In A Pandemic, the Cult of Individuality Is Deadly

My pantry is stocked, but I wonder who touched those beans before I picked them up.

Our cherished belief in the power of the individual has always led to harmful policies. Will a deadly pandemic be the thing that convinces us we all depend on each other?

If you need to be convinced that the Cult of Individuality exists before we get into how it is worsening the current pandemic, here are a few examples:

Income inequality:

Are millions of Americans living in poverty? That is their fault for being stupid or lazy or both. Look, here is one man (Jeff Bezos) who has amassed a fortune of $150 billion. One would think an economic system that is failing half the country would be seen as problematic, but we ignore the example of the millions in poverty and point to the few who have made fortunes as proof that “anyone” can succeed in our system. The working poor could have been wealthy, too, if they had just made better individual choices.

Parenting:

It starts in infancy. Why do Americans believe in letting babies cry it out, when maternal instincts and research on brain development and the customs of every traditional culture call for comforting a crying infant? Well, babies have to learn to self-soothe. They have to learn to put themselves back to sleep. They cannot be taught to expect someone else to tend to their needs, even if they are only…