American Individualism

America is a country of extreme individualism that affect just about every aspect of our life from birth to death. Our devotion to individualism shapes many major social systems like our free market, our democratic government, or our family structures. Sometimes it can be difficult judge the true value of individualistic behavior over the more communal set ups of some other countries since we’re raised to make all of our decisions by ourselves. If we take the time though to really look at how our individualism affects us and those around us it becomes clear how much being an island effect the community.

A great example of how individualism has shaped america is the growth of our hyper capitalist system. The United States was founded at the height of early liberalist ideology in the western world, which was responsible for creating many of America’s views on personal freedom and political structure, as well as founding one of the most unregulated economies in the world. The free economy results in people believing heavily in self reliance fiscally and it becomes increasingly more normal look at those who make it or don’t make it products of a sort of social darwinism. Capitalist culture does change from time to time depending on the state of the economy. During times of recession people support each other often through government action like in the great deal of the nineteen thirties or the bailouts of present day. During prosperity we often turn the other way competition increases and cooperation decreases, everyone should pull their own weights. Success after world war two lead to a long period of extreme darwinism which gave us most of the wealthiest individuals in the world, but created a huge wealth gap and made us a country with far fewer worker protections than most industrialized countries. The reason why america has such gaps is largely due to our opposition to labour unions, unlike countries of such as Japan which has a historically collectivist culture where workers organize in very powerful shunto.

Individualism also play a large role in family life, along with other relationships with those in our community. The size of families in the U.S. is largely based on culture that arose after world war two, with the growth of suburban life and the sudden economic boom. Before the large economic boom of the nineteen fifties americans lived in up to three generation homes similar to those of south american and asian countries, but afterwards developed into primarily nuclear families. Marriages are also largely influenced by individualistic cultures most obviously by their autonomy, but also in their stability. When comparing U.S. marriages to countries that favor collectivist behavior, ignoring those that support forced marriages due to the many addition forces related to it, people stay together longer and much few end in divorce in collectivist countries, likely due to the fact that understanding and helping solving others problems are a large part of their culture. While the previous statement makes individualist sound more callus when interacting with each other, favoring their own agendas rather than working things out, but those who are not part of the normal society integrate much easier with individualistic groups. Cultures with collectivist morals normally work through a series of in groups which, while close to each other, have difficulty accepting differences making people of collective cultures actually much more exclusive to outsiders than the average individualistic society. Selectiveness created by strong collective ideology in eastern european and asian countries may explain why fascism rose there while more individualist countries like Britain and the U.S. it had little effect in nineteen hundreds.

Decision making is also deeply affected by our perceived independence, as I somewhat stated earlier, but it goes beyond a government’s foreign policy. Individualism’s influence has made the democratic process an ultimate decision making machine, and any other way is viewed as archaic or tyrannical. Everyone likes to have their voice heard even if they might not know what their talking about, but this is what’s right and just so that everyone is equal in an individualist society. In a collectivist society however they would not see always majority rule as the fairest system and favor those who seem the wisest to make decisions. Sometimes collectivist model works in small groups, and is in fact modeled in many aspects of corporate america, but more often than not it leads to totalitarian ship on the macro level.

The Sociological Imagination

Every weekday starts just about the same. I wake up about an hour before class, head down the hall to take a shower, then go to breakfast. After breakfast it's time for a brisk walk across the street to make it into my first class.Rushing around all day it can be easy to forget to think about what it is I do and why there's these certain methods attached to them.

The first goal of the morning is to get cleaned up in the public showers. For most people showering starts with entering the wet shower then taking off what ever clothing they have behind the privacy curtain, whether out of discomfort with their own nudity or courtesy to others. Where this shame in our genitalia originated is hard to say, but it's present in almost every culture in the world. The humiliation of indecent exposure is reinforced constantly by the media and television, where the tiniest exposure of just another part of the body becomes a great debacle. Perhaps it relates back to our obsession with sex, how it's some ultimate goal or it's a sacred thing, and the mere image of another person relates them back to all the structure built up around the idea, just like someone might say dressing a certain way does.

After that is breakfast which has number of peculiar rituals attached to it especially as a public place. When I first arrive I hand the man at the counter my, I thank him and go on my way. Saying "Thank you" is a kind gesture we're told to use whenever someone does something in our benefit by our parents and educators from a very young age, but what point does it become excessive? The person who swiped my card did me a service, a mutual trade, not a  favor but thanks implies gratitude not just respect. The set consistency to use thank you in every exchange seems to weaken it's meaning after awhile and makes it into an act of conformation, but to not use it still holds weight since it has become part of our custom.

When I get my card back the next thing I need is food which for what ever reason is always completely different than lunch and dinner. There's far reaching establishment that is passed down by what our parents serve and it tells us what is good to eat and when it's meant to be eaten. Sometimes what we don't eat is logical for the time as our stomach is prepping for the day, but many restrictions are totally irrational and surely based on cultural heritage, and is reinforced by corporations as well as public utilities like the cafeteria till we crave certain products depending on time.

Once I have my food it's time to find a place to sit preferably by someone I might talk to, but truly my peace is most important to me when eating so why is there this nagging urge sit near someone and force myself to be social.This fear of being alone in a crowd most relates to one of the unofficial lessons from public education. Back in those days to not be surrounded by some friends at all times comes with feelings of both pity and superiority over the currently alone person. Continuous judgements made by peers eventually builds up a belief in doing everything with a group.

Once that awkwardness is over I have to cross the street and go to class. On most days I cross with a large group of people also going to class and because of that I often just trust them and cross without looking. There's many things that can be said about that behavior in relation to human psychology, but to me it's most interesting to point out our how aloof we are to dangers of the road. Automobile accidents take about twenty five thousand lives a year, and is the leading cause of death in young adults, but it has very little effect on our culture. Driving for us is a such a integral part of western ideas of freedom, independence, and success we couldent think of life without it even if that means endangering our lives.

Were things different maybe it wasn't part of our American dream to own a car, or we as society were so appalled by the deaths due to people driving around in two ton boxes of steel, with what is equivalent to a doctor having only first aid training, would we leave driving solely to professionals? Could it be possible to use all the money and resources from automobile usage to create  a network of public transportation to effectively deliver every one to their destination? If our societies proved anything it's that seeming imposable goals like that become possible once we focus, and our idea of what is acceptable or important changes.