Does the rise of individual anarchism in the US play into the indivdualism and narcissim of US culture?

Question

More akin to 'right' libertarianism? I see similar critiques playing out amongst the varying camps.

edited for tags

Comments

theoretically or actually?  My measure is there are far more red/communist/collectivist types 'anarchy' types in the US than individualist/egoist, so if the measure is the amount of people who have actually found it appealing because it plays into 'mainstream' values, well, theres your answer...which is no.  Just because you use the same word "individualism" to talk about something doesnt mean you are actually talking about the same thing.  Its kind of a lazy argumentative tactic that associates something people call themselves with a totally different meaning descriptor with what is assumed to be a lot of negative baggage so that people now connote the two.  Since anarchist individualism/egoism began, its actors have been called 'bourgeois' and like slanders in every country where those people have existed, from social democratic to fascistic, but this coming seemingly exclusively from communists and red anarchist types because they refused to adopt their programs.

If you want more than this for an answer, youll have to define individualism and narcissism as they exist in the dominant culture and what is the same about those things and individualist/egoist anarchy.

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Do you have any more thoughts on this question now?

Answer 1

yes and no, i'd say.
there are multiple and conflicting tendencies in u.s. culture, including both an excess of personal responsibility (i am the master of my fate), and an excess of social responsibility (i can do nothing without masses of people).
--i'm short cutting, obviously; the point is that there are two strong tendencies that seem to directly oppose each other. yet they operate at the same time in the same person (all of us) just fine, cause folks're flexible like that.--
and both tendencies, i'd say, have something important in them. we are not atomized individuals, neither are we social drones.
so people can take *any* theory that falls between those poles and make it simplistic.
i wouldn't say individual anarchism is unique in any way, along those lines.

Comments

i just wish the egoist writers would fucking stop using that as their personal identities and branch out a little bit...can't they slaughter that sacred cow as well?!