The Lonely Crowd

[stilltrucking]

http://www.meritocracy.org.uk/page20.htm

Riesman scrutinised the ways in which people formed their core values and attitudes and identified three distinct types of person and corresponding social systems, labelling them as 'tradition-directed', 'inner-directed' and 'other-directed'.

In a tradition-directed society, inherited conventions and belief systems are of paramount importance. Everything is inflexibly handed down from generation to generation, and there are severe penalties for anyone who attempts to break free. Shame and honour feature prominently in the thinking of such societies. As a result, behaviour changes little over many centuries.

The archetypal tradition-based model in the present day is the Islamic world.


A society dominated by other-directed individuals lacks credible leadership, is not concerned with self-knowledge, and arguably trivialises human potential. Today, the triumph of the other-directed is almost complete. Companies are full of emotionally well-adjusted incompetents. They control virtually all aspects of society. However, as Riesman points out, the costs of this dominance may be high. When conformity has been placed above individuality, society loses its ability to think clearly. Isn't that the most characteristic aspect of modern Britain - its hostility to serious ideas?

The final of Riesman's categories, and by far the rarest, is that of the 'inner-directed'. These are individuals who evolve their own values, based on their personal experiences and understanding. Often, their parents are freethinkers who have created the environment that allows them to develop in this way.

[SadLuckDame]

Thanks Jack.
Liked this, it actually got a lot of thought process going for me for the past two days. I wasn't raised by free-thinkers, but some-how I've been thinking of loop-holes.

[still.trucking]

I wish I could help you dame
I mean help you figure me out
or figure out any man

I been trying to be as objective as I can with you dame. brain to brain
all the while noticing the difference.

I am not asking you to believe what I say.
I am not trying to write a novel either.
just an artblog what ever that is

I am shooting for honesty, however that comes across.
Integrity would be a big plus
I would like to have some of that.

So there

[SadLuckDame]

You are helping me figure you out or men, only it's all in my head sort of figuring out, and I don't know if any of what I'm imagining is truly the truth of it.

I barely believe a thing you're saying and so I form what you say into a thing I can believe, la la la.

[jackofnightmares]

It wasn't Mae West who said skepticism is the chastity of the intellect. Do you believe that?

[SadLuckDame]

I'm always one thing, skeptical.
I do believe that.
I think your bosom snake and my bosom snake have made excellent relations. I don't know why I just told you that. Seems personal or intimate almost. Maybe you shouldn't know.

[still.trucking]

down and dirty in ah open text-box
like Freud's magic writing tablet

in the mean time
her son points a loaded shotgun at her head

In the mean times
I gave up trying to-figure out how to do this.

nothing wrong with being a couple of standard deviations from the mean

Rock and Roll
Freed my soul in 1953