Individualism vs Collectivism

I have been pounding on this for some time now and want to get it of my chest.

I will use some examples from the Netherlands so my apologies if I translate something incorrectly.

I often think about the meaning of commercials like:

Beter milleu begint bij jezelf (Better environment starts with yourself)

or

I amsterdam

Everybody states that if you want to change something in the world you should focus on 1 person at a time and confront the individuals with the issues and try to change them, thus putting focus on an individual.

My thought has always been different. If you are trying to change the world you should focus on the Collective and try to peak to the mass.

Example:

You have a huge mass of people in a stadium. How will you approach them?
Will you have 100 people with yellow shirts trying to speak to the individuals one at a time or will you turn on a speaker and try to make your point clear in that way?

I think talking to the mass will have a better effect then trying to talk to one individual at a time.

After saying that I want to go back to the commercials.

I amsterdam should actually be We amsterdam - cos its about the city and not the Weed, hookers, Rembrand Museaum...individual forms. It's a whole.

Same as trying to change the environment. Try to change the mass not the individuals as it's more effective and actually totally wrong in our time and world we live in.

What are your thoughts on this?

The difference between trying to convinve a mass and trying to convince an individual is :

1) When trying to convince an individual it is easier , as you may explain to him and get rid of all the doubts he has , meaning , you will most likely convince him 100% (or close to it)

2) Turning on the speakers can be a little hard , because the individual might not be totally convinced of what you say , it might conflict with ideas he has of his own , and you will hardly be able to answer everyone at the same time , if they have questions that could be answered and change their minds. So you get a lot of 50% convinced people .


Sooo , I think maybe you could try a mix of both , a good way , in my opinion , would be , reaching and exposing the thruth to many people individually first , try exposing as many details as possible.

Then after you feel you got the important idea through them , go ahead and turn the speakers on , and now you will have some people that will know almost as much as you , and they will probably inform the newcomers of the details , while you are giving the base idea.


That is of course only my humble opinion.