis of the conservative movement. Although I doubt that, I admired his clarity and succinctness.

Should our socialism be based on individual rights? This is a vital question. We are so used to thinking of our Constitutional rights that we can’t articulate the rights we really need: the right to be free of misinformation, the right to not be killed by our economy, the right to climate stability, the right to a good, useful education, the right to have children without living in poverty, the right not to be ruled by billionaires. These are all collective rights that benefit individuals as well, and that is the sort of rights our socialism should emphasize: rights that are claimed and exercised by humanity as a whole, but which also benefit individuals.

The old Constitutional (and common-law) rights sometimes still matter, but what’s the use of the right to either go to church or watch football on Sunday? We live in a profoundly destructive system, and the rights that count are the ones we can use to change that system. Fighting for your right to party is absolutely nowhere.

And we need to realize that discussions about individual rights can be profoundly misleading. Is gun control about the right to purchase a weapon? No, it’s mostly about gun manufacturers’ right to sell weapons versus the right to life of everyone else. It’s a conflict between capitalism and the well-being of the people.

To sum up: individualism is not an absolute value; human life is. Individualism has content, and this content can either diminish human life or make it more abundant.

If the content is selfishness and resentment, then that diminishes the individual and everyone around him; it diminishes the human race.

But if the content is reasonableness and compassion, courage and self-sacrifice, then that’s entirely different; everyone benefits.

If people think that individualism is an absolute value—perhaps in the belief that it’s the same as freedom—then this amounts to a denial of the bonds that unite human beings.

But far from being an absolute value, modern individualism itself is a social construct. Individualism is socialized into people in the West, and to what purpose? It’s to create personalities who are capable of making reasonable social, political and economic choices. So modern individualism and Reason are, since the time of the Enlightenment, strongly correlated.

Individualism is therefore a mechanism of rational change. Western civilization, so clearly the result (and cause) of centuries of change, has developed a mode of socialization to help people shape that change in beneficial ways. At least in theory….

But individualism can be co-opted. It’s easy to convince people that their destructive impulses and habits are rights, e.g. the “right” to smoke in hospitals, the “right” to drink margaritas at 7 am, the “right” to scream racial slurs at people on the street.

This co-opted version of individualism legitimizes anarchic and divisive behavior, and de-legitimizes (by indirect association) Enlightenment individualism, the sort that Eleanor Roosevelt meant.

And today we must use that genuine individualism, the one that comes from education and suffering,  to oppose billionaire capitalism and the immense harm it causes.

And consistent with ahimsa, no one has the right to do harm.