Loneliness/yearning to recognize someone and surprising Shining insight

[Paul Mackin]

Oh, the book couldn't have been more critical.  That's one reason it was 
so popular.

In popular talk the term "other directed"  came to mean  too conformist.

Not surprisingly,  people thinking of themselves as "non-conformist" had 
become quite other directed as well.

People read The Lonely Crowd the way they read White Collar.  Both were 
assigned reading in good colleges.

The 50s was a hotbed of social criticism among youth.

P





On 7/6/2011 6:00 AM, Kai Frederik Lorentzen wrote:
>
> On 05.07.2011 18:21, Paul Mackin wrote:
>
>> On 7/5/2011 11:35 AM, alice wellintown wrote:
>>>> TR Pt 2 ch 1
>>>> p.303
>>>> "With his dispatch case, and an unkind thought for everyone he knew,
>>>> Otto carried his head high: Affecting to despise loneliness, still he
>>>> looked at the unholy assortment past him as though hopefully to 
>>>> identify
>>>> one, rescue some face from the anonymity of the crowd with instantly
>>>> regretted recognition , and so rescue himself."
>>> Goodbye Yellowbrick Road. All the Lonely people live in the city. So
>>> eeasy to meet people on the farm.
>>>
>
>> Reminds one of a book very popular (and influential) in the 50s, The 
>> Lonely Crowd (Riesman, Glazer et al), which identifies the 
>> predominant social type of the day,  the other directed. (as opposed 
>> to tradition and self directed)
>>
>> The other directed person needs others and the opinion of other to 
>> define himself.
>>
>> This mode was considered  adaptive to modern social  conditions.
>>
>> Very inauthentic as far as the sentiment of being is concerned.
>> P
>>
>
> In your description it sounds as if Riesman/Denney/Glazer were 
> uncritical of the inauthentic and affirmative re the urban crowd's 
> loneliness. This is not the case. Check out the last but one paragraph 
> of The Lonely Crowd where the authors say that by diving into the 
> crowd people will never soften their loneliness, just like you cannot 
> quench your thirst with salt-water. If people realize this, the text 
> says, it is to expect that they give due regard to their feelings and 
> demands. And the book's last sentence has it that people are created 
> differently and that they lose their social freedom and their 
> individual autonomy when they try to be just like everybody else.
>
> "Wenn die außen-geleiteten Menschen entdecken würden, wieviel unnötige 
> Arbeit sie sich machen und daß ihre eigenen Gedanken und ihr eigenes 
> Leben mindestens ebenso interessant wie die der anderen Menschen sind 
> und sie ihre Einsamkeit mit dem Untertauchen in der Masse der 
> Zeitgenossen in Wirklichkeit ebensowenig mildern können, wie man 
> seinen Durst mit Meerwasser stillen kann, dann steht zu erwarten dass 
> sie auch ihren eigenen Gefühlen und Ansprüchen mehr Beachtung 
> schenken. (...) Die Idee, daß die Menschen frei und gleich geschaffen 
> sind, ist wahr und zugleich irreführend: die Menschen sind verschieden 
> geschaffen und sie verlieren ihre soziale Freiheit und ihre 
> individuelle Autonomie, wenn sie versuchen, einander gleich zu 
> werden." (David Riesman/Reuel Denney/Nathan Glazer: Die einsame Masse. 
> Eine Untersuchung der Wandlungen des amerikanischen Charakters. Mit 
> einer Einführung in die deutsche Ausgabe von Helmut Schelsky. 3. 
> Auflage. Hamburg 1960: Rowohlt, pp. 319-20)
>
> Ah, look at all the lonely people!
>
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Dsz4dB6DuM
>
>
>