Instrumentalizing charity alienates individuals more radically than explicit communal sacrifice does

Evidence

The alleviation of personal need is emotionally so categorical an end-in-itself, that to deprive it of this ultimate purpose and to convert it into a mere technique for the transsubjective ends of a social unit constitutes a significant triumph for the latter. This distantiation between the individual and the social unit—despite its lack of visibility—is more fundamental and radical in its abstractness and coldness than sacrifices of the individual for the collectivity in which the means and the ends tend to be bound together by a chain of sentiments. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 413

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Sharpens the contrast with ritual sacrifice in ‘On Sacrifice: The Real Kind, with Corpses’ — direct sacrificial acts at least bind means to ends with sentiment, whereas modern welfare’s cold instrumentalization is more alienating.
• DEEPTHINKING: A dense inversion: the visible coldness of explicit sacrifice is less radical than the invisible coldness of bureaucratized care — a paradigm-shifting claim about modernity.
• XREF: connects to: Giver-centered charity derails the recipient’s interests and even harms them — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 409; The felt obligation to continue charity presupposes a preexisting moral bond. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 427; Living people can be silenced by exploitation and poverty, not only by death — George Michelsen Foy, Zero Decibels: The Quest for Absolute…, 407 (+4 more)

Related

• Giver-centered charity derails the recipient’s interests and even harms them (similarity 0.80)
• Altruism can be weaponized purely to offend a third party (similarity 0.80)

Broader Connections

• The felt obligation to continue charity presupposes a preexisting moral bond. #expands (0.70) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 427