There is a fundamental distinction between all forms of political or social ideologies that forms much of the basis of any system of government. That distinction is a belief in individualism or collectivism.
Collectivism is the principle of giving the group preference over the people who make up that group. Under this ideology, it is not the health or rights of the individual people that matter but rather the “progress” (as defined by some central authority, rarely the people themselves) of the overall group that matters. Collectivism projects any of the struggles or injustices of an individual onto that individual’s assigned demographic. It is therefor never the individual who is at fault for the positive or negative outcomes of his actions, but that individual’s assigned group that is either rewarded or punished.
Because collectivism rewards and protects groups over people, it creates a strong and natural tendency for the people to form groups, or what the authors of the federalist papers referred to as factions. People naturally organize themselves into groups in order to benefit from that faction’s preference. These various factions then inevitably compete against each other for various entitlements or privileges over that of other groups. This systematic elimination of the person in favor of the group is how leaders of that group assert their own private will over that of the majority.
The natural tendencies of people are to atrophy to base behavior. This was outlined in: To What Extent Is Security Possible? It is for this reason that human nature always tends towards self interest as opposed to any form of altruism. The self interest tendency of man combined with the strong social incentive to organize into competing groups invariably results in division of otherwise cohesive societies. This is exactly the type of danger we are witnessing currently in the U.S.
When a police officer or person of some specific skin color, for example, commits an injustice against someone from a different group we must not only condemn all police or all members of that skin color for the same crime, but we must hold all members of the victim’s faction as victims themselves. This does two very destructive things. One, it socially convicts many innocent people of the crimes of an individual to whom very few hold any association, and two, it labels much of the remainder of the population a victim to some injustice that whether from circumstance or strength of character that group has not fallen victim. In either case, it denies the virtue and character of the entire population.
In the collectivist minded portions of our modern western culture the two most defining features of any individual are skin color and genitals. It is these two human descriptors and largely only these two physical descriptors that matter. To this collectivist mindset it is skin color and genitals that are both the cause and the solution to every problem in society. What this mindset unfortunately does is completely bypass the actual cause of our societal problems which is our imperfect nature. It sidesteps the critical need for human morality and the development of virtue and replaces it with the destructive nature of competing group factions.
The alternative ideology is individualism. When we define human beings based solely on a couple of physical characteristics we quickly realize that the major factions which develop hold little in common with one another. For example, if social identity is wrapped up completely in skin color and genitals, then white men have nothing in common with black women. White women have nothing in common with asian men, and so on. But if we accept that human beings are much more than any of their physical attributes and choose instead to see each person, regardless of skin color, gender, religion, political affiliation, or any other descriptor but as individuals, then all of sudden we go from holding nothing in common to holding everything in common.
We may all look different, but we are all human beings, we all have the same individual rights in common. We all share common emotions and capacity for evil or for virtue. We may experience these things differently and under different circumstance for any number of just or unjust reasons, but we are all people.
When we see people for being more than just some physical characteristic, and administer justice according to the each individual’s actions instead of according to group preference, we no longer hold the natural incentive to organize ourselves into competing factions seeking various protections or privileges associated with those factions. We see ourselves as a single people united by our common values and equal protection under the law which is universally applicable to every person.
If we want to end racism, sexism or any other form of prejudice, we need to first abandon the collectivist ideology that influences us into factions and to instead respect and protect the rights of the individual.
When we choose instead to atrophy towards the irrational appeal of collectivist group division we are surrendering our individual rights over to the leaders of those factions. We are essentially saying that a physical descriptor such as skin color possess rights or privileges, not the person wrapped up in that skin.
The danger in collectivism is that under it, people don’t have rights. Groups, or more accurately stated, group leaders have rights. Violating the rights of any person, particularly any minority faction of a group, is perfectly acceptable so long as the end justifies the means in the sense that it is for the “greater good”. Again, who is to determine what constitutes the greater good? In a slave culture it would be the slave owners who might determine the greater good of their society. In a dictatorship such as the NAZI regime or any of the communist regimes, it would be the dictator. If he just happened to determine the mass extermination of dissidents or undesirables was for the greater good, that would be perfectly acceptable.
It is important to realize that under collectivist ideologies there is no concept of human equality. The concept of equality says it is wrong to exterminate people you don’t like or to enslave others for your own benefit because this violates the natural rights of those people. The only culture that respects the rights of each individual, and that protects those individuals from the will of hostile majority, is one that respects individualism. This is why it is so important to understand the difference between individualism and collectivism and to continually promote the natural rights protections under individualism over that of divisive collectivism.