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0 pointspdonis8y ago0 comments

> who are the heroes in american TV and movies? The rebel against authority, the one that breaks the rules. Lethal Weapon, Die Hard, House

All of these heroes cooperated with close friends, colleagues, and other people in order to solve problems and achieve goals.

The difference is not individualism vs. cooperation. The difference is cooperation based on the voluntary choices of individuals, as needed to accomplish goals, vs. cooperation dictated from the top by someone's ideology.

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ergothus8y ago

I don't think we're talking about people that are utterly unwilling to cooperate with ANYONE. We're talking about whether they are willing to cooperate as a society.

pdonisOP8y ago

> We're talking about whether they are willing to cooperate as a society.

And what does "cooperate as a society" mean? If there is indeed a goal that every member of the society has in common, then yes, it makes sense for everyone in the society to cooperate to achieve that goal. But too often, "cooperate as a society" really means that some people get to choose the goal and force everyone else to cooperate to achieve it, whether they agree with the goal or not. That is the kind of "cooperation" that the American culture of individualism rejects.

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