Violence and Groupthink

I watched the Danish film “In a Better World” last night and it got me thinking this morning about violence between individuals and between groups.  I find it interesting that when we are younger, an effective strategy for dealing with a bully is standing up to him in a forceful way.  Bullies are often insecure individuals who use power and violence to make themselves feel better, but when challenged they’ll often move along to a new target.  The film showed such a sequence in which young Christian beats the bully, Sofus, with a bicycle pump and threatens his life with a knife.  Sofus is no longer a threat to Christian or his friend Elias after this episode, and in fact Sofus makes an overture to Christian to become friends.

Such a solution on Christian’s part wouldn’t be necessary if more was done at an institutional level to address bullying and its root causes.  That’s a separate discussion, but suffice it to say that victims of bullying are often left to themselves to deal with it, and fighting back may be the only option for some.

However, when it comes to groups, a show of violence generally leads to more violence.  Why do individuals react one way and groups another?  Is there some dynamic of groupthink involved?  Perhaps it’s due to the fact that not all group members are directly affected by the violence so it becomes easy, and less personal, to continue the cycle.  I feel like that’s part of the problem with the US’s perpetual war in the Middle East.  It’s simply too easy to continue to commit “faceless” troops to the violent conflict.  And once committed, it’s not easy to extricate our forces, as there is no definitive “victory” being sought.  Stopping the conflict will only invite criticism from more members of the group who do not have a personal stake in the violence being committed, and would be a threat to one’s career.  Those in support of violent conflict have done an excellent job of using emotions to drive groupthink.  Fear of terrorism and extremist Islam (ISIL), hyper patriotism (American exceptionalism), and outright hero worship of our troops are all examples of the emotional mechanisms being used against the American public, and they have been very effective.

I did a Google search on groupthink and the violence of nation states, and the results were interesting.  The vast majority were concerned with the actions of terrorist organizations, movements like Occupy Wall Street and #BlackLivesMatter, and other communist/socialist collectivist movements.  I find it strange that there was almost no discussion of the effect of groupthink on US political leadership in the War on Terror.  It seems to me that this would be a fascinating political science research project especially with so many different group dynamics.  As a society, are we too afraid to look in the mirror and honestly assess our role as a nation in the present cycle of perpetual war? 

I do appreciate that the question of how to deal with terrorism is not an easy one.  While I think it’s important to realize how we arrived at this point from a root cause perspective, we have to deal with the present and how to move forward.  Many of those committing terrorist acts have such a different mental model of the world from our own that dialogue is nigh impossible.  Over the last week, I have been listening to “I Am Malala,” and it’s frustrating to hear about the Taliban and it’s impact on Malala’s home valley in Pakistan.  Their beliefs are so antithetical to modern Western civilization that I’m unsure of any basis for negotiation.  Both sides believe the enemy is extreme (and wrong) in its view, and both are correct.  There must be moderate voices on both sides; people who know that the cycle of violence solves nothing.

Just because both sides are extreme doesn’t mean we shouldn’t negotiate or at least continue to make attempts to do so.  The world is not a better place with more violence in this conflict so the moral thing to do is to determine a solution to end it.

What to do about 'Religious Freedom' movements

The new Religious Freedom Act (aka, Freedom to Discriminate) legislation in Indiana got me thinking this morning about why human beings – or at least a large segment of them – seem to default to distrusting others that are different.  There is always someone to hate and mistrust:  gays, blacks, muslims, atheists, Taylor Swift.  Is it the survival instinct in our brain working on overdrive trying to find things to be afraid of?  Are these people addicted to the chemicals the brain produces by feelings of fear and anger?

We know that all signals the brain interprets first go through our survival system – the reptile brain – which evaluates the threat factor of external stimuli.  Is this a threat to my survival or not?  If yes, the brain starts producing chemicals that engage the possible responses of fight, flight or freeze.  If no, the signal is passed on to the more rational part of the brain for further interpretation.  For the most part, we are able to let most of the occurrences in our lives through this filtering layer so that we can then process the events more thoughtfully.  Most situations we face in modern life are not life or death, but for some, the threshold of what is a threat seems to be low thus allowing fear and anger to dominate their lives.  This becomes an addiction.  Welcome to Fox News as your threat response dope dealer!

