Can You Be A True Existentialist?

An existentialist is someone who is a free and responsible person that determines their own development through their decisions and actions. Existentialism is another theory that determines a way of life. As with every theory, society will be pushing back constantly. Our society uses family, education, religion, friends, etc. to cope with existentialism and block it out. All of these aspects of life are used to shape conformity and create a life that can block out existentialism. These aspects make people go to school or stay with their family when in reality that is not needed at all. To be a true existentialist, you must be able to shut out all of these aspects of life and live life as a true individual shaping your own path. This begs the questions if someone can ever be a true existentialist.

Being a existentialist means that you have to block out everything from life and do everything individually. If we go by these terms then no one can ever be a true existentialist from birth to death. While you are a kid you will always have someone caring for you and making decisions for you because you do not have the intellectual ability to make them for yourself. The only true way to be an existentialist is to live alone, away from society, and forever in isolation. While this may seem doable it is almost impossible for someone to raise themselves from birth. In our society, you need someone caring for you or else you might starve to death or die of dehydration. While you can become an existentialist later on in life, you still can never be a true existentialist. One cannot ignore the early years of life when you were apart of the various distractions that help shape conformity. You can only be a true existentialist to an extent because their will always be a part of your life when you are not an individual and not making your own decisions. Going back to Jessica Benjamin's Bonds of Love, she talks about mutual recognition which is in order to be an individual you must recognize others when someone is recognizing you simultaneously. If we take this into consideration when determining whether someone can be a true existentialist, then the answer is no. One who exists among others cannot be independant and an existentialist.

Meursault considers himself to be an existentialist. He shut out his family, does not show emotion when being faced with death and love, and he shut everyone else out. He makes decisions as they come to him with no real path in life and no life goals. He is someone who is not afraid of death and realizes that death is inevitable. While one could argue that Meursault is as close to a true existentialist that one can get, he will never be a true existentialist. If we interpret an existentialist by the definition of an existentialist, then it is virtually impossible to be someone who shuts out life completely.