Warning: this one is a bit … let’s say, for laughs. While I believe it, I’m also aware that if someone was telling it to me, I’d begin to think that he or she was going a bit too far, maybe “losing it”… 
So, please, don’t take it too seriously.
One of the big differences between individualism and collectivism is that the former believes in individual responsibility, where the latter doesn’t.
For instance, if a man becomes a criminal, individualism says it’s his own responsibility, while a collectivist will say it was his “environment”, his “upbringing”, his “genes”, or, in a more general way, “society’s fault”.
Conversely, if a man brilliantly succeeds in some field, a collectivist will say that he was “lucky” to have such opportunities, or such an education, or something - while the individualist position is that that man is responsible for his own achievement, and has a right to be proud. (that doesn’t mean he didn’t have help, but it would be actual help (such as the parents who took care of him as a child, the teachers who taught him, a partner who worked together with him), not “his environment”, or “his upbringing”, or some other crap.)
Now, let’s move to a completely different field: the heating in an open space office. No, really, bear with me.
I work in an open space office, and it’s winter here. Lisbon, in winter, is not incredibly cold (it never snows here, for instance), but you certainly can’t go out without some layers of clothing.
Now, the office here is heated up. Commonplace, right? But it’s collectivism in action - instead of each one doing what’s required for him or her to be comfortable, “the system” does it for everyone - whether you like it or not, since anyone who ever asks to lower the heater is treated as an evil selfish monster.
Furthermore, people seem to believe that the room shouldn’t be just as warm as a warmer winter day. Oh no. They heat it so much that it’s only comfortable if you’re wearing spring, or even summer clothes. Short sleeves and such. Now, who ever leaves home wearing those… in winter?
And it’s not that way just in offices. In Portugal, any shopping center, in winter, is so freaking hot inside, that people have to leave not only coats, but wool shirts, and possibly even long-sleeved shirts in their cars. What about those who don’t come by car? Tough luck. The “people” have spoken, and the people want everything summer-hot.
Am I just weird? Or is it the world that has gone insane?
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It is the world… it has gone insanely cold :-S
lol you see this everywhere. in the winter, buildings are heated to the point where you’re sweating, even in a tank top. but more important for where i live (the deep south of the US) - is the summer. because then, by some moronic move of logic, they figure all the classrooms, offices, and grocery stores need to be as cold as a cold southern winter’s day. what this leads to is three unhappy consequences:
(1) in the winter, you must wear summer clothes under your winter clothes to abide the heat
(2) in the summer, you must carry or tie around your waste big, heavy sweatshirts to abide the cold
(3) you’re sick the whole damned year.
gotta love it.
“the individualist position is that that man is responsible for his own achievement. (that doesn’t mean he didn’t have help, but it would be actual help, not “his environment”, or “his upbringing”, or some other crap.)”
Is there is a difference between actual help and environmental help or upbringing? Why is one crap and not the other? I’m not sure what you mean by actual help, since it seems perfectly obvious to me that we are helped by many people throughout our lives. Our environment certainly contributes something, as does our upbringing. My personal belief is that when we benefit individually, we have a responsibility to contribute collectively and to ensure that future generations have the same or better access to what we took advantage of. Its like being a farmer. You are allowed to take what you can from the land, but if you take too much, the farm will become exhausted and be unable to grow anything any more. You must feed the system just as you must feed yourself.
What individualists do is claim that they don’t need collectivism to be successful, they can do it on their own, but all of civilization is simultaneously a collectivist and individualist project. Individualists take the easy way out by pretending that the benefits that they take advantage of are purely individualistic. Like your “actual help” vs “fictional help” that you want to pretend doesn’t exist. Of course, people have good reasons for pretending certain facts don’t exist. They might help you take a more extreme position against people who you think are evil, or to advance a particular political goal. Those might very well be worthwhile goals, but just because a goal is good doesn’t mean that the strongest argument that supports it is true.
Mike: hey, don’t be so serious. This wasn’t such a serious post.
Your farmer example could be seen in a different POV: by ruining the earth, you are harming yourself too. So it’s a stupid thing to do.
As for “a responsibility to contribute collectively”… I don’t think I’d go that far. I think that, by trying to improve our own lives while respecting the rights of others (which collectivists always believe individuals never do, for some reason, even though it’s one of the main points of individualism), you end up improving the lives of everyone else around you, even if that wasn’t your actual goal. But to say that you have some kind of duty to improve others’ lives… I don’t think so. We’ll agree to disagree, or disagree to agree, or something like that.
Anyway, my point in the part you quoted wasn’t that we didn’t need anyone else, but was, instead, that most people never take responsibility for anything they do - good or bad. And they prefer a “nanny government” (or group, or state, or organization, or whatever) to take away any shred of responsibillty left - and, although the room heat example was mostly for the humor, in a way it’s also a true example of how people don’t want the responsibility of taking care of their own body warmth… or anything else.
At the beginning of your post you seem to be either comparing “apples” with “oranges” . . .
If a man becomes a criminal it is, indeed, his own responsibility but, the collectivist is not wrong by suggesting that what got him to that point in his life is environment, upbringing, genes or even a corrupt society. There is no contradiction there! The “crime” is still his responsibility.
The same for your “success” example . . . a man can be proud of his achievements and take credit for them and still recognize that it’s the other “crap” you point out that helped him along the way.
. . . or, perhaps, your reasoning is just beyond me.
If a man becomes a criminal it is, indeed, his own responsibility but, the collectivist is not wrong by suggesting that what got him to that point in his life is environment, upbringing, genes or even a corrupt society. There is no contradiction there! The “crime” is still his responsibility.
My point there was that I disagree with the first part.
IMO, environment, upbringing, genes and society are influences, sure. But what “got him to that point in his life” were his choices.
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