Drowning in hyperindividualism? Feeling like you’re uniquely isolated in a world of 8 billion people? Is it mysteriously difficult to make new friends or even meet new faces? Do you feel disconnected from society? From the „others“? Have you perfected the art of binge-watching series with absolutely no one to discuss that mind-blowing finale with? You’re not alone in feeling completely alone—the irony isn’t lost on us. Combating hyperindividualism starts with recognizing we’re all separately experiencing the same isolation.
Are you trapped in an information bubble so personalized it knows your coffee preference but still sends irrelevant ads for products you’ve only thought about?
Do You Feel Special and Miserable? Welcome to the Club Nobody Attends
I feel all this. Many people do. What we have in common is that we are separated from another.
But why?
Short answer: The system.
Long answer: coming in.
The System is Not Your Friend (But It Pretends to Be)
We live in a hyperindividualized society. It’s all about the single person. The individual. The community comes later.
As sociologist Robert Putnam demonstrated in his landmark work ‚Bowling Alone,‘ the decline in community participation has measurable negative effects on both individual wellbeing and democratic functioning.
If it is in the economy where competition is everything and cooperation is for losers.
Or in politics, where the one leader finds quick answers to the most irrelevant questions, singing common answers for the most urgent questions is woke.
Or in a society where you have to drive your car everywhere, whoever uses another mode of transportation gets killed.
Individualism, having everything optimized for the single person, is one of the main reasons why we feel lonely and why our system sucks.
That said, individualism isn’t all bad. It is complicated.
Having personal freedom is of high value. Think, believe, become what you want is great and is an achievement for which we have fought for centuries.
Having the possibility to vote for whatever you want is the best political system we ever had.
When Being Yourself Became Too Much of a Good Thing
Furthermore, having medicine individualized is excellent. Getting the therapy that fits perfectly for you, rather than taking medicine that maybe never been tested on your gender, is a positive development.
Learning at your own pace and not sitting in the classroom looking out of the window and being jealous of the birds that fly freely, while you are imprisoned with all the others, who need double the time for the test. Or on the contrary, you struggle to hold the tempo and begin to hate this stupid school.
Since we are far away from this educational utopia, it is one area, where I wish even more individualism.
There are many more examples, why individualism is good or the lack of it is bad.
But there is also the dark side of individualism.
Everyone working for themselves to climb the carrier ladder.
Having problems finding new friends because there are less and less common places.
Having a social media stream, that is optimized for you makes it difficult to speak with friends about what you saw. You can share it via the app and talk in the DMs with your friends, but is it the same as meeting one another IRL?
Individualism is bad for the environment because we need to produce so much more stuff because everyone needs their own stuff. They do not dare to share.
And it is not only bad for every single human being, it is also bad for the whole society. Because we can’t connect or find common goals. We can’t come together or know each other. Despite we believe more than ever about everyone because of social media. But that is all fake.
But why is our society so individualized. What are the causes of the current hyperindividualism.
Stanley Cups in 1534 Colors: Capitalism’s Love Affair with Your Loneliness
For one, capitalism is the main driver for individualism. Like it is implemented in our current system, it’s built upon competition, not cooperation. You have to be the best in your field to grow.
The illusion of the entrepreneur or genius, the one (mostly) man that got rich and successful, is told to us every day. Whether you succeed or lose is entirely up to you.
Of course, this is not true. Every successful person has some kind of team. And where you were born and who your parents are has more influence on your success than your skills.
On the other hand, capitalism is built upon consumerism. It has to sell things to survive.
If there are more single households, more homes, furniture and so on to sell.
If everyone has their own car, more to sell.
A Stanley Cup in 1534 different colors, more to sell.
The capitalist system profits on both sides of individualism. People who fight each other’s and reduce wages on the one side and seeing more to the employees who live alone because they work so hard, they have no time for family and friends.
Politicians Love It When You’re Home Alone (Scrolling Twitter, I mean X, sorry)
The political system or at least parts of als enforce individualism because it supports their cause.
There is the myth of the one strong leader, who saves us all. Many dream of being this man, or they wish someone in demand.
The one individual to rule us all seems for many the better solution than the long democratic process of finding common ground and compromise.
This process is considered weak, in contrast to the one ruler who makes quick decisions.
That people come less and less together comes also in handy. The risk that they rebel is lower. That they found a movement to change things is harder.
As the capitalist elite fears unions, the political caste fears political movements.
That’s one of the reasons why the rich work so good together with the far right.
Having everything optimized for you makes it difficult to join political parties or movements that can’t fit 100% your personal beliefs. So people become more and more apolitical and are no thread for politicians anymore.
Furthermore, dividing people is so much easier when everyone is for themselves.
If you don’t know your neighbors, it is easier for the populists to make you hate them.
Your Personalized Prison: How Tech Made Isolation Convenient
Both the economic and political systems are using technology to intensify individualism.
Algorithms that show personalized streams and ads.
