Nope. Most people are collectivists, I wager.

Opposed to collectivism but voted for a collectivist. But it’s my imagination that you voted for a collectivist — even though you did. But Trump isn’t a collectivist…no wait, he is. But most people are…so, you did but you didn’t.

It’s like Faye Dunaway in Chinatown: “My sister, my daughter, my sister, my daughter!”

Always stimulating.

I don’t see politicians as more than job holders. They certainly aren’t avatars of any one ideology. You’re just trying to make a last-ditch efforts to ascribe to me views I do not espouse and do not hold. If you want to know my real views, I’ll tell you, but unfortunately I’m faced with this weird posturing.

ascribe to me views I do not espouse and do not hold. — NOS4A2

I’ll make it explicit: I don’t care about what you think you believe. I care about actions and decisions in the real world. You have voted for and defended Trump. That speaks volumes— whatever else you want to profess. To say nothing of the numerous other repugnant positions you’ve held.

So yeah, you’re anti-statist, pro-individual, pro “freedom,” blah blah blah. And the guy down the street is “Christian” yet beats his wife and hates homosexuals. Who cares.

Also, it’s not posturing. It’s having fun with the resident fascist.

You’ve made a little caricature and premise your judgements on it. You poison your own well. Then you froth and seethe wherever I appear despite claiming you don’t care. Clearly you do.

I didn’t say I didn’t care. I said I don’t care about what you think you believe. I care deeply about fighting sociopathic, Trump supporting fascists at every turn.

Well, you’re not getting any swings in, that’s for sure. You’re not fighting anything. You’re staring at a screen reading words. Is this really the extent of your moral behavior, your deep caring?

Sorry; this isn’t fighting, and frothing on the internet is no display of moral behavior. What we can do is talk about these ideas.

Is this really the extent of your moral behavior, your deep caring? — NOS4A2

Yep.

You’ve made a little caricature — NOS4A2

I’m pretty sure you’ve done that yourself.

Feel better?

OK, I'm interested in the idea of a compassionate, caring individualist. There's over a million children in Yemen right now on the brink of starvation. The UN is delivering aid using about $2 billion of taxpayer's money. The collectivist, big government, strategy.

Given that the individualist cares about these starving children, what's the individualist strategy to prevent their suffering?

You seem to avoid naming concrete examples of liberal ideas that were implemented and how they led to the problems you describe. "Just look at Chile and Kansas" obviously won't do if you're trying to make a convincing point, just like it wouldn't do for me to criticize socialism and end with "Just look at the Soviet Union".

Simultaneously, you ignore my point that we live in highly collectivist societies, as evidenced for example by high tax rates, big government, etc. Again, the idea that we have ever lived in some form of liberal utopia, and that we can blame the liberal utopia for the situation we are in, does not seem to hold much ground.

I’m not scapegoating either. They’re useful covers for the anti-democratic, anti-new deal ruling class. — Mikie

Maybe so. But why then take issue with the ideas of genuine liberals? This is sort of like blaming Nietzsche for Hitler.

But the bottom line here is whether government truly is the problem, and if so what the alternative is. The decisions need to be made one way or another; the entire theory basically transfers decision making to private enterprise, with predictable results. Despite all the pleasant phrases about freedom. — Mikie

The first thing that needs to change is for government to stop being an instrument for big cooperations to achieve special positions in the market - something which is happening today at alarming levels and can only happen because governments have powers they shouldn't have.

One reason for this is the fact that western governments have started to use propaganda on a large scale against their own populations to further their own agendas. To create domestic support, to support political candidates, to promote certain corporate interests, etc.

In this war against the common man information is the primary weapon. Censorship, ommiting truth, and downright spreading lies are everyday activities for the modern western government, and a great deal of this is done wherever big corporate interests meet the interests of the political elite.

If you ask what the alternative is: my first step would be complete government transparency. Every document, every recording, every word uttered by a politician in power or government official should be available to the public from day one. If the truth can't stand the light of day, then the writing is already on the wall.

If there is no transparency, there are no checks and balances, and without those an upright government is pure fantasy.

I’ve yet to see Hellenistic analyses of the self. — Mikie

Plato's concept of the tripartite soul, for example. Homer's sophrosyne, that went on to inspire many thinkers after him like Zeno, Cicero, Thomas Aquinas, etc.

The words "Know thyself" were inscribed on the Temple of Apollo in Delphi.

The ancient Greeks did plenty of thinking on that subject.

If we look at how families function, most of these ideas about individualism, collectivism, etc, completely break down. — Mikie

How so? Would you say the individual that is made profoundly unhappy by their family still owes them their loyalty?

As with government, it only becomes a problem when the relations become defunct, and I think what you're describing only makes sense in a family that functions properly.

Unlike the “will of all” the “general will” refuses to take into account the private and particular interests of all individuals involved. It excludes them. Instead, it takes account of something called the “common interest”. — NOS4A2

The "Will of all" can be implemented both as a collective, and as an individual. But so to can the "Will of self". An individualist with the will of self does not care at all about their impact on other people, and can be completely exclusionary. A collectivist society that narrows itself also has a "will of self". The best example I can think of is a totalitarian society in which a self extends its will completely over others and a certain percentage of society agrees with this and enforces it.

I have appreciated the conversation, but perhaps I am diverging on the points you want to address here. To say that collectivism is more or less exclusionary than individualism, as a blanket statement, is wrong. If you wish to compare certain exclusionary collectivist ideologies and compare them to a particular inclusive individualistic ideology, then of course you can. There is no debate that a particular inclusive individual ideology is more inclusive then particular exclusive collectivist ideology.

If you want to bring this back to the point of a blanket statement, I would compare the most exclusionary individualistic ideology, like solipsism, and compare it to the most inclusionary collectivism such as a rights based democratic ideology, and demonstrate why why solipsism is more inclusive. But unless such a comparison can be correctly made, I don't think it can be reasonably concluded that all collectivist ideologies are more exclusive then all individualistic ideologies.

Feel better? — NOS4A2

I’d feel better if individualists were more inclusive towards collectivists.

I was speaking of politics, collectivism as the principle of giving the group priority over the individual, and individualism as the principle of giving the individual priority over the group. It’s where we give political primacy or rights or freedoms or protections to one or the other opposing political unit, the individual or the group.

One approach has to, by necessity, consider the wills of each individual involved. As far as abstractions go “the individual” is universal. The other isn’t. It considers at best some general will, at worst the will of a faction or of one man while excluding the rest.

But your point that there are different collectivisms and individualisms is true; these are protean terms and I will not argue that there can only be one definition or application. If by individualism we’re considering only the will of one man, then you are right, he’s being exclusive. I appreciate the objections.