Neither Individualism nor Self-Interest can be a political principles. If people are told to pursue their self-interest or to become individuals then they are being treated as a collective and are being centrally instructed and governed. Indeed I would say that political regimes use Individualism to weaken the power of the collective so that it is easier to govern: the classic divide and conquer. The last thing a government wants is for people to join together and over power it as happens in revolutions.
Monty-Python satirised this perfectly in ‘The Life of Brian’ when Brain tells the masses that they are all Individuals and they reply in unison that they are all individuals. Maybe this was poking fun at the mindless nature of people of faith, but really for me it was driving the stake into the idea of telling people that they are individuals. It is fashionable in our culture to be an individual; it is the common philosophy of people here; it is the collective consciousness to view oneself as an individual; if Individualism is the truth then there is one thing of which we can be sure: all people share solidarity in being individuals.
This is the problem of the usual understanding of Individual: it is contradictory. One is only an individual when one doesn’t know it, doesn’t codify it and tell other people about it, and doesn’t enforce it upon other people. Anarchy as I’m trying to show in this blog isn’t a form of truth that can be taught, understood or made into a political movement like the others.
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