As Tim Kasher wrote, "My ego's like my stomach, it keeps shitting what I feed it", and lately no matter what news coverage I look at I feel like I might need to do just that. In an era where we as a country and a society are "free", nothing seems further from the truth. Turning on the radio leads to the knowledge that supposedly we can quantify people in any number of ways. Republican, Democrat, black, white, Mexican, legal, illegal, poor, middle-class, rich, elite, etc., are words that not only are part of our vocabulary, but define it. Literally every person can and will be quantified every day, because it is easier to do so than to know and acknowledge the person for the individual they are. We are no longer human beings with our own thoughts and beliefs; we somehow fit to a mold and will follow however that mold dictates we move. If we stray from the mold we can be reprimanded and punished. The fact of our own existence is even constantly thrown in our faces every day, because one way or another we destroy the country, or we are holding back the rest of the world. Well, ladies and gentleman, in the words of Ayn Rand, "guilt is a rope that wears thin." This rope has worn very thin. People are individuals, and should be accepted as such, as living and thinking and breathing animals with the capacity to decide what they want and what they need. We don’t need someone to help us or tell us what is good for us, because when it really comes down to it, no one else is you, and no one else is me. The only person who knows infinitely what is best for me is ME. There is a reason social policies don’t work, and that is because quantifying a number of people in one group does not work. People do not add up like numbers, because numbers are always the same and always mean the same thing. 1 will always be exactly one. People are not always the same, because no person is the exact same as another person, and we cannot allow ourselves as thinking and acting people to be led down this path again and again. The problem with schooling today is not only the lack of intellectual thought, but also the collective ideal that is taught in so many supposed institutions of higher learning.
If every human being were exactly the same, collectivism would work. I am not too arrogant to admit this fact and to concede that if humans were robots, this idea that every one is the same would be a perfect way to govern and act. Normalcy is not a trait that humans can exemplify, however, because there is no normal. Who among us establishes a standard for all of humanity to abide to? Who can we honestly be led to believe is the ideal human for all of us to be? Even if this human did exist, why would we want to strive to be this ideal human? I, for one, see no reason to believe or even consider the thought of an ideal human. The ideal human to me is me, and if I don’t think so then why would I lead my life the way I do? All we can do as human beings is live the life to which we feel we need and should be living, and anything beyond that is out of our control. Collecting a bunch of individuals does not give you a population, but leaves you with a group of individuals. Math has no bearing on the human population.
