Contemporary History   Individualism Goes Mainstream

The fetishized individualism of the Western lifestyle, realized through consumption, is one of the causes of climate change and its appalling consequences. Yet, the roots of individualism lie precisely in the renunciation of worldly pleasures, not in fetishized consumption. The poverty of medieval beggars leads us to the excess of today. 

The subjective entitlement to the unlimited fulfillment of all desires in the name of prosperity — until the cash runs out — has turned into a predominant worldwide obsession. Authoritarian capitalist systems are especially responsible for doling out consumption in large quantities as a palliative treatment for their own population. How many homeowners with an SUV in the driveway are calling for a revolution just because of some human rights violations?  On closer inspection, however, the history of individualism not only has surprising origins but also facets linked to the exact opposite of the fetishism of wealth and consumerism: the complete denial of all possessions and the absolutization of poverty. 

Asceticism 

Some approaches suggest that the history of individualism begins with the anti-social escapades of the early Christian ascetics or the tradition of world renunciation in various Hindu movements. The subject fell outside the social constraints and expectations of society, ignoring the economic demands society placed upon individuals — and therefore their ideals, aspirations, and values. The Indian guru who renounced the world after a lifetime in society so he could commit to spiritual self-realization did so in old age. On the other hand, early Christians took the vow of asceticism upon entering adulthood, when they retreated into the desert as hermits to dedicate themselves entirely to the service of God.

The emerging church viewed this ascetic extremism with suspicion and tried to curb it by compelling followers to live in monastic communities, excommunicating, and vilifying these ascetics as heretics. But at the same time — and this is where economics came into play — immediately upon receiving recognition as the state church in the Late Roman Empire, the church changed rules on marriage. From then on, only the individual feelings of the spouses, their individual love, determined partner choice, and only the church could forge the lifelong union (which no one could break). This delegitimized any entitlements from other parties, particularly to an expected inheritance. The church individualized so that it could exploit the economic benefits. Back then, no one would have guessed that individualization of the decision to marry, as initiated by the church, would have repercussions 2,000 years later. The church encouraged whatever held an economic advantage, opposing anything that posed a risk to its institutionalization.  

Redemption 

This caused conflict between the church as an institution and the faithful who insisted on the individuality of their religious experience or the right to draw their own interpretations of the Biblical teachings right up to the late Middle Ages and Reformation. The best-known example is Francis of Assisi (1181/82-1226), a young nobleman from the Umbrian town he made famous. He publicly renounced his father, stripped off his clothes in the marketplace — “naked to follow the naked Christ.” From that point onwards, he fought with the church in Rome because he rejected any possession of worldly goods with militant radicalism.

St. Francis saw himself as a successor to the apostles and caused the church — which after all, also relies on an apostle, Peter — considerable difficulties justifying its worldly riches when Christ came to Earth to redeem humanity from precisely that, the inevitably sinful worldly existence. He achieved this, on the one hand, through His death on the cross but, on the other hand, through His future second coming, known as parousia. But there’s a long wait for this second coming — in fact, we’re still waiting on it today. So how did St. Francis think people were supposed to survive without possessions? The answer is probably that he wasn’t concerned. With the help of a complicated theological construct, the assumption goes, St. Francis projected himself as a second Christ that surpassed the first one, thereby rendering His ever-delayed act of redemption redundant. The time is fulfilled, redemption is accomplished, and humankind lives in a state of grace – worldly possessions become superfluous, valueless, and condemnable because there is no point in the world itself, or living in it, if one has already been redeemed. There’s nothing else to wait for. The grace is now. The time has come. 

But of course, time did not come to a standstill and promptly confront the Franciscans (along with the Cistercians and Dominicans) with the paradox that they became one of the richest orders in the Middle Ages as a result of preaching (and practicing) renunciation. The thing is, in the very possibility of being able to buy their salvation through donations to organizations most strictly and radically dedicated to the service of God and community, the medieval believer saw the solution to the problem of how firstly to have a great time walking the Earth, and secondly, to ensure eternal life: with money. 

It was in precisely this economy that Luther protested. In his eyes, the trade in indulgences, using endowments and donations to pay off sins, represented a virtually unsurpassable perversion. And Luther, too, can be seen as an embodiment of individuality, borne out not only of his teachings, but also of a famous quote — although unfortunately, it’s probably made up: At the Diet of Worms on April 18th, 1521, he allegedly told Emperor Charles V that he refused to recant his teachings with the words: “Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise.” 

Consumption 

Interestingly, the Emperor’s argument against Luther was that contradicting the majority opinion — which had been accepted for over 1000 years — was madness. With this statement, he aptly summed up the antisocial aspect of the individual decision to rely solely on one’s conscience or personal religious experience. And that is still the joke today, except that individualism and antisocialism are no longer at the core of the heroic narrative of the individual’s rebellion against an oppressive majority society. Instead, it is just a comment on the banal ignorance of the individual towards the common good. Salvation no longer lies in renunciation of the world, but in an uninhibited hedonism, an inner-worldly, individualized promise of salvation that can be fulfilled through consumption. The opposition between individualism and society has broken down because individualism has become a predominant social ideology. Individualists are no longer resistance fighters, they are mainstream conformists, streamlined participants in society. And the state of grace is 150 miles per hour in my SUV on the freeway, redemption is my 65-inch LED screen, and parousia is my annual return to paradise in Bali.  

Between the excess of today and the unlivable poverty of the medieval mendicants (or the renouncer’s rejection of the world the night before his death), an Aristotelian mean is desirable: a compromise between boring common sense, bourgeois modesty, and an understanding of the need for abstinence, without histrionics. If there’s the slightest chance that letting something be would help, then you should let it be. Simply because doing the right thing is the right thing to do, and doing a good thing is a good thing to do. 
 

09/2023