Do you really think that the majority of individual people in any society go to work daily "to promote the group's interest"?
Yes, although I doubt they'd phrase it as such. In America at least, the knee-jerk hatred of anything with a socialist, communist, or collectivist label has obscured the understanding of the reality, purpose and functioning of a society.
At a basic level, this is why work is valued over theft. The group of individuals who comprise society has decided that their common interests will be served better if people work to produce goods and services rather than fight and steal resources from each other. Every time someone goes to work rather than attempting a mugging or a burglary, they are promoting the common interests of the group.
You find more examples as the situations become more complex. The group of individuals who comprise society have decided it benefits them as a whole to have as many educated individuals in society as possible. For that reason, we support children's education regardless of the financial ability of their parents to provide that education. At least that's the goal currently. There's an increasing movement that says the group's benefit in supporting that education is outweighed by the costs. In my personal opinion, I think this is less an instance of reevaluating societal goals and more of an ideological opposition to the concept of society itself.
The idea that we as a country are members of a group and as a group should create policies and systems to promote our group as much as possible; that is the idea of a society. This isn't anti-capitalist; properly applied and regulated capitalism has been one of the best policies for promoting societal well being. The problem comes when people confuse means with ends. When capitalism becomes the goal, people have lost sight of the fact that it is an economic system meant to maximize the benefits to society and not a value system whose promotion is valuable in and of itself.
People losing touch with reality like this has a self-fulfilling prophecy effect. When people no longer see themselves as part of the group for decision making processes, when they no longer see themselves as included in the benefit analysis, when they no longer see government as a body invested with rights by the people and delegated to make decisions where it is impractical to include every individual member of society in deliberation; when these things happen, people cease to participate as members of society. When people cease to participate as members of society, it leads to the separations of identity listed above.
There are three possible reactions people can have to this separation:
1)Reject society. This is no longer possible. It used to be that when you felt separated from the rest of the group of individuals in your society, you could pack up your bags, recruit some followers, and find a patch of wilderness to set up a new society. This is no longer possible, for obvious reasons. The result is that you get anarchists and libertarians on message boards calling for separation from and destruction of society from residences that society has constructed, fed by food society has produced, communicating over a medium that society facilitates. It becomes an exercise in absurdity.
2)Assert themselves in society. Form political parties and other organizations starting at grass roots levels that change what it means to be a member of society. Instead of calling for society to be split and destroyed, call for it to change to something more acceptable. This is more realistic, but once enough people have chosen strategy #1, this becomes impossible as well. Or it could be that the ideas for change are actually fringe, the mass of society is not feeling disassociated from the group and it is impossible for that reason. The case where change in society is possible is when enough people disagree with the current policies the group has enacted, but still feel enough connection to the group to engage in a process of change.
3) Destroy society. This is the Troofers, militias, White Supremacist, tax protestor, style option. Man the barricades and fight the power! Don't only reject the group of individuals that you feel is going the wrong direction; kill them and scatter their influence. Create a new society out of your fellow disaffected on the burning rubble you leave behind. I don't think I need to spell out the problems with this.
