Each one of us suffers from an affliction that is terribly difficult to overcome, yet is sometimes strangely helpful. It's something we inhereted from our ancestors, and our children will inheret it from our genes, no matter how much we hope they don't.
What is it? Tribalism. And it's the primary reason why so many people around the world are able to hate and curse and kill each other every day. It also is probably one of the primary reasons why humans still exist today.
I'm not an expert in this field, so my explanation will sound quite simplistic to someone well read on the topic, but I'll give it a shot anyway.
In the beginning, people who tended to work together tended to survive, and those that didn't tended to die. Therefore, our spieces evolved the instinct to group together into communities/tribes for mutual protection and to collectively work for the public good of the community/tribe.
Of course, to do this effectively, the brain had to develop a few tricks to make it all work. For instance, you had to be able to view the killing of a person from another tribe as a far less "bad" thing than the killing of a person from your own tribe. Being completely objective would have been a character flaw. After all, you had to have a moral compass that essentially held that whatever benefitted your tribe was good and whatever hurt your tribe was bad.
So when the other tribe invaded your territory and stole from you and killed your people, that was obviously bad. But when your tribe invaded their territory and stole from them and killed their people (thus making it less likely they could harm you in the future), that was seen as a good thing. We became programmed, through evolution, to be willing and enthusiastic hypocrites. Because we placed a huge value on our own tribe, and very little value in the other tribe, we developed the instinct to apply motivated reasoning to simply delude ourselves into thinking that whatever "they" do is bad, while whatever "we" do is good.
Of course, it's not hard to see how this human instinct manifested itself over time. Our tribes of early days morphed into all sorts of different things -- including religions, races, nationalities, sports fans, and political parties.
In each of those modern "tribes," we see evidence of the same kind of motivated reasoning taking place that existed back then. To a completely objective outsider, most of the disagreements between these kinds of groups sound completely absurd. Both sides hold on to beliefs about their own religion/race/nationality/sports team/political party that ignore any negatives or flaws, while they view the "other" with nothing but comtempt and spite. But to the outsider, both sides are completely full of shit (which is generally always the reality).
Each of us suffers from biases resulting from our own tribalism, and it's incumbent upon each of us to overcome that in order to even begin to start to reach sound conclusions on any issue.
When we are faced with an issue, we need to be mindful to clear our mind of our desires to believe what we want to believe (colored by our own tribalism) and truly view the issue on the merits of the facts and logic available.
Instead, far too often, we see people giving in to their tribalism.
Instead of seeking out the best objective information available, they only listen to people of their own tribe that tell them what they already want to believe (which not coincidentally always tells them that their tribe is right and the other tribe is wrong).
Instead of respecting and thoughfully considering the ideas and perspectives of those from the "other" tribe, they assume the worst about the character, intellect, and motives of those people in order to justify dismissing everything "they" say.
Instead of being intellectually honest and consistent when comparing "us" to "them," the tribespeople will have a completely different set of standards to judge actions of members of the tribes, always showering praise on their own and scorn on "them."
All of this may sound like the approach of a deranged person ... but it's not. It's how each of us already acts, in varying degrees. We need to stop. We need to cease allowing ourselves to be ignorant in the name of tribalism. We need to stop pledging allegiance to any tribe if it ultimately forces us to give up our objectivity. We need to be post-tribal.
On that note, however, a few caveats need to be noted. There actually are benefits to tribalism, particulary when it doesn't result in the behavior I noted above. For example, I think one could claim that pride in one's community is an offshoot of this tribalism, and that's certainly a good thing. It's just when the pride in one's community is amped up to include scorn for everyone else's community that it becomes a problem.
Then there's also the matter of sports fans, as I mentioned earlier. In most cases, sports fans are arguing and fighting over things that are so pointless and shallow that it really doesn't do much harm to anyone. It could almost be seen as a masturbatory version of these ancient instincts. So maybe one could even argue that sports fans acting that way is a positive thing -- it channels those ancient instincts into something harmless and gets it out of our systems (I'm saying this as a life-long sports fan myself).
But again, even that can always go way too far, as tragic stories such as that of Brian Stow sadly prove.
So on this blog, I will attempt to write what I write fully aware of my own tribal loyalties, and do my best to avoid the motivated reasoning that comes with them. I will try to be as objective and fair as possible. I'm not interested in advancing anyone's existing agenda -- I just want to find the best answers, no matter where they come from or who else holds them.
I ask each of you to do the same.
Just for a Kumbaya sign off ... just imagine how great our world could be if every person did this. For a bit more tangible visual, just imagine how much more intelligent and constructive the political debates in our country would be if everyone did this!
As always, I welcome all comments, whether you agree with me or not.
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