Getting back to Indiana’s recent legislation - at a rational level, I think one would have difficulty defending the ethics and morality of some of the Bible’s passages on homosexuality.  Those views seem so 1^st Century!  Haven’t we progressed, even a little bit, from the social views of 2000 years ago?  Of course we have, but homosexuality isn’t quite mainstream yet so the Religious Right is putting up a fight as its views are in the death throes.  Giving religious justification to discrimination is a last desperate act, but sadly, those in power in many states have mobilized fear and anger to a point in which they have the votes to enact such legislation.

People who want to discriminate against others based on their religion are simply finding phrases in religious texts that support their views.  There are plenty of passages within the Bible that contradict the negative treatment of homosexuals and call for love of all people, but those sentiments tend to get ignored as it’s much easier to hate than it is to trust and love.  Negative emotions come more easily than positive ones when confronted with differences in people, religion, and politics, yet it is the display of positive emotions under these circumstances that reveals depth of character.  It is in a word uncommon, but wouldn’t it be great if we could turn uncommon into common?  Trust and love can leave us vulnerable to the thoughts and whims of others, and that can be uncomfortable and possibly even perceived as threatening to our sense of self.  However, there is power in vulnerability; it can be the foundation of connection between two human beings.

As I come to the end of this, I’m not completely clear on the point I’m trying to make so I’ll wrap up with this.  I understand how such legislation gets enacted.  From an early age, many people are taught to distrust those who are “different”, even fear them.  That programming is not easily overridden, and it surely won’t be changed through ridicule, boycotts, etc.  Those measures may exert pressure on the State of Indiana to reconsider their stance, but they will only further marginalize and alienate the people who support such measures.  As difficult as it may sound, a dialogue of some nature must be established with the religious right, probably at an individual level, to start the process of reconciliation and promoting equal rights for all.  Futile?  Probably.  Perhaps the long-term strategy is to just wait for Millenials to start governing since their level of tolerance seems much higher, but not having a dialogue with the religious right is akin to the conservative viewpoint of “we don’t talk to our enemies.”  Can we learn to empathize with the opponents of gay rights?

Go Your Own Way

A couple of nights ago, I had the misfortune of watching The Unbelievers, a documentary following Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss around the globe engaging with audiences on reason and science.  The film is simply a visual travel scrapbook with clever soundbites interspersed. It lacked an overall theme, was very disjointed, and brought no new information to the viewer.  As a supporter of atheism and secular causes, I was disappointed and had a hard time understanding why it was rated so highly.
However, something Dr. Krauss said in one of the many conversations shown did provoke a thought on the difficulty that some believers have in subscribing to the full doctrine of their religions.  Should they have to?  Most religious texts were written well over one thousand years ago and the world has changed quite a bit in that time.  What may have been moral or acceptable in the 9th Century may be different today, and to deny such change is to deny reality and progress.
Perhaps Joseph Smith had the right idea when he started Mormonism (at least in concept, not necessarily execution).  If you're a believer, why not start your own religion or create your own doctrine?  Since there's no evidence of god anyway, it's not as if anyone can prove you wrong, and you can follow beliefs that are more consistent with who you are and the moral code of the present day.  Why should you be restricted by the world-view of someone who lived two thousand years ago and knew far less about the nature of the universe than we do in 2015?  You should not be.  Think of the freedom that would bring.  You could celebrate the religious holidays you like and maybe come up with some new ones.  You could stand up for social progress and not feel guilty that you were in opposition to the stance of your religion.  Eliminate the conflict and start the religion of YOU.  Define the morals and ethics of your religion.  Draft a set of core values and live your life by them.  Be at peace with your choices and most important, promote peace and compassion in the world.