U.S. Education System is Teaching Our Youth That Individualism is Bad and Collectivism ('Group Think') is Good

The rebel against the controlled world

By Jon Rappoport, Infowars.com
May 30, 2013

The campaign and attack against the individual takes many forms.

In 2012, I was contacted by a disillusioned psychiatrist who had “left the field.” He told me he was interested in discussing his experiences.

Here is a key remark he made in our conversation:

“Is there a normal state of mind? The answer is no. There is the ability to deal with the reality of the world, which is a very important skill. But state of mind is another matter entirely. You could have a million people who can deal with the world, and they’re all operating in different states of mind. There is no ‘normal’.

‘Normal’ is a modern myth that has no benefits—except to the people who invented it and control it. If you can control ‘normal’ and disseminate it broadly, slip it into consciousness, you have power. It’s like one of those steamrollers. You flatten people.”

There is no ‘normal’ state of mind. It’s a myth.

It’s sold.

The professional definitions of normal are supposed to create a uniform standard of thought and behavior. A collectivism.

Coming in from another vector, we have sociologists and anthropologists, practitioners of a fake science to rival psychiatry in promoting a climate of pseudo-babble.

One of the founders of sociology, Emile Durkheim (1858-1917), coined the phrase “collective consciousness.” Durkheim insisted there were “inherent” qualities that existed in society apart from individuals. Exposing his own absurd theory, he went so far as to claim suicide was one of those qualities, as if the “phenomenon” were present beyond any individual choice to end life. He wrote:

“Man is the more vulnerable to self-destruction the more he is detached from any collectivity, that is to say, the more he lives as an egoist.”

In other words, according to Burkheim, the individual who rejects the norms of society must be wrapped up in himself in some morally repugnant way. There are no other alternatives.

In his book, The Division of Labor, Burkheim spun moral conscience in the following fashion:

“…Make yourself usefully fulfill a determinate function.” 

He cited this as a kind of command issued by collective consciousness. If this sounds Marxian, and if it sounds like the presentation of the individual human as machine-cog, it is.

From the mud of sociology’s beginnings, the long sordid history of the academic discipline brings us to something like this. Peter Callero, of the department of sociology, Western Oregon University, has penned a paper titled: The Myth of Individualism:

“Most people today believe that an individual is a person with an independent and distinct identification. This, however, is a myth.”

By some mistake, Callero’s memo never reached me. For example, I’m under the impression that I’m sitting here writing these words. Apparently not. A collection or group is doing the job. Where are they?

Maybe they’re hiding under my desk or floating in the air of my room like invisible wraiths. Maybe they’re off in the Amazon annoying a tribe of hunters, shooting videos of their “daily customs and practices.”

Sociology and anthropology have established themselves as serious “social sciences.” That means professional journals, university courses, endowed chairs, conferences, links to foundations and governments, task forces designing optimum futures.

The practitioners of these fake endeavors are dupes and agents in a massive psyop, whose purpose is the deleting of the independent individual.

Collectivism is the replacement.

All their hypotheses start with a consideration of the group as the prime element of existence.

The psychiatric State operates hand-in-glove with sociology, in the sense that it promotes some 300 officially certified mental disorders that are the same in all people. Psychiatry is a collectivism of the mind.

I’ve established, in many articles, that psychiatric diagnosis is a complete fraud. There are no physical tests of any kind for any so-called disorder.

The 20th century saw the rise of systems-thinkers, who applied their ideas to society as a whole. They gained power because global elites were pushing forward a systems-program of their own: planetary management.

The Globalist program was (and is) all about central planning and distribution of goods and services, under the cynical rubric of “greatest good for the greatest number.” This is collectivism, plain and simple. It camouflages a leading prow of brute force, Soviet style, with more subtle forms of brutality.

Universities serve as mind-control factories, turning out graduates who only see the sunshine propaganda of group harmony.

Capitalism and socialism have sex, procreate, and their child is Globalism. It contains elements of both parents. The capitalism of the father is, however, is not about the free market. It’s founded in the crime of controlling the means of production, when what is produced (out of thin air) is money.

The Federal Reserve, along with other private international banking institutions, invent money at their discretion and profit from that invention. They give and they take. They expand economies and contract them. They create booms and busts. They bankrupt nations, as a prelude to asserting the only solution is a de facto single global nation.

At the same time, the fortunes of the old captains of industry have been diverted into foundations, which are run by men who were the diabolical spawn of the parents mentioned above.

These foundations (Ford, Carnegie, Rockefeller, etc.) are devoted to funding projects, both intellectual and material, which promote and expand collectivism.

The independent individual is seen as a barrier to these operations.

He must go.

As always, the men who run this planet have put in place “the solution to their own problem.” They understand that their schemes will raise resistance, and so they’ve devised the favored form of that resistance.

It’s false unity.

They bankroll groups and projects that seek to overturn the march toward a fascist world order. These groups offer, instead, their own form of collectivism, under the flag of “cooperation.”

“If we all cooperate and come together, we can stop the spread of the evil empire. If we join hands around the world, we’ll attain social justice for all. If we see ourselves as One, instead of as individuals, we’ll emerge victorious.”

Naturally, this op causes considerable confusion. People want to cooperate. They want to do good. They want to join together. But when the means to make it happen are simply diversions from true resistance, we have a bait and switch.

And the target is still the free, independent, and powerful individual.

Occupy Wall Street was an example of a budding movement that went nowhere. It was co-opted by, of all people, the staff of the White House, who encouraged it, while at the same time carrying on their usual incestuous partnership with Wall Street.

The Big Sleep coming at the global population from a number of vectors is couched in terms of collective unity. The sign of waking up is a demand for individual freedom. And then, taking that freedom without waiting for permission.

