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Monday, February 3, 2020

The Utter Individualists

An individualist mindset is, paradoxically, an obstacle to the development of real individualism. The man who is stirred by individualism is driven to join groups with likeminded people whose philosophy and agenda he accepts as the gospel for an individualistic way of life.

The term “individualism” (“individualisme” in French) was being contemptuously used in France in the 19th century, after the bloodbath of the French Revolution, to refer to the anarchists and socially unreliable folks. Subsequently, different forms of individualism became popular with the youth in different countries: in Germany, there was the rise of a romantic notion of individualism; in America “rugged Individualism” was extolled in the early decades of the 20th century.

After the 1950s, individualism morphed into a cultish movement—there was the rise of cults catering to the intellectual and psychological needs of youngsters who claim to be individualistic and require privacy from society. Nowadays, most individualists exist in cult-like formations.

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