In his review of the book 'The Undiscovered Self' by the psychiatrist and philosopher Carl Jung
, Maxwell Cynn suggests that:
"Dr. Jung noted that whenever individuals are pressed into a group an averaging effect occurs and part of the individual Self is sacrificed in order to fit-in to the norm of the group. We stop thinking in terms of Self and the group becomes our personae. The larger the group the more the individual suffers. He pointed to the Iron Curtain as a physical manifestation and symbol of a psychic schism within mankind.
He also warned that the freedom-loving West was not immune to the psychic infection of the communist Eastern Block, but rather more susceptible because of our free and open-minded societies. The fall of the Iron Curtain in modern times did not symbolize an end to the schism Jung described, but more ominously the acceptance in the West of collective ideals.
Jung's words ring soundly today in our modern electronic society of larger groups, stronger connections, greater integration, and socio-political correctness. Our nationalism has turned to internationalism and our group has become global. Individualism is under greater assault today than at any point in history--Jung's words live on in an almost prophetic sense. The Self continues to drown in a sea of collectivism."
Ive been reading 'The Undiscovered Self' on my iPhone via Questia.com.
[…] and/or her audience? My recent reference to Carl Jung’s writings are perhaps relevant here https://climatelab.com.au/2013/11/against-collective-integration-carl-jung/ […]
thinking about hunter's comment about eschewing critical thinking and mc's that we can't walk with just one leg
and noting this comment that:
Logos is a certain peculiar quality in a man's being which leads him to discriminate, to reason, to judge, to divide, to understand in a particular way.
http://unanswerables.blogspot.com.au/2005/04/carl-jung-on-logos-eros.html
Thank you Jennifer.
You have raised what seems to be the most crucial and central issue to this whole cultural war subject, one that has been largely missing in competent and considered form, namely the role of human psychology in the formation of political systems and society.
Destroy the individual and you destroy the society.
What is a society if not a collection of related individuals?
Take away the unique individual spirit of the members of a group and who is left to relate to whom?
Automaton to automaton?
Hollow man to hollow man?
Artifice to artifice?
What true solidarity can exist between the soulless and the soulless, between a person who is an artificial ideological construct and another person equally artificial? There may be solidarity but it cannot be of a fully developed human kind, it is stilted, brittle, lacking true depth. It comes across as over earnest and ridiculous.
A human society is a collection of individuals of differing temperament, talent and outlook. In accordance with the diversity of nature we are not naturally a homogenous mass. Uniformity of human personality can only come about by being imposed, either forcefully or subtly or both.
The clarion call of our times is that we must learn to live in harmony with nature. What is natural about repressing and stifling our inborn impulse to grow and develop to our unique potential in the name of a social cohesion which in fact cannot occur under such conditions of repression and in reality must lead to the wasting and decay of human relatedness? This is of course where the saviours of humanity from the forces of social anarchy and chaos step onto the political stage with their prescriptions and solutions imposed upon us all, and all choice is removed, and the sum total of human evolution becomes humanity’s grotesque and revolting decent into its greatest possible failure, humanity’s failure to live out its humanity.
We need to find the bridge Jennifer; you seem to be looking in the right direction.
Cheers. Mc.
Ps. here’s a joke for you.
A bloke says to me, “Are you a logos person or an eros person”?
Me. “Oh yes that is funny, tell me, when you go out for a walk do you use your left leg or your right”?
Jennifer,
You make a very profound point about how a whole people can eschew their critical thinking abilities and accept the ridiculous as part of 'getting along'.