“If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”
On Liberty, John Stuart Mill
This is, I think, the truest, most absolute definition of liberty – that no one imposes their will on another, not even all of mankind but one on the remaining one. Is it impractical and entirely unfeasible, though? Definitely, because you couldn’t do anything – say build highways or industries if even one person opposed it. You couldn’t have mandatory universal insurance if one person refused.
Nevertheless, like any ideal, it serves a purpose – in this case, of being an ‘ideal’ scenario. You start off with the ideal and add exceptions that justify deviating from it, to arrive at an acceptable, and more practical, solution. Interesting as liberty is, however, it’s not what this is about.
What interests me here is that one solitary person of contrary opinion to all humanity, standing alone against the world, literally. What moves this lone hero, what passes through his mind as he takes a stand against everyone?
Contrarians are usually judged retrospectively. It’s trite to point out that if time validates your position, you’re hailed as a visionary, a genius, like Jensen Huang for his prescient bet on AI. Otherwise, you’re a presumptuous arrogant twit, who thought he knew better than everyone else – if, that is, you’re noticed at all. Otherwise, one joins the statistics, just another fellow who took a risky bet and, in line with probabilities, turned out to be wrong and bit the dust.
But at that very moment, before the game is over and the results are out, what goes through this ‘one person of contrary opinion’? After the game, post facto, narratives are spun. Hindsight bias combines with self-serving winners or hero-creating worshippers to weave a tale of a calm, cool, resolute, unflinching hero who never for a moment doubted himself, notwithstanding the hordes of naysayers all around him. While the game is being played, however, I doubt things are so deliciously simple.
Perhaps there are some such legends who really, truly, don’t feel an ounce of self-doubt standing by their lonesome selves against the tide of mass opinion. I don’t think I’m one of them, and, I’d wager, most people aren’t. These unflinching souls are probably the exception rather than the norm.
Which means, then, that some uncertainty probably passes through this lone wolf’s mind as he stands in his solitary defiance. Two possibilities exist; either he gives in to this self-doubt, or he struggles on, despite it.
If he gives in, he abandons his position and turns over to the side of the majority, and the story ends. Kafka’s maxim summarizes this tale well. “In the struggle between yourself and the world, back the world.” It’s an anticlimactic ending, but there’s nothing wrong with that. There’s no inherent virtue in being a contrarian, nor any intrinsic sin in sitting with the majority. Both are, after all, individual choices.
If he doesn’t give in, though, then he chooses to persist, despite his doubts, carrying them with him, as it were, acting or committing to an action, and at the same time acknowledging it might be mistaken. Why, after all, do so many people think differently? Can they all be dumb(er), or is it just that he is smart(er)? Anyone even vaguely familiar with probabilities knows how unlikely that is – improbable, though not impossible, although tending towards it.
Or is it just that on this particular matter, he might have an edge? That is likelier – not likely, still highly improbable, but less so than the former. Nevertheless, even this belief isn’t an easy one to carry, particularly as one undertakes something all by oneself, in direct opposition to what everyone else is doing.
When you consider that ‘different’ things, whether they be objects or people or actions, tend to be noticed and commented upon, usually unfavourably, you realize that this doubt isn’t simply one’s own creation, but something also inflicted upon one by others. People who do ‘different’ things, or do things ‘differently’, whether it’s something minor like dressing differently or something strange like sologamy or polyamory, therefore, in addition to fighting their own demons of doubt and anguish, also have to deal with those others send towards them.
They might be hailed later, post-facto, after the race is run, in the tiny eventuality that they’re successful, or, more likely, tacitly ridiculed for believing in an impossibly unlikely delusion. Because they’re post-facto, though, these are pointless – praising a winner or condemning a loser doesn’t affect the outcome, though the former at least can make someone feel better. At the moment of running the race, before the outcome is known, all one has is one’s doubt, and belief.
What this probably means is that, whenever you see someone doing something distinctive, all the more so if the crowd has taken notice of them, they’re likely going through some self-doubt. Why does this matter? Idiosyncratic or distinctive characters are typically either valourized or mocked. Such a one can be silently or openly admired, for doing openly what others long to but are afraid to. Or they can be ridiculed, from whatever motive – a nature that feels better for putting others down, or that feels envy for another doing what it itself fears to, or feels threatened and needs to assert itself.
But, I think, if you have in mind that someone in such a position, on their lonesome against a majority, is probably under significant doubt, if not, anguish, then, whether or not you lionize them, you can at least refrain from adding to the burden they carry. Neither glorifying nor condemning, one can empathize. And since, I think, everyone usually finds themselves in this position in at least some matter – unless one really lives by the conventional way in every single thing one does (a degree of conventionality I imagine is itself unconventional) – one can at best hope for the same in their turn.