Individualistic Thinking

Is individualism a myth? Or is thinking that we are completely independent, self-reliant, and free to do what we each individually want a form of mythological thinking?

A lot of people in the U.S. and elsewhere seem to believe that an individual should be the only person who determines what his or her own actions should be, often without consideration for how those actions may affect others or what the practical consequences of everyone thinking and acting that way might be. Maybe that is the case for some people. But let’s explore that way of thinking.

Let’s start with biology. Who has come into this world solely on his or her own independent and self-reliant actions? Who has escaped the process of sperm fertilizing egg in order to be born? Aside from some religious origin stories, I can’t think of anyone. And even those religious origin stories involve a virgin who gave birth or a white elephant. So, no one was born completely by his or her own doing. Going further, who can survive completely on their own? Our biological needs for energy, water, and oxygen cannot be met in a vacuum. Our ability to meet those needs may rely on other species to supply us with energy, to clean our water, to create our oxygen. Does this biological interconnection and interdependence disprove individualism?

From a socio-cultural perspective, how does individualism hold up? Do we need social interaction? Is it a biological need? Maybe for the first decade or two of our lives? Can we survive on our own from the moment we are born? Legally, in our culture parents are generally responsible for their children for the first 18 years. And, in the modern societies and cultures we have created, do we need to have certain social and cultural competencies to survive once we are on our own? Is it possible to learn those competencies in a vacuum? What about the fact that when we are around other people (and even other species) our nervous systems sync up? We co-regulate each others’ nervous systems. Does that blur the boundaries between so-called individuals? And, did we just cycle back to biology? Is this an infinite loop?

So, what’s so bad about individualistic thinking?

Does it convince us to think and act in ways that may not be beneficial to ourselves and those around us? Does it give us license to be self-centered, even solipsistic? Does it give us a false sense of self? That we are each an island or some such other isolated metaphorical entity? Does it afford us the ability to ignore the interconnection and interdependence that is imperative for our survival? Does it give us another thing to argue about?

None of this is to say that there should be no individual rights, but is everything that we lump into that concept really a matter of individual rights? Or does the mythological nature of individualism require us to rethink what individual rights might mean?

Is individualistic thinking equivalent to buying into the idea that your “self” exists and is therefore owed something for being in existence?

Or is individualism just a myth?

I don’t know.