I've seen it pop up in quite a few threads, sometimes in jest (or sort of in-jest), but I think it comes up enough to talk about seriously, both from an individual behaviour standpoint and a broader activism/socialism/whatever standpoint.
This is also coming from someone that sees themselves as very extroverted (but also autistic and socially anxious, so pretty poor at getting my social needs met), so maybe this whole idea is way off base.
There's two narratives here for discussion in this thread:
- I struggle with pushing myself to be social, and I am afraid this makes me a poor activist. At some point or another advocating for socialism will rely on socialists to talk to non-socialists in spaces and circumstances that are not comfortable.
- Socialism, on some level, involves a society with more time and space to socialise. What will this look like for a severe introvert? Will there be room for a person to buy a plot of land in the hills and live separate from society forever? Will I have to go to Commissar DanceClass's Dance Class?
And two sentiments that should be discussed with those narratives re: other people:
- Introvert, socially anxious, autistic etc. There are people they get along with and comfortable social situations, but for a variety of reasons need a break regularly
- "I just hate people"
This whole post was a thought I had when reading the second people-hater. My initial thought was that this was an internal pathologisation of people based on the society we live in. If the only people you encounter day to day are ladder climbing suburbanites whose main interests are competitively assessing lawn heights and promotions, you're probably going to "hate people". However, this may not be the case for all people who claim this of themselves. Maybe they hate other people on the road, people in queues for groceries etc. I just find it hard to believe that someone who genuinely hates all people would hop on to a forum (an entirely social activity) and spend any amount of time there. Nonetheless, it probably happens.
But, I figured that the topic had enough range and nuance to turn into its own thread instead of responding directly, and saw someone else post the introvert activism thing.
One of the things I thought of was the social battery and how it's often expended on work and commuting. If your main social energy is spent at work/commuting, I feel like it's very possible that one might come away with a dim view of any social activity (incl. organising) and your ability to participate in it, especially if you'd largely done it since school (another cutthroat highly hierarchical social setting).
(how is commuting social? You're in a constant negotiation with other drivers to avoid bumping your 2 ton $20k machines into each other, with a wide variety of levels of aggression, empathy, engagement etc. It's not words, but there is a communication there that can be very draining)
"I hate people" is just the literal meaning of misanthropy and is a deeply pathological attitude to have. If that's someone's reason for not doing socialism, the answer is to do what you deem best to fix that attitude.
Most people who say they hate everyone find to hard to relate to anyone, and that's the main issue. And that's either because the misanthrope needs to work on themselves, they can no longer see shared humanity. Or it's because they're a person with some kind of divergent lifestyle and they're not being acclimated properly.
It could go either way and I don't know which is more common. A lot of people on internet forums probably come from a bookish, nerdy background and don't have quite the same experiences or goals as other people. So they don't feel acclimated and end up misanthropic. But whatever the cause I think better and socialized mental healthcare could help. Also people work too goddamn much.
On a systemic level, yeah, there are a ton of ways to help such people if you actually have levers of power, I was just trying to be brief in answering what a socialist who is personally a self-identified misanthropic socialist should do.
Edit: I've been a misanthrope and still need to uproot some parts of it that are embedded really deep in my personality, to the point that it feels like there's a second person underneath me who does an objectionable job managing things when I'm not paying attention to my actions. I think your diagnosis is fair.
To be fair, socialism is, at its core, a type of structure for economy and production. You don’t need to love people to conclude it’s the most logical. One can be a narcissistic, selfish, psychopath and choose socialism simply because it makes sense, like choosing to wear a jacket when it rains, or because it serves their personal agenda.
Though I don’t think the majority of people on here who “hate people” fall into the above category.
I agree with what you are directly saying, but remember that the question is based on someone having their misanthropy preventing them from doing socialism -- which, again, I can identify with from pathologies I have spent many years trying to fix in myself. Yes, Marxism is either Scientific Socialism or it's another show-and-tell affectation just like every other "analytical lens" that you learn in a philosophy or literature class, and things like moral sentiments must come second to that for it to have power as a means of social analysis.
That makes sense. I feel like if you do desire to help people, but avoid doing so because you feel like you hate people, then I don’t know. Maybe you don’t really hate people after all
That's why I said the thing to do is work on that feeling. Just because someone feels that way now doesn't mean they need to feel that way in the future, especially if they don't want to feel that way, and very few misanthropes really "like" being misanthropes even if they revel in it as cope (again, speaking from experience).