My grandfather used to tell me about growing up in the Italian suburbs of New York City. The Church, family, shared hardships – all these made neighborhoods more than a place where you lived. In a time before the Internet and cell-phones, personal connections, loyalties and reputations ran peoples lives. The community was unavoidable, both the bad and the good. Your reputation carried weight and going unnoticed was difficult, if not impossible. Community was not an abstract concept that had to be built; it was the foundation of people’s lives.
When we hear the word “community” we think of a generally positive thing, but this is something we have to think conscientiously about. Our community is something we have to think about, comprehend as some kind of abstract force that necessarily gives us some positive benefit. Yet, especially on this campus, we throw the word around so loosely that we are not even sure what it might mean. On a superficial level we might say community is the act of looking out for our neighbors. Knowing that the people around us will come to our aid in dangerous situations, we form a sense of comfort and security. This has become enmeshed with a kind of legal enforcement – the community aspect being somewhat drained. Well what about placing the needs of others before us? Yeah, but come on, who would do that for a stranger. Besides, I’ve got work to do.
Middlebury is, by its very definition, an individualistic place. It is just the nature of the beast. We worked hard in school to get good grades for ourselves, got ourselves into a good school, get our work done on time. We are efficient and capable students, and our rampant individualism, while not in itself a bad thing, has made building a community an almost charitable exercise. In the age of the Internet, mass media, and television, we are more focused on larger global narratives than the ones playing out all around us. This is by no means limited to us, but you have got to admit there is something ironic about us praising the value of a strong community while mostly living in our own private little bubbles.
I would be a hypocrite by saying I am not also a very individualistic person. To be honest, I get why we are so removed. It’s the simple question of asking – what’s in it for me? Community is not a charitable exercise towards our neighbors. It’s an exchange of commonalities that builds value for each individual. As unpleasant as it is, there has to be some kind of selfish motivation otherwise there is nothing to stop us from shrugging and going about our daily lives.
Back in the day, things were a little scarier. Communities like my grandfather’s bonded for protection, common language and often because there was simply no other way to get the news. Being an outsider in that environment carried serious ramifications, not just socially, but economically too.
What then does the modern community look like? Generally speaking we feel protected by the cops, we get the news from our station of choice and handpick our political opinions from Reddit. The old benefits of community are somewhat lessened, or rather just do not make a lot of sense for this generation. The few times community bonds are felt clearly are in moments of extremes. Maybe there is no going back. Maybe individualism should be embraced for what it is: the way of the future in a world strung together by hashtags and status updates.
One major misconception our generation has had is that we have mistook more ways of communicating as meaning more communication. This is the dilemma we find ourselves in now. We mistake active social engagement as one-sided opinions instead of conversations based on reciprocity. A few generations back, communities had ways of sorting out their problems. Community problems required communal solutions, not a million opinions. Of course, there are all kinds of jokes to be made about Italian-Americans, “sorting out their own problems.” We can do a lot better than being a school, or maybe even a generation, of contrarians and cynics. Not too long ago, communities facilitated local debates, political and otherwise. However indirect, they were still forums for discussion. That is an impressive tradition to replicate, and with any luck, we can work on it. The alternative is to live as individuals, pursuing our individual lives and our individual goals, which at the very least, sounds a little lonely.
