Solidarity Sunday: Things are Different Now, Because They're the Same
You've seen the recent vandalizing of Tesla dealerships. Not long before that it was January 6th. Before that the George Floyd riots, and so on. I got curious how mobs form and why seemingly rational people can completely lose their minds in a group. I wanted to understand group-think in a social media world. The best resource I found to truly understand how group-think manifests in a social medial world was the highly influential book called The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind, by an author named Gustave Le Bon.
It's a good long read, but essentially his main argument is that individuals lose their rationality and become more susceptible to suggestion when in a crowd. He believes that the collective mind of a crowd is fundamentally different from the individual minds that make it up, both psychologically and neurologically. Crowds are driven by unconscious and irrational desires, emotions, and instincts.
As union leaders responsible for the leadership and well-being of a large group of people, it is useful to understand the characteristics of group think and crowd behavior, especially in an online world, where things can be whipped up and circulated to the crowd at lightning speed. Some observations and lessons I gleaned from this book.
Crowds lose their personal identity and critical faculties. People online hide behind anonymous profiles or avatars, allowing them to act more impulsively and aggressively. This anonymity leads to a greater sense of detachment from personal accountability, similar to the loss of identity in physical crowds.
Crowds are driven by suggestion and conformity. In modern social media, this is evident in the formation of "echo chambers," where users surround themselves with information and opinions that reinforce their pre-existing beliefs. Those within these online crowds can lose the ability to critically analyze information, instead absorbing and propagating ideas in a mindless, emotional way.
Crowds are stoked by charismatic leaders. Social media influencers, celebrities, podcasters and even politicians act as modern "leaders," influencing the behavior and opinions of large online groups. Through platforms like X(Twitter), Instagram, and TikTok, they can use emotional appeals and captivating rhetoric to sway millions, much like the leaders of crowds described by Le Bon.
Crowds are swayed by emotion not intellect. Another principle Le Bon touched on was how crowds are easily swayed by collective emotions. In today's world, viral content—whether a meme, a video, or a news story—can spread rapidly through social media and amplify excitement, or fear. This virality is an example of the "suggestion" process Le Bon described, where a single piece of content can trigger a massive, often irrational, collective response.
Le Bon puts it this way:
The masses have never thirsted after truth. Whoever can supply them with illusions is easily their master; whoever attempts to destroy their illusions is always their victim."
"The crowd is impulsive, irritable, and inconsistent; it is at times brave, at other times cowardly; it is easily influenced by small suggestions and readily accepts the most absurd ideas, provided they are presented in a form calculated to stir its emotions."
Much of this you already know because you do business in the same constantly connected environment that we do. Here's the crazy thing. This book was written 130 years ago, in 1895.
Things are different now because they are the same.