prof@chinet.UUCP (The Professor) (03/30/88)
Ever notice how the vast majority of the people who call themselves individualists spend most of their time letting other people know how individualistic they are, and attempting to convince other people about the "need" to be individualistic and not subject to group mores and peer pressure? Ever notice how it upsets them so much when they deal with people who don't match up to their standards of how individualistic people should be? Ever notice how they either go to great lengths to convince such people that they should be more individualistic, or else they speak disdainfully about those people (very often not having the courage to say it to their faces, mocking them when they're not around instead)? Ever notice how these so-called individualists feel superior to people who aren't individualists by their reckoning? Ever notice how their time spent in an effort to convince others about the importance of being individuals is actually an effort to proselytize "individualism" as a religion, to add more people to the flock of "individualists," in what is ultimately an attempt to legitimize their belief in individualism to themselves? Ever notice how individualists actually need to have other people legitimize their individuality? Ever notice how all the great individualists look alike? "You have to express your individuality. All individualists do." (Of course, this does not apply to you, the reader, who is a genuine true individualist.)