I appreciate your comment. I see what you mean bringing up the Greeks, but a couple points:
- Human history goes back far, far longer (200k years or so) beyond Ancient Greece, so this is still quite recent in human history. For the vast majority of time, humans lived collectively in socially structured systems where individual rights, work, etc would not have made sense.
- Greek notions akin to the individual existed but were by no means mainstream. They were reserved for the elites, not as a fundamental way to structure society. Regardless, even if we count it, see #1.
- The sociological critique and deconstruction of individualism has a robust history--> in other words, this is not my opinion. Because we grew up in an individualistic society, people ASSUME it is the natural order of things. I am simply pointing out what we know from anthropological research-- that it is not. There are cultures today that are "collectivist", and the individual as the basic building block of society is an idea born of recent (historically speaking) political and economic developments. Not human nature.
- Definitely not a bigot. To the contrary! Pointing out that we are social beings is supported by scientific and historical evidence. Politically, though, what is at stake is the way we in society treat the most vulnerable. Western ideologues have always used "blaming the individual" to support racism, classism, and sexism, so if I was a good bigot I would go with that.
RE: Sociology and the modern obsession with the "individual"