Are Americans really individualists or just the same old herd mentality?

Question

Americans talk about freedom and being different and then seem to be manipulated by mass media popular culture. Which way do Americans really swing and why?

Answer 1

Interestingly, Americans more than any nation believe that "you can't make generalizations about any group." Also interesting is your use of the term "herd mentality", which was used by Allen Blum in the "Closing of the American Mind" when he described American individualism. The metaphor is like this: there are "herd" and "hive" mentalities: individualism and collectivism respectively. Americans tend to believe that a person should be able to operate independently of the group, like a cow in a herd could survive on its own should it be separated from the group. Hive mentality is the metaphor that a bee, separated from the hive, is presented with such specialization and reliance on the group that it can not survive as a single part.
We do prize independence, individualism.. We tend to shun the idea of relying on others for our outcomes, and we despise those who try to inifluence our goals and future plans to conform to their preferences. It is not this way everywhere. for those of us who haven't been to intensely collectivist cultures like China, Vietnam, Zimbabwe or the other numerous collectivist peoples, maybe the endless empirical support for the fundamental difference between US (we are typically the most individualist in any construction of individualism) and collectivist mind set. This difference is even embedded in language, where the US has institutionalized the idea of "self". We got self respect,self responsibility, self control, self efficacy, self actualization. Cripes, even self checkout at Home Depot now. Several languages, including Tagalog and Vietnamese do not typically use a pure term for self, rather they tend to speak of "themselves" in what we call the "third person". It is manipulated by media an pop culture. Being "yourself" is "celebrated" while staying with your infirm spouse or parents and subordinating your "own" interests is suspect.
The idea that generalizations are not useful or revealing of real differences is idealogical baloney. Learn another language and live part of your life in other places. You will appreciate the US more as well as see some of the blemishes any society has when you look back here.

As a further direction to your question, we Americans talk about freedom and self determination, given this is what our nation was established under. Outside of here, more emphasis is paid to the constraints of societal structure on a person's success. In sociology they call this "structure". This also is somewaht similar to the "institutional" school in economics pushed by Douglass North.

Good question, sorry about the long answer.

Answer 2

America is a land of individuals.You can't make generalizations about any group, but this is especially true of Americans.Some Americans can't be manipulated by mass media because they ignore it.Some will disagree with everyone else.Some only listen to sources they already agree with.The only herd mentality is that they can't stand the other herds.