Isolation Cultivates Collectivism
The idea for this piece came from a well made video produced by the Academy of Ideas Substack. The video cites numerous psychologists and philosophers, in highlighting the effects of isolation on the human psyche, and the sense of (lack thereof) belonging in the absence of community. This void is invariably filled with embracing collectivism and statism.
Focusing on the twenty-twenties to date, consider how often you have scratched your head at the personality changes your nearest and dearest appear to have undergone. Many readers and writers have anecdotally shared these bizarre experiences here on Substack.
In describing the fertile relationship between isolation, collectivism, and totalitarianism, Academy of Ideas cites Hannah Arendt, Robert Nisbet, and Erich Neumann. Here is part of the video transcript, for which I have added links to the book titles -available to read for free at Internet Archive’s digital library:
“…totalitarian domination as a form of government is new in that it… bases itself on loneliness, on the experience of not belonging to the world at all, which is among the most radical and desperate experiences of man.”
Many people have amnesia regarding that fact that a mere few years ago we were forced to seclude ourselves in our homes, banned from partaking in social activities and attending communal gatherings, and even told to maintain our distance from others out in public or in our own homes. What was the intention of this extreme social isolation? Was it to protect us, or is there a more nefarious reason behind the social distancing and isolation we were forced to endure? In this video, we explain how tyrants and totalitarians in the 20th century, and into the modern day, have attempted to isolate and atomize individuals, in order to make them easier to control.
In his book Community and Power, Robert Nisbet writes:
“The genius of totalitarian leadership lies in its profound awareness that human personality cannot tolerate moral isolation. It lies, further, in its knowledge that absolute and relentless power will be acceptable only when it comes to seem the only available form of community and membership.”
Man has social needs that must be fulfilled as a basis for psychological health. Throughout most of history, these needs have been satisfied at a tribal or local level. For hundreds of thousands of years our hunter-gatherer ancestors lived in small, tight-knit tribes, and each member’s sense of self was deeply intertwined with the group. This tribal identity provided our ancestors with an unwavering sense of social belonging.
“History teaches that in the beginning the individual did not exist as an independent entity…In the early state there is a fusion of the individual with the group.” - Erich Neumann, The Origins and History of Consciousness.
The springboard for each of us at the start of the scamdemic was whether or not we followed the rules. If all of our usual social grouping outlets were closed off to us, did we self-isolate? Did we flout the ‘rules’ on gatherings? For those at that time who were willing and able to rebel against the lockdowns by continuing to meet friends and family in person, they were exchanging ideas and information more freely. Their in-person interactions provided welcome, albeit discreet socialising, at a time of extreme duress, restrictions on freedom of movement, and attempts to suppress freedom of thought.
Think back to that time as well as the present day - then and now, is there a notable difference between people you know well who had and still have hobbies and interests, whereby they meet other people once a week or more, in person? Do you find them to be more open-minded to conspiracy realities, compared to reclusive, solitary types of people?
Solitude can be healthy for reflection and introspection. However, self-imposed isolation, worsened by the scamdemic era, then habituated since, could further prime individuals for collectivism.
There were many who unquestioningly permitted a statist intermediary to govern their lives from 2020 onwards; dictating contactless interactions through plexiglass or other nonsensical, torturous impositions. Those unfortunate individuals were ground down, robbed of their individuation, bereft of social interaction and physical contact. They became primed for embracing statist intervention and collectivist ideology. Their void became filled with MSM regurgitated soundbites, perpetual mask-wearing, Covid obsession, and the ‘we are in this together’ mantra. In their desperate, crushing loneliness, they found solace in fellow internet netizens, whilst told to accept ‘the general consensus’. They followed the rules. They embraced the new abnormal ideology.
Consider how this mindset has since been molded, morphing into an ever expanding scope of collectivist beliefs:
It was acceptable to shut the world down when people were dying of ‘covid’.
When people started dying from the c19 injections, nothing needed to be shutdown or investigated. The greater good was endlessly referenced to explain away the ‘rare’ side effects and the excess deaths. The injections continued. The democide rages on still.
Children, teenagers, and elite athletes have heart attacks all the time. They always have done.
People die suddenly more often nowadays because they are stressed, or because they go to bed late, or because they had an underlying medical condition - which is only discovered during the autopsy, and in no way could have been caused by a c19 injection a few years prior.
Cash is dirty and dangerous. Central Bank Digital Currencies are beneficial, so that the government can algorithmically, programmably, control inflation and deflation, as well as ‘helping’ people spend their
moneytokens more ‘responsibly’.Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) via statist intervention is empathetic, altruistic, and is in no way open to being abused by the state as a eugenics program for depopulation.
Do not resuscitate (DNR) notices placed upon elderly and disabled hospital outpatients by nurses, is a commensurate and acceptable practice, because so many health services are being ‘overrun’, and because the ‘world is overpopulated’.
Putin is the source of all economic woes in the west.
There are still sovereign nations.
There are genuine right and left political parties. Those parties have completely different policies. There is no such thing as the Uniparty. Voting can make a difference. When it doesn’t, it can be blamed on ‘government incompetence’.
We all should accept curtailments to our standards of living, embracing carbon credit and social credit systems to dictate our lifestyle choices, because we are responsible for climate change, along with flatulence from livestock - which must therefore be culled to reduce emissions.
