![]() ![]() ![]() The drama of the story begins however when the Chimera Ant Queen started consuming humans and her offspring began adopting human individualistic trait. ![]() So to quickly recap, in this story arc, there is a species of creature called the Chimera Ant who evolve and thrive by consuming other species and passing on the genetic trait of the species that they consume into their offspring. Which is to say that individuality can be both paradoxically feeding into our destructive impulses but also a source of empathy for the Others in our society. The Chimera Ant arc in Hunter x Hunter, however, really manages to clarify that weird gut feeling that I have. I can’t quite explain why it is, but it just feels that way to me. And while that is true in a sense, there is a weird gut feeling that I have which tells me that this dichotomy feels simplistic. One thing for certain, however, is this insistence of how individuality is always something that is seen in direct contrast with collectivity, of how putting the emphasis of one self is something contradictory to emphasizing over the others. Sometimes the latter is also being advocated as a response for the former, where our individualist machine of society has to be replaced with a more collective-driven society. At the same time, I’ve also seen individualism regarded as everything that’s wrong with white-centric society, where the emphasis toward individualism brought about through western imperialism has basically allows exploitative abuser who don’t care for nobody to thrive, and we should all become more collective who care for each other. Some people champion this value, often putting it in a stark contrast against the crushing conformity of our soulless machine of society, chewing people out and spitting them out as a cog in the machine. Individuality, or individualism, is the perhaps one of the most overvalued or undervalued traits, depending on who you are on the side of debate. (Warning: Spoiler for Chimera Ant Arc portion of Hunter x Hunter) ![]()
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