It is really hard to be an Individualist these days, because you are fighting a 2 front war. On one hand you have to push back the Nazi elements of the Right-Wing, but you also want to fight against the "forced equality" nonsense of the Left-Wing, and fundamentally you have to fight against Collectivism as well that comes in all shapes and sizes.
It's a tough position, and I really can't make up my mind which side is the best to align with, so I really have to walk on the center, sometimes more left, sometimes more right, but I have to keep my balance.
It's like you have a rope above a canyon and you have to walk over it to the other side, and you don't want to lean too much to left nor to right because then you will fall into the abyss of totalitarianism of the either sides.
I have started sympathizing a little bit more with the left these days, just because the right-wing is pretty much authoritarian at this point, but I am also fully aware of the flaws of the left.
The Fundamental Conflict
The fundamental conflict between the left & right is that of EQUALITY VS HIERARCHY, I mean this is the core of the conflict that either sides represent, and the irony is that the left tries to "force equality" on people, which is kind of an oxymoron. While the right wants a democratic hierarchy, which is also kind of silly and makes no sense.
And the truth is neither side is right for example:
- You don't want a military dictatorship, that would be the definition of tyranny, but you also kind of understand that democracy doesn't really work when most people are dumb and irresponsible as hell.
- You don't want to subsidize stupid people with welfare, but you also don't want them to starve to death, nor do you want them to start riots after their welfare goes out.
- You don't want war, but you also have to understand that certain groups of people don't understand but violence
- You don't want policing of people, but you also have to understand that there are murderers out there that would murder anyone for even 1$
- You don't want taxes, but you also have to understand that certain things are more efficient if they are collectively funded, and freeloaders have to be forced to participate, in their best interest
- You don't want forced public schools, but you also don't want dumb illiterate people that chose to not go to school and instead chase sex all their teen years
So as much as I hate collectivism, sometimes even I as an Individualist have to admit that Collectivism is more efficient in some cases. You cannot run an army as an individualist unit since not all humans can think rationally in a battle and people are afraid, but if they don't stick together then they all die.
For example it would be good to disband all armies in the world, but then what if an alien civilization comes and destroys us while we live our happy utopia here. And as improbable as an alien invasion sounds, it is still not impossible.
The Golden Mean
Therefore the truth is always a mixture of both left, right, collectivist and individualist ideas. I would like if more emphasis would be put on the individual, but in certain cases that is not possible.
Aristotle knew this, why can't humans living today understand this too? Every evil has a little bit of good in it, and ever good has a little bit of evil in it. This is what the yin-yang symbol illustrates:
So neither hierarchy nor equality is always good. Sometimes one is better than the other, and vice-versa. But neither should be too extremely pushed, because that is bad.
Even the concept of force and authority is in certain cases good and in certain cases bad. We cannot know that the future holds, so people should not have their ideologies carved in their minds, be more flexible than that.
Things always change, so humans have to adapt to change, that is the art of survival in this world full of mysteries.
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To me the primary conflict between left and right is just what areas of your life they want to control. The right wants to control your personal life, the left wants to control your public life. As they join in their efforts to whipsaw us back and forth with these conjoined but competing goals, we lose track of the primary fact that they want to control our lives.
That's the real conflict an individualist has to face.
There are certain characteristics of both left an right that are not always that obvious. But the hierarchy vs equality conflict is of thousands of ages, even if modern political parties don't reflect that.
Humanity is like a pile of random elements (individuals) that always revert back to the mean, this is where the force of equality comes from, it's a biological manifestation of this basic mathematical truth.
And the force of hierarchy is just the forces of Darwinism at play, as humans tend to group together in order to survive.
It's just a biological conflict inside us, the 2 forces that fight against eachother, regardless of what political movement they show up these days.
There are two positions. Those who don't want you robbed to fund their priorities, and those who do.
The left and the right are both in the latter.