It is instructive, I think, to consider the implications of this personal and social state of affairs by reference to what Edmund Burke called the “little platoons” of social life. He writes in his “Reflections on the Revolution in France”: “To be attached to the subdivision, to love the little platoon we belong to in society, is the first principle (the germ as it were) of public affections. It is the first link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our country, and to mankind.”
Burke’s description of these mediating institutions between the government and the individual, such as churches and social clubs, is primarily political. I wish to consider their social importance as the primary contributors of stability and security to society as a whole and to the individuals who constitute it. They are associations defined by mutual responsibility and, to some degree, dependence, as individuals know they can count on their fellow members for support in times of trouble and understand their own responsibilities to one another. Furthermore, unlike bureaucratic administrations, they are defined by personal contact, mutual friendship and a more-or-less intimate understanding of the needs and desires of fellow members of these “little platoons.”
Families are the most basic and fundamental of these institutions, and it is precisely the closeness of these relationships of blood that makes the separation of college life such a startling development.
A popular perception is that college is a period of emancipation from the stifling oversight of and obligations to family. The logic behind this supposed liberation has always struck me as somewhat strange. Are our obligations to our family proportionate to our geographic distance from them? Does the acceptability of shameful decisions increase as the train approaches Princeton Junction? Do we ever stop being our parents’ children or our siblings’ brothers or sisters, even when we are a plane ride away or even when we reach the “age of consent”? Certainly the answer to all of these is “no.”
So we ought not to pretend that the bond of this most important little platoon is broken while we are at Princeton. To ignore the responsibilities and obligations, as well as the benefits and support, that come with family in the name of supposed “independence” is to unnecessarily cut oneself off from the greatest source of stability and security in any life, from the most fundamental little platoon of society. The independence of college that is so lauded is not, and can never be, limitless.
Though the bonds of this particular little platoon cannot be completely broken, it would be silly not to acknowledge that they are stretched by distance. Separation from family and the other support structures of home undoubtedly diminishes the stability and security of college life, particularly during this confusing time between adolescence and adulthood. The solution, however, is not to embrace the naive cult of radical independence, supposedly free from inhibition and consequence, that pervades many parts of campus.
Rather than seeking false succor against this confusion and insecurity by reveling (or wallowing) in a fantasy world without responsibility, we should seek out our own bastions of social and personal support, based on mutual obligation and trust. That is to say, at this moment when our natural support structures are at their weakest, we must create and sustain our own little platoons that mimic those found in wider society.
The infrastructure is already in place. Sports teams, religious communities, a cappella groups, ethnic and cultural organizations and, of course, eating clubs are all social institutions that have the potential to serve as the little platoons of college life.
If that potential is to be realized, however, students must treat these associations — these friendships — as more than just nebulous social circles. If these are to truly lend security and stability to campus life, then they must do more than simply enable experimentations in independence; indeed, they must entail the relinquishing of independence.
The success of these little platoons that are so crucial to a healthy college experience, then, is founded on the willingness of individual students to give up a little freedom and to take on obligations and responsibilities to their friends and colleagues. It is through mutual responsibility, even mutual dependence, that we not only prepare ourselves for the rigors of society at large, but that we discover present fulfillment.
Brandon McGinley is a politics major from Pittsburgh, Pa. He can be reached at bmcginle@princeton.edu.
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