i’m considering putting together a final paper for my political philosophy class, and i would like some input.
i made sure the professor wouldn’t have a problem with me straying from his suggested topics, i just need to make what i’m writing about quite clear.
just about anything is fair game in this class, but i’m going to try to stick to what we’ve gone over in class: socrates (plato’s republic), hobbes, nietzsche (genealogy of morals), marx (engels- socialism: utopian and scientific), rousseau (first and second discourses). it occured to me that i could write something about the descent of the individual man.
man has left a primitive state of nature when he was the best individual (aggressive, selfish, strong)
commonwealth where he would give up some of his rights to others to protect his life and secure property
commonwealth would demand more of his rights in exchange for more security and more niceties through increased production via teamwork
more production at reduced cost, increased efficiency and decreased character of products
identical products consumed by everyone because of massive capitalist marketing to everyone
man has lost individuality through homogenization of products, given up more of his natural rights (timid, deferent, weak)
it feels like i make a couple of big leaps and stretch to make ideas connect… can anyone offer any thoughts about something else to include? i would like to put this together as an excellent last paper for the class, but i’m prepared to use a suggested topic about marx.
any input that can be offered will be appreciated. thanks
and no, the leaps are not that big… you may wish to include some soviet history to highlight the utopia that was the ussr…
but of course you may wish to concern yourself with writing for your professor… if he has been espousing the greatness of marxist totalitarianism, you may want to tell him what he wants to hear and not the conclusions you have made (which I think are correct, but I am not your professor)…
post it here when you have it finished and tell us of your score…
I would suggest focusing on either “1” or “6.” You could do a whole paper either defending or attacking either of those propositions. (Personally, I’d enjoy criticizing them much more than I would defending them.)
ok, i ended up just writing a paper analyzing marx because i found the aforementioned topic to be a bit difficult to keep short enough to safely call it a paper.
i should have the website finished soon, but right now i only have a couple of my essays available
but this brings up an interesting idea that i think i discussed in my first discourse paper: is the will of the masses the will of the mass of individuals?
groupthink or mob mentality, if you will
exactly, is what was done done because it was the will of masses of individuals that thought it was what everyone else wanted and so they went along with it? everyone afraid to voice their opinions because they’re afraid to be wrong?
kind of like modern “popular” music. people only “like” it because they’re told that everyone else likes it, they’re socialized to believe they should like it, and so…
it doesn’t even have to be selfishness, but rather the fear of going against the grain… even though the direction the individuals is going isn’t a way that the majority is even interested in
i believe i see what you mean, i really like that idea of fear being selfish… now that i think a little bit about it, you are completely right in that aspect