The rebel is forged in any of a thousand different fires of mad controlling authority. That’s where he is born. He knows, in his bones, what these authorities are demanding of him: surrender.

He knows this in an unshakable core of his being.

He can spot the collective that asks for that surrender from a mile off. It approaches, these days, with a glazed friendly smile, produced out of thousands of hours of market research.

The rebel isn’t trying to produce a better overarching system. He isn’t falling for that one.

He knows that within him, the potential for creation is extraordinary. He doesn’t complain about a lack of answers. He invents them. He exposes arbitrary authority as an insane form of theater, more surreal than surreal.

He does this for his own sake, and then to wake others up.

Compromising his freedom to attain valuable goals isn’t on his list of things to do.

He knows the bait and switch.

He doesn’t need a mythical place where everyone comes together.

Like any fairy tale, myth, legend, story, collectivism began as the idea in the mind of one person. Somewhere in the mists of the past, that person dreamed it up. It was his notion. It was his perverse “work of art.”

He sold it to his friends as a way they could control the mass, the populace, the audience. He said,

“Do you see how this works? We can subscribe to the most wonderful sentiments, we can appear to be servants of the Good, we can hide behind all that while we destroy freedom. It’s a winner.”

Collectivism isn’t a mass outpouring of share and care. It’s coming down from the top of the ladder.

The rebel understands these things. He knows someone, somewhere, cooked up the whole idea and promoted it, like flatware or recliner chairs or rhinestones.

In 1934, Smedley Butler became a rebel. He was the highest ranking general in the US Marine Corps. He’d been awarded two Medals of Honor. Approached by a group of corporate leaders to put together his own army, march on Washington, and dethrone Franklin Roosevelt, Butler pretended to go along with the plan, then exposed it.

Here are two of his more famous statements:

“Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service.”

Butler’s second statement was published by Common Sense, a socialist newspaper, in 1935. The newspaper failed to realize that Butler’s derogatory references to capitalism applied to a specific kind of theft and murder, practiced by corporate men who ultimately intended to destroy whatever was left of the free market and, then, own all markets—State Corporatism, Globalism. Socialism.

“I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers.

In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.

I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914.

I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in.

I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street.

I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912.

I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916.

I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903.

In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested.

Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”

Butler’s rebellion was actually against the elite capitalists who came to support socialism as the method for securing and expanding their wealth and power.

That’s the turnaround that many people miss, especially those who are dewy-eyed about what collectivism promises.

The rebel is able to defend himself against delusion all the way into the core of his own mind. He discovers and invents his own reality, and he doesn’t suppose that any other human being has to agree to the contents of that reality.

Oscar Wilde said: 

“Art is individualism, and individualism is a disturbing and disintegrating force. There lies its immense value. For what it seeks to disturb is monotony of type, slavery of custom, tyranny of habit, and the reduction of man to the level of a machine.”

Nevertheless, Wilde was a socialist. He labored under the puerile delusion that private property could be abolished, thereby freeing all people from the need to slave for a living. In this way, he urged, everyone would have the necessary leisure to pursue art.

Collectivism leading to freedom of the individual. How quaint.
The real strategy of collectivism is the squashing of the mind, making it into a center of passivity and obedience, bereft of any original thought. When all people share the same imposed reality, there is no reality at all. The mind then stands only symbolically, like a black tree that has been dead for years.

To the degree it ever existed, the principle of the individual determining his own reality is being lost. What’s replacing it is the idea that “common ground” comes first and last This means doctrine. This means operant conditioning in schools. This means a Holism that preaches delusional unity.

The anthropomorphic religious diddle called Gaia has ascended. The idea of humble devotion to Mother Earth is a fool’s errand.

As George Carlin put it: 

“The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sun spots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles … hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages … And we think some plastic bags and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference?”

It’s one thing to keep the environment healthy. It’s quite another thing to worship it and feel anxious about its future. Humans aren’t going to destroy the Earth.

But humans may end up submitting to a level of brainwashing that rivals the all-encompassing mind control of the Mayans. Humans may forget how to rebel. Humans may accept the loss of freedom as a minor bump on the road to promised salvation in the arms of “the wise ones.”

The Reality Manufacturing Company turns out its product every day. It strives to improve its sales pitch and televised fabrications. It deploys talent spotters to enlist the best and the brightest in its research divisions. It invests considerable time and money in diversionary scandals and their subsequent exposure by way of the limited hangout:

“Yes, mistakes were made. A few heads will roll. These people, who were supposed to serve the public good, wandered off course, and we promise to make every effort to see that this doesn’t happen again.”

“Do you want to be normal? Buy our product. You’ll never feel so welcomed, so accepted. You’ll resonate with all other minds. You’ll ascend to the highest point of the collective star. Be the first on your block to sign up for the future.”

This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, not with a whimper, but with a heavily armed, surveilled Disneyland. Everyone takes the same rides and eats the same cotton candy. In this cartoon called reality, whoever declines and defects is reeducated.

The list of functioning conspiracies in our time period is very long. But the conspiracy of conspiracies is systemic. It is the action of the non-rebel, who shapes his own mind as a receptacle, inviting in any philosophy that suggests interconnected zeroes.

This is a mind where any thought or idea is automatically stripped of meaning and then hooked up to another such zero, and the whole apparatus is networked for ceaseless motion.

It is, in fact, a mirror of collectivism which, similarly, insists on an intimate relationship among all persons, who have themselves been emptied of individuality.

The rebel says no. And he means it.

Jon Rappoport

The author of two explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED and EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29thDistrict of California. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at www.nomorefakenews.com