"Tea Party anger is, at bottom, metaphysical, not political: what has been undone by the economic crisis is the belief that each individual is metaphysically self-sufficient, that one’s very standing and being as a rational agentowes nothing to other individuals or institutions. "
Yes, this is interesting. The founding myth of capitalism is found in the story of Robinson Crusoe -- the original self made man who, after spending some years on a desert island reinventing himself from the ground up, returns to society to discover that he is now a rich man because some plantation he owned made a lot of money in his absence.
Since his absence consisted in this very materially deprived self-making (we'll leave Friday aside), we're supposed to feel that he now has earned his plantation riches.
They've been pulling this particular rabbit out of the hat for three hundred years. (Latest example being Shawshank Redemption.)
Any shrinks on this list? When did social inter-dependence become such a deep object of shame?
Joanna