Social Identity

Topic: Social Identity,

Richard: This social identity, which is otherwise known as a conscience (a moral/ethical and principled entity, with inculcated societal knowledge of ‘right’ and ‘wrong’), is overlaid upon the instinctual identity itself … and its associated personae consist of (for example):

The Formation and Persistence of Social Identity

  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a vocational identity (identifying as an ‘employee’/ ‘employer’, ‘worker’/ ‘pensioner’, ‘junior’/ ‘senior’, ‘peasant’/ ‘squire’ a.k.a. ‘villein’/ ‘lord’, and so on).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a national identity (identifying as ‘English’, ‘American’, ‘Australian’, ‘Nigerian’, ‘Korean’, and so forth).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a racial identity (identifying as ‘white’, ‘black’, ‘brown’, etcetera, or whatever ethnicity nomenclature is the latest fashion).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a religio-spiritual identity (identifying as a ‘Hindu’, a ‘Muslim’, a ‘Christian’, a ‘Buddhist’ ad infinitum).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of an ideological identity (identifying as a ‘Capitalist’, a ‘Communist’, a ‘Monarchist’, a ‘Fascist’ and the like).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a political identity (identifying as a ‘Democrat’, a ‘Tory’, a ‘Republican’, a ‘Liberal’ and all the rest).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a class or caste identity (identifying as an ‘aristocrat’/ ‘commoner’ (as in, ‘the gentry’/ ‘the peasantry’), ‘patrician’/ ‘plebeian’ (Latin), ‘noblesse’/ ‘roturier’ (French), ‘ariyan’/ ‘puthujjana’ (Pāli), ad nauseam throughout the ages.
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a familial identity (identifying as ‘son’/ ‘daughter’, ‘brother’/ ‘sister’, ‘father’/ ‘mother’, ‘uncle’/ ‘aunt’, and the whole raft of relatives).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive of a sex identity (identifying as ‘boy’/ ‘girl’, ‘man’/ ‘woman’).
  • The term ‘social identity’ is also inclusive, nowadays, of a gender identity a.k.a. sexual orientation identity (identifying as ‘asexual’/ ‘bisexual’/ ‘homosexual’/ ‘transvestite’ a.k.a. ‘cross-dresser’/ ‘transsexual’ a.k.a. ‘transgender’/ ‘gender-queer’ a.k.a. ‘queer’ / and, colloquially, an ‘alphabet-soup’ of initials.

Richard: A social identity is a psychological creation manufactured by society to act as a guardian over the wayward rudimentary self one was born with. All sentient beings are born with a biologically coded instinctive drive for physical survival which, when one is operating and functioning with a group of people, is potentially a danger to the survival of other group members. Hence the need for principles and morals and ethics to regulate the conduct of each person … with appropriate rewards and punishments to ensure compliance.

In a well-meant but ultimately short-sighted effort to prevent gaols from being filled to over-flowing, a social identity – a psychological guardian – is fabricated in an earnest endeavour to prevent the offences from happening in the first place. This ‘guardian’ is programmed with a set of values and charged with the role of acting as a conscience over the wayward self. A conscience is made up of a sure knowledge of what is Right or Wrong and Good or Bad … as determined by each society. By and large this enterprise has proved to be effective – only a small minority of citizens fail to behave in a socially acceptable manner.

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  • keep your hands in your pockets

    [Peter]: The expression I heard Richard use was to ‘keep your hands in your pockets’, meaning be wary of doing something you may regret while in the midst this period of psychological and psychic turmoil. The process can be very confusing and disorienting for one is demolishing one’s own spiritual/ social and one’s instinctual identity – something any good psychiatrist would warn you against and something your priests and Gurus will utterly condemn as being evil. It may be useful to ask questions such as – am I trying to change the other, am I blaming the other, is my reaction considered and considerate or is it thoughtless instinctual? One’s own interactions with others provide a literal goldmine of valuable information as to how the human psyche is socially and instinctually programmed.’ I spoke to No 7 just a while ago about a recent experience with fear. There is no need to really go into all of it right now, but in light of what you wrote, the advice to ‘keep your hands in your pockets’ is sensible. I do regret acting unwisely in the situation. I did become somewhat aggressive. I recall the supervisor saying that I was ‘defensive’. [endquote].

  • Your own best friend

    With no social identity to maintain and no social ladder to climb I am now free to set my own pace as to how I like to spend my time – except for the time that I sell for a living, in which case the pace is set by those who employ me.

  • Sexual Desire

    VINEETO: The desire for sex is a complex issue in that it is both socially conditioned and instinctually ingrained. Instinctually the male seeks to spread his semen as far and wide as possible whereas the female looks for a strong, faithful and controllable partner to raise the offspring. Both on the social and on the instinctual level, this programming is responsible for the systemic misunderstanding, disappointment and dissatisfaction between the genders. Because the instinctual sexual drives are accompanied by powerful chemical processes in the brain, the battle between the sexes is so endemic.

