About two centuries ago a French sociologist described the phenomenon of ‘anomie’. Basically he suggested that in any society in which individualism is valued, like every modern liberal democracy for example, people will inevitably become isolated and disconnected from reality. With all these school shootings its a wonder we still ponder what causes them. As long as we have a society that focuses to heavily on the individual we will have anomie; we will have lonely people committing horrible atrocities. The modern populist solution of course is to try to reduce the lethality of these incidents by limiting access to things such as explosives and firearms. You don’t need to be a sociologist or psychologist to realise this is a recipe for disaster. Identifying a problem and then trying to address it without actually suggesting a remedy to the actual problem solves absolutely nothing.
Even though I call myself a liberal, a classic liberal at that, something has to be done about this increasing isolation and disenfranchisement of people, particularly youth. I still favour a society that emphasises the individual, but the problem I suggest is that perhaps individualism doesn’t necessarily mean people collectively should reject the bonds that tie us to the people around us. The biggest misconception about liberalism is that it necessitates individual self development in isolation. If anything, liberalism is about the freedom to enter into these bonds on a voluntary basis (excluding some such as family for example). Even older classical liberal philosophers such as JS Mill in On Liberty emphasised the role of society in regulating conduct and providing structure in the individuals life. All too often the criticism levelled at liberal though is that it is heartless. It seeks to deregulate alcohol, narcotics, firearms, abolish welfare and generally remove government support and control to the furthest extent possible. On the face this almost seems like a fair criticism, but the truth is the reason for these policies is because the current system isolates individuals from their environments. If individuals come to depend on the government for everything in their life they also come to blame it for all their problems. The government does not care about the individual in any real sense, it is not there to provide the individual with the best path of development for him or herself. The problem is that it while it is not there to provide this guidance, the position it has cut for itself in contemporary liberal societies firmly thrusts that obligation upon it. It has become the case that government regulates every little triviality of life. In such a climate, where people are devoid in most circumstances of the opportunity to make the wrong choice, how are they to ever realise a right choice when they see it?
It is government that creates dehumanised productivity atoms by isolating people, placing them on a metaphorical island, and then still the world turns to government to take action when these drones recognise the bondage they have been placed under and act out. If anything we should be grateful guns and bombs are around so we have been able to recognise there is something seriously, seriously wrong with the way our society is structured…