Self-driving cars, so you can even consume media or shop during a traffic jam on your highly personalized smartphone or other wearables.
Creating information bubbles so you are easier to manipulate.
Social media that is addictive and makes us more lonely, it shows us the fake happy people meeting their friends, who maybe only looked up their own phone for the picture to post.
Online stores that make it convenient for you to buy, so do not have to leave your house in the suburbs and meat people in a brick and mortar store.
That brings us to another driver of individualism, that is the product of political and economic decisions. Infrastructure or the lack of it.
People living in one-family houses in urban sprawl or suburbs, that are only reachable via car. They have no stores or other amenities there, so they have to drive a long way for shopping, school, work, or everything else. And thanks to technology, you do not even have to do that anymore.
You can sit in your home office, order food and do groceries online. You can do your exercises at home and don’t drive to the gym. I mean you could do sports, but since you are not seeing anyone, who cares.
The lack of third spaces, where you can meet people you don’t know, makes it more difficult to connect with others.
It also is harder to bump randomly into people you know, when you don’t walk on the street or drive public transportation but sit in your car.
This makes you feel lonely.
We also know more about loneliness than before. Which makes us more mindful about it. It is a good thing that there is research in these fields. Knowing more helps us find solutions eventually.
But ordinary people get this information via media, YouTube or (clearing throat noise) bloggers. And they present it clickable and flamboyant. (Ok, I used that word because I think it is hilarious)
They know that they have to speak to their audience so that they feel connected.
Instead of explaining the results, the media uses catchy titles like “The Ironic Loneliness of Being Extremely Unique: A Guide to Combating Hyperindividualism.” They don’t give working tips but try to pull you further down the rabbit hole by keeping them on their site and saying stuff like [you are not perfect]
Understanding psychology makes ads, media, and politicians so dangerous. They know how to be addictive, to create fomo or fear in general and lead that to rage.
They also know that humans like it convenient. That’s why companies take care of everything. You only need to ask your artificial intelligent personal assistant to do something, and it takes care of it. You do not have to search for things anymore, they are presented to you based on the personal data they collected.
Fake news and filter bubbles increase the fear and rage and make people easier to manipulate.
Being Alone vs. Being Lonely: A Solitary Appreciation Society
Before I present possible solutions, a short digression:
There is a difference between loneliness and being alone. While there can be a relation between the two, it is also common to be alone but not lonely.
I like being alone. To have the time and place for thoughts about things like individualism or a good system. There is nothing wrong with you enjoying being alone. As long as it is voluntarily and not forced.
So it is possible, that the hyperindividualized society makes it happy, because you can be alone all the time and still have all the amenities, that you had to go outside before.
Loneliness is a feeling that you can have when you are alone or even when you’re with people. It can make you sick. The increase in loneliness is beside other reasons because of individualism.
Combating Hyperindividualism: A Survival Guide for the Pathologically Self-Sufficient
What can we do about loneliness and individualism?
Short answer: change the system.
How can we do this?
Combating hyperindividualism requires rethinking how economic systems reward collaboration over competition. We need to create a collective economic system that still allows for the good sides of individualism, like personal freedom. I won’t go into detail because I intend to write a whole article in the future. I just wanted you to get hooked.
The social market economy is partly this system, but it is not good enough. We need to find something better.
The political system has to be more participatory and transparent. We have to overthink the representative system. I would rather not get rid of it, like some right-wing populists want. I just think that one person can’t represent an entire country.
We need more regulation for technology and media. I think strengthening the public media is a good idea. Furthermore, why not make social media a public good.
So there wouldn’t bet be any need for being profitable anymore. It could just be a platform for information and communication.
The path to combating hyperindividualism involves creating infrastructure that naturally fosters connection. We need to build third spaces like libraries, community centers, parks and more. We can create all these places as pop-up. That’s cheap and fast. Later, we can transform them into permanent constructions.
Cities need to be walkable and everything should be nearby. No more sprawl, car dependency nor suburbs.
From Doom Scrolling to Door Knocking: Practical Steps for combating hyperindividualism
How can we achieve this?
Let’s become political.
Join groups or parties. Go to town hall meetings. Be active in your neighborhood. Vote for the party, that work for the good and convince others to do so.
Use the good sides of the internet to connect with people. Maybe you can later meet them IRL.
Talk to your neighbors. Just knock on their door and say hi. Perhaps they are home alone and hoping for someone who knocks.
Write or call friends. Even meet with them. Just go for a walk in your neighborhood if it is possible.
I know it is difficult to do. It is so much easier to sit home alone and doom scroll on our phone. That’s why we are doing it. But we have to stop.
For a society that accepts all our quirks and ticks, so everyone can be as good as they can be for the community.
By combating hyperindividualism while preserving personal freedom, we can build that good system together. A system that embraces the good sides of individualism to create a good and strong community.
As always, the good system finds the right balance between two opposing poles.
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