Social Tribalism and Modern Society

For as long as humans have been around, we have separated ourselves into groups, and we almost always seek a need to extend that separation to those who surround us. Doing so brings order and understanding to the world around us, allowing us to accomplish great things. However, it also leads to a form of tribalism. An attitude of pride and superiority based solely on identification with a group. This tribalism has manifested itself in various forms throughout history, from warring religious groups, to ethnic cleansing, to the social and political climate we live in today. Almost always this human need to label and categorize results in groups of ‘us’ and ‘them’ – with the caveat that one is always more than the other. My question is why? As a society we are complex and established enough to move past this social tribalism.  We need to begin a shift away from this categorization of ‘us’ and ‘them’ and the prejudices associated with those labels.

I began to think about the idea of social tribalism because of a conversation I had with an old friend I hadn't seen in years. While discussing where we were in life and it arose that my friend now identified himself as gay and had fallen away from the LDS Church. He made a statement along the lines of: “So you see I couldn't be a part of a church that doesn't accept me for who I am. They’re so against gay marriage, and I believe you should be able to marry who you love. They just don’t understand us and don’t accept us, so I had to leave.”

As I thought back on the conversation I realized all the things I wanted to say “The church accepts you, they simply can’t condone some of your behaviors.” “I don’t understand how there is a ‘you’ and a ‘them’? Do I count as one of those who doesn't accept you because of my affiliation with the church?” The more I reflected on this, and on much of the discourse surrounding this and other social issues, the more I realized that our current political and social climate is because of this tendency to label – ‘gay’, ‘mormon’, ‘democrat’, ‘republican’ - and identify with and act on those labels to a frightening degree.

The term for this, as I discovered, is Social Tribalism. These reflections resulted in my first blog post where I called for an abandonment of labels and ‘overly simple tribalism’.

Upon receiving feedback on that idea (especially an excellent rebuttal by a good friend – see the second comment on the above post) I realized the fact that labeling and categorization have become essential to our way of communication and allowed us to accomplish all that we have. Wholesale removal of groups and labels is unreasonable and could result in social collapse.  In my second post I argued for the separation of ourselves from the labels and groups we use to facilitate social interaction.

The idea was furthered when I considered the use of groups and labels in communication, especially mass media. In order to convey information about yourself as an individual you only have to identify with a group to have a vast amount of notions about yourself and your views to be communicated. We see this as we look throughout history. We label groups of historical figures as humanists, romantics, industrialists – by so doing we can convey information about the individuals that we only have to explain once. I now know that, because Erasmus was a humanist, he shares at least some traits with Petrarch, da Vinci, and Michelangelo.

This further understanding, coupled with yet more feedback, resulted in a short video - which called for change to the way we group ourselves and discuss ideals in the public forum.

As I have called for change in this fundamental area, many have said that ‘you just can’t change that, that’s just the way we are.’ And my question is why? While our social structure may be dependent on labels and groups to function. We as individuals don’t need to constantly group ourselves into areas of ‘us’ and ‘them’ – we don’t need the sense of entitlement and superiority that so often accompanies those labels. We can change the way we look at each other. We can be more willing to look past the labels and groups and look at each person individually. It will be hard, but things worth doing always are.

As I've said before, Social Tribalism may be our heritage, but it doesn't have to be our destiny.





------------------------------------------------------UPDATE--------------------------------------------------------


It's been a crazy semester, and this class has made me think more than I had thought it would. Thank you for the comments - it's nice to hear comments that come from different viewpoints. In response to Chloe - I absolutely think that social media is adding to the division, in kind of an odd way. As we are able to connect with more and more people it becomes easier to look for those that fit in our category of 'us' for our social interaction. Those who share our outlooks on politics, humor, values etc. etc. While this isn't necessarily bad, it also removes the necessity for us to look closer to home, and among a less homogeneous group, for our friendships - allowing us to close ourselves off from getting to really know those who perhaps have other viewpoints.

Michele - I think that grouping and categorization is a necessary thing to society - a certain degree of separation is necessary for society to function. However, the problem arises when we vilify those who fall into the 'them' category - and as such we cease to attempt to understand them. We do need those connections, but we need not be afraid, or unwilling, to look beyond those close connections to understand and broaden our horizons. Unfortunately, we too often look only the labels and groups people subscribe to in our attempt to understand them. This is the idea that needs to change. We need to look at people as nuanced individuals. Is it exhausting? Yes! But it's also necessary.