We must demand that the individual shall be willing to lose the sense of personal achievement

In "Democracy and Social Ethics", Jane Addams wrote the following: (page 275)

The power to distinguish between the genuine effort and the adventitious mistakes is perhaps the most difficult test which comes to our fallible intelligence. In the range of individual morals, we have learned to distrust him who would reach spirituality by simply renouncing the world, or by merely speculating upon its evils. The result, as well as the process of virtues attained by repression, has become distasteful to us. When the entire moral energy of an individual goes into the cultivation of personal integrity, we all know how unlovely the result may become; the character is upright, of course, but too coated over with the result of its own endeavor to be attractive. In this effort toward a higher morality in our social relations, we must demand that the individual shall be willing to lose the sense of personal achievement, and shall be content to realize his activity only in connection with the activity of the many.

So first off, all of you who reach higher to be better people, you're ugly.

Second, individuals must surrender to the collective - "the activity of the many".

This is pure poison. But it's a consistent refrain from those who believe in progressive ideals, that the individual doesn't matter. Only the group matters.

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