John Carroll - Social Quotes

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Whereas Marx's vision of homo faber becomes inoperative within social chains, Stirner's man makes his own freedom.

John Carroll
For Stirner, the social axiom of conservative, liberal, and socialist schools of political thought alike is in itself repressive: it disguises as potentially redemptive an order whose central function is inhibitory of the individual's interests.

John Carroll
The Inquisitor is the forgiving father, the scientific materialist, and the social engineer. He is the most compassionate, and honest, of politicians; he takes on great burdens of responsibility in order to protect his subjects from ethical doubt. But he also suppresses any attempt to expand their self-consciousness: he is the 'great simplifier', the shepherd to a flock of carefree children.

John Carroll
Stirner's political praxis is quixotic. It accepts the established hierarchies of constraint as given. … Not liable to any radical change, they constitute part of the theatre housing the individual's action. … The egoist uses the elements of the social structure as props in his self-expressive act.

John Carroll
Any attempt to break with the past, or with existing social structures, is a failure if it leads to a bored, listless, and colourless style of life; assertive and enduring innovation, like the mastering of a new environment, requires the confidence and discipline which are founded on exuberant emotions.

John Carroll
R. W. K. Paterson makes a central point of identifying Stirner with nihilism. His argument depends on a failure to distinguish between social values, which Stirner does reject, and personal values, to which he is more overtly committed than any other philosopher.

John Carroll