Skip to main content

The Myth of the Self-Made Man

Something that's been on my mind lately is how many people (Specifically here in the USA) claim that they've made it all on their own, that they've made it through life without any support, or that they've relied on nothing but themselves and hard work to reach their success. While I understand and appreciate the fervor of the human being in believing in their strength, I can't help but feel that they discount the role that their world plays in fostering it.

A man may come from poverty-stricken conditions, go through life while facing many obstacles, and reach unimaginable heights of success. The man faced adversity, he faced issues that more well-off people may not have, but to say that he (or anyone else in this country for that matter) made it all on his own is false. Access to food is dependent on the farmers and laborers that produce it, and he would not eat without them. Access to a means of transportation is dependent on those that produce and manage it, and he could not travel in our cities or towns without them. Access to drinking water is dependent on a dedicated group of people who manage the water supply, and the man would not have drinking water without them. And access to an education or practical skillset is dependent on those who instruct it, and as such the man can not learn without them. Even if these entities are acting only in self-interest or to make a profit, they provide the means for an individual to survive in our modern world. 

To call yourself a self-made person is noble, as you indeed do have inner strength and ability to fight your way through adversity. But it ignores the complex systems that make your success possible in the first place. Without others performing the work that tends to your basic needs or forming a world where you can crawl out of such adversity, you may well have ended up dead in a ditch. 

The world is more than just yourself, despite how alienating and lonely it may feel at times. And with that understanding, I believe it's important to understand the overwhelming amount of background cooperation that exists for you to have the opportunities you have in the first place. Something as simple as having a paved path to walk on depends on the cooperation of others to ease the journeys of everyone else. You have both directly and indirectly relied on others to bolster your own success.

It would be good to remember that.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Notes on Culture and Primitive Man

Primitive humans, through their lived experience, lived lives that were wholly satisfying: they engaged in work that was meaningful and personal, they had constant challenges and mental stimulation, an unrestricted sense of autonomy, and a sense of adventure belying the entire thing. Humans had no choice but to derive meaning from a life that was exhilarating at every moment. Every choice was meaningful and required an unparalleled trust in one’s ability to overcome the next obstacle. It was an enduring but highly satisfying test to see if you had what it took to have mastery over life.  And in our chase toward rapid industrialization, we have lost the personal touch of what it means to be human. Many of the activities we engage in are indeed surrogates for that which were once accomplished and deemed satisfying by primitive man. Take video games or movies, for example. One engages in adventurous, dramatic, action-packed, or otherwise exhilarating genres to induce pleasure in onese...
1 comment
Read more

To Care Beyond Yourself

We humans are an entertaining bunch, aren't we? At one moment we care for our neighbors, we nurture our communities, and are joined in solidarity when tragedy strikes. At another moment, we find ourselves viciously reaching for each others' throats for the most trivial and banal of opinions. We seem to be in constant flux, feeling the desire for great love and care whilst simultaneously feeling the desire for great violence and dominion over those we view as inferior. What a precarious situation we seem to find ourselves in on a day to day basis; we care too much for others at the expense of ourselves, or we care too much about ourselves that we crush others and leave them by the wayside. Of course, the world doesn't always function in such moral absolutes. We all do what is in our best interest, after all. But how do we know that what we're doing is in our best interest? I'd argue that more often than not, we are absolutely clueless. The world and universe seem to ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A Common Enemy

Many works of art in history have demonstrated an idea of human unity: the idea that, if faced with a disaster that seeks to destroy humanity, we will all forget all of our minor transgressions and band together as one race to fight the enemy head-on. Whether the media presents it as an alien invasion, a meteor, a great evil wizard, or some other seemingly insurmountable threat, the core concept remains, which is that through our collective power, we can stand up to any enemy, no matter how terrifying or powerful. This is especially useful in the act of warfare. The way Americans united against the Japanese threat by interning Japanese-Americans in camps on their own soil. The way the profiling of Muslims increased after 9/11, as Americans were thoroughly convinced that Muslims are far more dangerous than other people. The amount of civilians and innocent people that have been eliminated from the face of the Earth for no other reason than in the name of “freedom” and “democracy,” which...
Post a Comment
Read more