Advanced Philosophy
Individuality: A Burden of Elites and Paupers
Why reason, autonomy, and creativity aren’t for everyone.
Individualism is a multifaceted nineteenth-century ideology that’s still influential today in its various guises. This ideology has roots in the conditions of the countries that gave rise to it.
Thus, individualism, as it’s come down to us, encompasses the anarchic fallout of the French Revolution; German romanticism and the cult of the individual genius; British nonconformity and economic liberalism; and American pragmatism, egoism, and social Darwinism.
We in the twenty-first century assume we have special, human rights, not because of our humanity in the strict, biological sense but because our species is made up of people rather than animals. In so far as “humanity” is a biological category we assume our mentality and individuality emerge from that animal makeup, and it’s that higher-level agency that makes us responsible for our choices and worthy of moral consideration.
Individuality is slightly paradoxical, then, since we deem ourselves to be special in virtue of our unique personality and individuality, but we assume all humans are equally special since we’re all “persons” or “individuals” in the lofty philosophical sense.