Geo-engineering is a conspiracy theory, weather warfare is not real, to even consider that our governments would intentionally poison our skies, and by extension our forests, wetlands, drylands, freshwaters, farmland, and oceans - is ludicrous - therefore it is unthinkable - therefore it is to be shunned.
*This is not an exhaustive list, feel free to add other collectivist beliefs in the comments.
Fear, pleasure, pain, and comfort
Now consider how a large swathe of people never regained their sense of individuation since 2020. The very essence of their identity, the core of their being, has been captured. Cultivated inside their blue screened handheld devices.
Fear grips them like a Boa Constrictor, squeezing the lifeforce out of their mortal coil. They are catatonically entranced by the 24/7 news cycle of never-ending crises. Simultaneously, comfort is crippling them. They pursue pleasure, avoiding pain and discomfort at all costs - whether that comes in the form of challenging their belief systems, or facing adversity, which could be character building.
The saddest, surrealist aspect of this total capture of mind, body, and spirit, can be observed in the most unlikely of places. Observe entire families stood or sat together in the park, glued to the spot, frozen in time, captivated by their screens, completely silent. More frightening still, notice the parents and children who remain masked. They are ‘together’ yet at the same time they are isolated from one another, and from the rest of the world. Social cues and interactions are either very limited, or not possible in this state.
The three images above are taken from another great video by Academy of Ideas: Pursue Pain, Not Pleasure - Why Comfort is Crippling You.
Value your friendships. Make time for in-person catchups. Step out into the real world, move away from the artificial. If you enjoy taking part in sports, or other group activities, consider inviting your reclusive friends and acquaintances along. Maybe they are yearning for social interaction. Others, more introverted, might prefer a maximum company of two to three for conversation that doesn’t induce their anxiety. We are all different. Yet we are all social beings. Fight the urge to embrace self-imposed isolation and comfort.
According to Marcus Aurelius,
“The object of life is not to conform to the majority, but to escape finding oneself among the ranks of the insane.”
Nicholas Creed is a Bangkok based writer. All content is free for all readers, with nothing locked in archive that requires a paid subscription. Any support is greatly appreciated. If you are in a position to donate a virtual coffee or crypto, it would mean the world of difference.
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As much as I respect Hannah Arendt, I have to disagree with her on this: Totalitarians don’t cash in on loneliness. Loneliness is the emotion of a person with something valuable to offer. It’s the emotion of an independent person who seeks intellectual peers (or superiors), who are the only kinds of people he can respect and with whom he can enjoyably socialize. The emotion felt by people who are lured by collectivism at the expense of their independence and freedom (or because they already gave those things up) is not loneliness but fear. They don’t see giving up their freedom as a cost but as a relief: Finally somebody is going to officially do their thinking for them. The reason “absolute and relentless power” was acceptable to so many people was because it removed the demands of independence: thinking, moral judgement, and integrity. That’s why the Branch Covidians embraced “experts” telling them what to think and do. That mentality didn’t develop overnight in 2020. The Covidians longed for it before coronaviruses were a gleam in the eyes of the WHO.
It’s true that most people can’t tolerate moral isolation, but it’s true because they lack moral certainty. To the extent that they can articulate moral ideals, they recite what they’ve passively absorbed from the culture: the conventional wisdom of those around them, who are just as adrift and whose ideas remain just as unexamined. They can’t defy a mob and say, “This is right because,” or “This is wrong because.” They can’t *know* they’re right, so first they waffle and then they cave. They don’t think in terms of principles and they can’t defend (or even define) what they cite as their values. That’s how they could abandon those they claimed to love to the care of TikTok dancers. People like that are the reason you don’t hear “No” any more: “No, I will not pretend that your son is a girl.” “No, I will not pretend that floor arrows stop viruses.” “No, you will not coerce my medical decisions.” The people who resisted the psyop resisted it because the moral isolation of resistance was preferable to greasing the skids for dictatorship. I.e., they resisted because they were brave, and because they were brave they were lonely. Nothing would have made them happier than to find real allies. Nothing would have been more inspirational to them than the sight of other heroes. They are the people who spent the plandemic feeling like they didn’t belong to the world—and like the world no longer belonged to them.
“An unwavering sense of social belonging” is possible *only* to people who are brave enough to stand alone. They’re the only kinds of people suited for civilized societies. They can feel a sense of belonging only with other rational people with integrity: They can’t benefit from belonging to a society of cowards and morons, and they’d rather be alone than settle. Collectivists will do and give up *anything* to avoid being alone. The people I know who socialize often and meet with other people once a week or more, are the very people who chomped like bass on the virus porn. They’re the ones who let others peer-pressure them into muzzles and injections and elbow-bumping. No one who valued his individualism—who had an iota of pride, who understood the all-or-nothing quality of freedom, and who valued himself enough to uphold his integrity regardless of what others screamed at him: No one who was strong enough for that was primed for collectivist ideologies. Such people aren't tempted by collectivism. They’re disgusted by it. And angered. And they’re already the kind of people who are used to feeling lonely.
The Belgian psychologist Mattias Desmet expands on this theme in his recent book "The Psychology of Totalitarianism."
From the foreword:"The world continues to exist in the grips of mass formation―a dangerous, collective type of hypnosis―as we bear witness to loneliness, free-floating anxiety, and fear giving way to censorship, loss of privacy, and surrendered freedoms."