Individualism
Individualism is the tail end by-product of humans’ search for emancipation and, consequently, is commonly conflated with emancipation itself. The development of “individualism” as a concept corresponding to two factors:
- The cyclical expansion of wealth afforded by material progress
- The impotency of the present-day ruling class
Fully developed, human history is viewed through the lens of countless subjects engaged in temporary alliances towards their own self-interest. However, it is only with the real history of humankind that individuals can envision themselves as such. The more truly individual a person is, the less they are capable of asserting themselves (and others) as such. The reliance of conceptual individualism on the full history of human social development is supported in three critical ways:
Barring the benefits of prior social development (not the least of which is language itself), the human individual, as demonstrated by feral children, is reduced to a reactive bumbling scavenger. Accordingly, “human as individual” develops in proportion to material and technological development of society where the perception of reliance on others is obfuscated by the cheapness and general availability of peoples needs and wants. Without the illusion of modern “personal wealth,” made more abundant only by an increasingly less personal global supply chain, the true individual returns to their natural slavery.
Without the alienating solitude of modern specialization and wage-labor, the true individual has no perspective from which to falsely affirm their own self-reliance. Accordingly, “human as individual” develops in proportion to their feeling isolated and alone in their labor and finds the affirmation of themselves as an individual through exchange. By receiving a wage in exchange for their labor and in turn exchanging that for what they need and want, they obtain the appearance of creating their own fortune and livelihood in total, independent of society.
Without the antagonizing frustration brought about daily by their supposedly natural superiors (bosses, experts, political leaders), the individual has no command to which they could possibly respond “I know better.” Having no one to command them, the individual would be compelled to reconcile their apparent knowledge and skill with that of their true selves, thereby, recognizing the need for greater social assistance.