A mention of "Lord of the Flies" on the FedWiki matrix.org chat sparked the following thoughts.
Several years ago there was a critique of LOTF based on a real-life experience of a group of young boys who were marooned (?) on an island for several years. Contrary to the fictional account of such a group, the boys took care of themselves and each other. They did not separate themselves into groups and then fight and terrorize themselves. (need to find the reference for this BEFORE posting)
The LOTF novel has re-enforced the idea that humans are, at root, an individualist species that see each other as competing for the essentials of life in a world of scarcity. This notion seems so self-evident that it is the basis for, and an animating spirit of, our current social, pollitical, and economic systems. It is such an unexamined idea that in the 1990's that market-centered, neoliberal capitalism was promoted under the slogan TINA (There Is No Alternative) (ref. NewLeftReview mind-map?).
Here in the USA the idea that the government is the problem has been internalized by so many citizens that the idea of public goods is treated as an anathema. This does not bode well for a humane society of more than three hundred million people.
Mutual aid as an alternative.
Freud's conception of humans as herd animals.