  • Seriousness

    • [Richard]: ‘ ( … ) around the time of puberty onwards, adolescents become increasingly serious and childhood fun gives way to societally-inculcated obligations and responsibility.

  • Security

    [..] To defend the belief that this life is forever fatally flawed – defend to the point of idiocy – is actually a cowardly attempt to stay hidden inside ‘humanity’. To skulk behind a sick social contract is a desperate ploy to remain ‘human’. If one takes one’s intellectual ability back from the decrees of the cultured sophisticates – to which one has surrendered – one has taken a courageous step. One has cast oneself out of the biggest group there is … humanity. If one stays within the group, for its perceived safety and security, one is selling out to the system because of a pusillanimous character.

  • Naive Optimism

    [Richard]: ‘In 1980, ‘I’, the persona that I was, looked at the natural world and just knew that this enormous construct called the world – and the universe itself – was not ‘set up’ for us humans to be forever forlorn in with only scant moments of reprieve. ‘I’ realised there and then that it was not and could not ever be some ‘sick cosmic joke’ that humans all had to endure and ‘make the best of’. ‘I’ felt foolish that ‘I’ had believed for thirty two years that the ‘wisdom’ of the world ‘I’ had inherited – the real world that ‘I’ was born into – was set in stone. This foolish feeling allowed ‘me’ to get in touch with ‘my’ dormant naiveté, which is the closest thing one has that resembles actual innocence, and activate it with a naive enthusiasm to undo all the conditioning and brainwashing that ‘I’ had been subject to. Then when ‘I’ looked into myself and at all the people around and saw the sorrow of humankind ‘I’ could not stop. ‘I’ knew that ‘I’ had just devoted myself to the task of setting ‘myself’ and ‘humanity’ free … ‘I’ willingly dedicated my life to this most worthy cause. It is so exquisite to devote oneself to something whole-heartedly … the ‘boots and all’ approach ‘I’ called it then!’

  • Meaning of Life

    PETER: If ‘I’ seek meaning for ‘my’ life then narcissism can be the only result – and the long history of the famed spiritual search attests to this fact. If ‘I’ simply reject the traditional meanings of life then meaninglessness aka nihilism can be the only result and this seems to be where U.G. Krishnamurti has ended up.

  • Instinctual Treadmill
  • Identity
    Social Identity, which is overlaid on top of ‘being’
  • Gender Ideology
    Social Identity, the larger theme behind the illiberal gender ideology.
  • Community

    The phrase ‘good of the whole’ seems to imply this, but closer examination reveals that ‘the whole’ exists only in bombast and blather … it is a concept, an ideology. Only an individual person – a flesh-and-blood body – actually exists. Where people have no integrity – which is the case in order for the ‘whole’ to exist – they have no genuine individuality. They are invisible … as if a non-person, a statistic, a number. They may complain about the ‘dehumanisation’ process, little realising that they are but a social identity … a fictitious entity having only psychological existence. This social identity has taken up residence in the body and rules the roost in an autocratic manner. Nevertheless, it is itself subject to the commands of the community, for it is a loyal member, having been created by the community – the ‘whole’ – in the first place. This loyalty thrives on the moral investment that the social identity has made in the community; one’s very ‘well-being’ depends upon receiving a continuous supply of moral dividends.

  • Basic Resentment

    But then again that’s the challenge intrinsic to the process of actualism – to do something radically different to what everyone else has been biologically programmed to do and socially conditioned to think and feel, to be sensible in that one obeys the laws and conforms to societal protocols yet be a rebel in that one devotes one’s life to not only breaking free from the crowd but to become actually free of the human condition itself.

  • Autonomy

    The magic outcome of this process is that one eventually ceases to expect anything of anyone else – then you can never feel let down, disappointed, obligated, grateful or resentful. This cleaning yourself up – eliminating your social and instinctual identity – leads to a delicious and tangible autonomy. You become delightful company, both happy and harmless, free to interact with all of your fellow human beings in a way that is always appropriate, for you are guileless, innocent – childlike but with all the benefits of life experiences and a passion-free benign clarity.

  • Anti-crypto
    Mr. Guido van Rossum, a Dutch programmer living in woke* California. Created the Python programming language.

    Incidentally, Mr Rossum’s Twitter / X biography reads “fully vaccinated” with pronouns “He/him” (usually a form of status signalling of woke identity politics, if not a bizzare reinforcement of one’s illusory gender identity) plastared over it.

    – Ms. Molly White (a self-identified “queer feminist”, “a pretty visible editor of wikipedia articles on controversial subjects” and anti-crypto grifter who is also described as “leading” a crowd in an attack)

  • Actualism Method

    RESPONDENT: Can someone please list the laws contained within the method that enable one to minimise the social identity and the instinctual passions?