A Refreshing Defense of Individualism

Actually, We're Not All In This Together, by Edward H. Crane, president and cofounder of the Cato Institute.

My commentary:

Ed Crane is right. No one can think for you. No one can acquire knowledge or skills for you. No one can exert the mental efforts required to make the neurological connections that make understanding possible in you own brain. No one can make the choice for you whether to initiate action or stagnate. No one can make the choice for you of what kinds of actions to take. Everything you are begins with self-motivation and self-discipline. The choice of whether to be honest or not, a parasite or not, a thug or not, self-supporting or not, is entirely an individualistic affair, no matter what advantages in terms of nurturing parents or the accumulated knowledge of mankind or other kinds of cooperative opportunities “society” makes available to you.

Collectivists see no difference between human beings. That is why collectivism in any of its manifestations must lead to the subordination of the thinking, self-supporting, honest, moral people to the lazy and the shiftless. The “We’re all in this together” philosophy is a philosophy by and for parasites and power-lusters – seekers of unearned material benefits and seekers of unearned greatness and “prestige”. It is the siren song of universal destitution and totalitarianism.