People seem to be confused about what collectivism is.

[heavenlyboy34]

Well I think it's a bit childish to just hate something for being collectivistic. I define myself as an Individualist politically speaking. However, I'm an Individualist in the ancient Indo-European sense. As in, I still value things like culture, language, heritage, nations while putting a healthy emphasis on the Individual. The original Liberals & Mutualists were along that line of thinking as well.

What do you mean by "Indo-European" in this context? In linguistics, this refers to a language family spread throughout the Indian sub-continent and Westward. I haven't found many "individualist" cultures in that region prior to the rise of classical Liberalism in the West. Perhaps you could enlighten me.

ETA: here's a map of the Indo-European language family-

 

[otherone]

Collectivists view the group as an entity of its own, with rights of its own.

SPOT ON! (Emphasis mine). Individuals have Rights, not groups. Collectivism has nothing to do with "lumping people together". It's about undermining the DoI and BoR. It's a recipe for justifying positive Rights and necessarily the State.

 

[PaulConventionWV]

I don't know ... there are two definitions according to webster:

1: a political or economic theory advocating collective control especially over production and distribution; also : a system marked by such control

2: emphasis on collective rather than individual action or identity

I think stereotyping and bigotry do fall under definition 2. "All cops are bad" emphasizes collective identity, rather than the individual.

So perhaps stereotyping is just another form of collectivism? So stereotyping is collectivism, but collectivism isn't necessarily stereotyping..

 

[PaulConventionWV]

What year? I think it was 1974 for me, junior high! We were put into groups and had to decide as a group. It was so disturbing at the time. I don't remember details.

Lol this was just 4 years ago. Come to think of it, it's been a while, but that was my freshman year of college and it seems like yesterday. It was in an English class that was part of the generally required curriculum for that school.

 

[July]

"It's not looking at the individual and thinking they should be like other individuals from that group. It's looking at the individual and thinking they should be in lock step with that group."

Those sound like the exact same things. What's the difference?

Force. Stereotyping is assuming that all members of a group share some similar characteristic. I don't think there is actual collectivism until coercion becomes part of the equation, though. Subjugating individuals or minorities to the will of the majority, etc.

For by art is created that great ‘Leviathan’ called a ‘Commonwealth’ or ‘State,’ in Latin civitas, which is but an artificial man, though of greater stature and strength than the natural, for whose protection and defence it was intended;

- Thomas Hobbes

Collectivism is when the group literally has it's own distinct identity or personality, as an entity in of itself, which all members of the group identify with.

 

[BAllen]

Collectivism is the excuse for reverse discrimination. Whites are passed over for the 'good of the group'. What happens when the affirmative action hire's lack of qualification threatens the safety of the group? Is that justifiable? I've never heard the supporters' answer that question.

 

[BAllen]

Our education system is another example of failed collectivism. School standards are lowered to allow minorities to pass, and it affects most other members of the group. How many times have you seen someone type 'should of' instead of the correct 'should have'? This would never be allowed when I went to school. Now it's commonplace.

 

[BAllen]

Failed collectivism in law enforcement. They are not allowed to profile vehicles because of the fear of stereotyping.
Newscasts describe the clothing of a suspect, but not the race, for fear of stereotyping one group as the perpetrators, even if it's true. They don't look at fixing the actual problem.

 

[FreeHampshire]

What do you mean by "Indo-European" in this context? In linguistics, this refers to a language family spread throughout the Indian sub-continent and Westward. I haven't found many "individualist" cultures in that region prior to the rise of classical Liberalism in the West. Perhaps you could enlighten me.

ETA: here's a map of the Indo-European language family-

Well I just meant being an Individualist but still having nationalist feelings. Like what the ancient Greeks and other tribes believed. Not hyper-individualism in the Ayn Rand sense.


Early Aryans, despite their tendency to individuate, were highly conscious of themselves as a distinct
group. Both the Greeks and the Romans looked upon everyone else as
“barbarians,” and we have already
seen the high degree of racial consciousness that pertained among the
Indo-Aryans. Aryans were also
closely attached to family units, not
only the nuclear family but also the
clans in which their society was organized, and clan warfare in Ireland
and Scotland, family-based political
factionalism among the Romans, and
conflicts among the many independent
city-states of ancient Greece were notorious as forces that tended to keep
these populations divided. It was
groups like race, nationality, clan,
community, class, and family that established the social fabric of early Aryan life, and individualism in the
modern sense of a John Stuart Mill or
Ayn Rand—as a belief that justifies
the individual neglecting or betraying
his social bonds—did not exist.
Nevertheless, the Aryans exhibited
a high degree of individuation, and
this is reflected in their mythology as
well as in their art. The gods and heroes of the Greeks and the Norsemen
have far more distinctive personalities
than such Egyptian deities as Isis and
Osiris, and the stories the Greeks and
Norsemen told about their gods and
heroes—the embittered and wrathful
Achilles and the wily Odysseus, the
imperious Zeus and the dashing
Apollo, the angry Ares and the comic
lame god Hephaestus, the jealous Hera
and the lascivious Aphrodite—are far
richer than the thin tales of Egypt and
Babylonia. There is also a greater


http://www.amren.com/ar/pdfs/1996/199612ar.pdf

 

[Deborah K]

I'm bumping this because periodically I notice the conflation of stereotyping and collectivism. I'm noticing it a lot lately, probably because I've been on the forums more.

 

[heavenlyboy34]

I'm bumping this because periodically I notice the conflation of stereotyping and collectivism. I'm noticing it a lot lately, probably because I've been on the forums more.

Good idea. ~hugs~