Individualism: Eastern Religion, Falling Down, and Rand.
The western culture seems to be leaning towards individualism more, having lived in three continents of the western world. This individualism culture is also creeping up in major cities of more traditional cultures in Africa. As an international student, and a mother of children all under age 6, I constantly find myself trying to find a common ground between my culture and the culture my children are growing up in. I search to merge the positive sides of each, to better prepare my children for the life ahead. Having been born in a “third world country” and having the most part of my growing up in that country and the U.K, gave me a great buffer for some of the culture shocks. My mother in-law has yet to understand why children do not acknowledge elders or why neighbors do not acknowledge each other often, here in the United States, being a seasoned traveler herself. Is the American society teaching selfishness? Parents always teach charity to their young children, but the society, blurs these lessons with age. Children’s TV teaches sharing, been kind and all other societal perceived positives. It (society) teaches children that life isn’t always fair and people are not obliged to share. Technology on the other hand has not aided issues; the younger generation in particular seems to be more attached to their technological gadgets than to their fellow beings.
The movie “Falling Down” showcases the effect of individualism in the American society. The main character goes against the Hindu and Buddhist practices of renouncing or extinguishing oneself. The Hindu religion believes we can have whatever we want, but at a point we realize those things are not going to satisfy us. However what we ultimately desire is infinite existence and not the present self, this realization brings about Moksha (liberation from empirical self).
The Essay on The Concept of Culture and Society
Culture, as often defined in most sociology textbooks, is the way of life of a society. It is the sum of the ideas, beliefs, behaviors, norms, traditions, and activities shared by a particular group of people (Appelbaum and Chambliss, 1997). According to Giddens (1989), any society cannot exist without a culture. This means that culture is an important element that makes a group of people be ...
In Hinduism, renunciation is renouncing oneself by coming to a knowledge of Brahman so complete that one no longer distinguishes between self and Brahman. Renouncing self or worldly desires means embracing the whole universe without discrimination. While Buddhism believes that life in itself is unnecessary suffering, selfish desire, referred to as Tanha, is the cause of unnecessary suffering, which is referred to as dukkha. To eliminate suffering, one must extinguish self. Extinguishing self and eliminating Tanha involves following the eightfold path. The eight fold path includes 8 rights; views, intent, speech, conduct (do not kill, lie, steal, use intoxicants, unchaste) occupation, effort, mindfulness, and concentration. `
The beginning of the movie shows a traffic holdup scene; the main character William Foster, whose license plate reads: “D-Fens”: and goes by this name throughout the movie. He is a divorced and unemployed. This traffic holdup takes place in Los Angeles on a hot and humid day. D-Fens is enraged by a series of events that keep him from getting to his daughter as it was her birthday; these events cause him to act violently towards people who have crossed his part.
Hinduism does not encourage most behaviors of the movie characters. D-fens for one is disillusioned about life that has dealt him a bad hand. He encounters other people who have issues like the storekeeper who insisted D-fens buy something from the shop, if he wanted change. The storekeeper then charged him 35 cents extra for a can of coke, thereby making the reason for wanting change, pointless. D-fens then proceeds to thrash his shop. On leaving the store he encounters two gang members who claim he is on private land, threaten him with a knife using undesirable language and demand his briefcase. The gang members see D-fens walking down the street and try to shoot him; instead they take down by standers and then are involved in a fatal car crash (the law of Karma?).
The Essay on Gang Life
Gang Life In life, teenagers and adults join gangs for difficulties in their life. They feel that they need a group of people to understand and support them through the rough stage of their life. In the novel, The Outsiders, by S. E. Hinton Ponyboy is a fourteen-year-old boy who is a part of the gang called the greasers. His whole remaining family are greasers.Gang life can lead to death and ...
He encounters them again where they were involved in a fatal accident; he takes one of their guns and shoots one of them in the leg (this act goes against the eightfold part of the Buddhism, do not kill).
The gang members go against the eightfold part in many ways. They definitely do not have the right views, there speech (using foul language) is not acceptable, they do not have the right conduct (they lie and they kill).
They do not have the right livelihood, (extortion and illegal gang related activities).
According to Buddhism and Hinduism, they will not make Nirvana according, they died having not extinguished self, and they died without relinquishing their selfish desires. They did not achieve Moksha. Yet again he encounters a panhandler who weaves him a story about his hard life, D-fens views his story suspiciously yet out of “compassion” gave him the briefcase, which only had food in it, the panhandler does not appreciate his gesture and shows his displeasure. Buddhism does not approve lying and the pan handler’s re-incarnation status is not looking too good according to Hindu religion, he seems to be in a bad position already.
The main character, D-fens died without extinguishing Tanha, without making Moksha, he is definitely going to have another circle in life. He did not show compassion, he resort to revenge most often, a very sad soul.
Ayn Rand‘s Anthem defends individualism. It basically stated that the most important freedom is freedom from each other. To Rand, individual existence is of utmost importance. The reading, if not done in-depth, could be misunderstood. She obviously does not agree with renouncing or extinguishing self. Extolling one’s self is the beginning of wisdom.
I would understand with Rand, as she is a product of communism, where the individual was nothing but, a collectivity of people. The United States must have allowed her write the unthinkable, her Russian society would not allowed. The American society let her have a self that was solely hers, a name that could be mentioned apart from her community. In the U.S she could say “I”, without a sense of guilt. Rand does not then believe in renouncing the self and embracing the whole universe, which is the Hindu belief. As if she is going against her communist society, in page 39 she writes, “”My dearest one, it is not proper for men to be without names. There was a time when each man had a name of his own to distinguish him from all other men. So let us choose our names”. (Rand) she carves out a name for herself, as an individual.
The Essay on A Way of Life for Searching People
The book Practicing Our Faith: a Way of Life for a Searching People is about addressing the need for sharing the fundamental needs of man to establish faithful and honorable Christian way of life. It explores twelve central Christian practices contributed together by thirteen individuals coming from diverse denominational and ethnic backgrounds. Specifically this book provides significance to ...
In some sense I agree with Rand, as well as these other religious beliefs. I am a part product of a society that believes it takes a village to bring up a child. In this society the individual is recognized as well as the society he or she is associated with. However, you are not allowed to think of yourself alone, you’re expected to be concerned about your neighbor. My Christian faith, enthuses laying one’s life down, because on our own we cannot do right, except we have Christ in us. We’re supposed to be our brother’s keeper. It still emphasized individualism in relationship with God, but not completely separate from others, this can be seen in Mathew 10: vs. 40, “He who receives you receives me, and he who receives me receives the one who sent me”. Protestant Christian views encourage individuals to seek salvation for themselves, to ask for forgiveness of sins directly from God without going through a priest.
I do believe in individualism but not as stipulated by Rand, I believe in the common saying that no man is an island. We cannot completely do without each other; we’re still compelled by our natural instincts or is it conscience, to care what happens to the next man.
The law of karma is something I believe in, not necessarily as in the next life but in this life, when one negates ones responsibility, there are consequences to that. For example if parents fail to tell their child, who brings other children’s toys home, without asking, that this act is wrong, lives to the imagination what kind of adult up child will be.
Although the western world leans towards individualism, I do think it is not necessarily an all negative practice. There are still people in these societies, who still do not live selfish lives. I have seen philanthropists give their time and wealth to those who need them. Not so long ago tsunami was a world concern, they human in us reacted to the plight of these people. Haiti was another reminder of what being human means. People selflessly offered their self and time to people whom only tie they have is just being human.
The Term Paper on Is Grendel Evil Existence When Society Human
In a world of chaos, he who lives, lives by his own laws and values. Who is to say that the death of millions is any worse or better, for that matter, than injuring a cockroach. And in the case of an existing power in the form of God, who is presumed to be all which is good, presiding and ruling an organized universe, why then does evil exist? The prosaic response of "without evil, there is no ...
Works Cited
Net library. N.p.’, n.d. web 19 Oct. 2010
The Bible (on one sheet of paper).
N.p.’, n.d. web 19 Oct. 2010
