Mass Psychological Conformity

Thinking about our current covid totalitarianism, columnist Roger Simon recently wrote:

What we have witnessed throughout the world [today] is millions, really billions, of people taking orders without thinking or, in the majority of cases, even seriously investigating what they have been told.

Simon states that witnessing this has helped him answer his long-held question (also held by many, including me): how could educated people in World War II Germany do what the Nazis did to Jews?

The best he could come up with:

We live in a culture of pervasive obedience….It’s everywhere—people giving up their personal agency, even their ability to reason, out of fear and willingly adhering to the mass.

A generation of conformists has been created as never before in our history.

Which certainly is true, but leaves the question “why?” unanswered. The best I can come up with is “mass psychological conformity,” or to elaborate, “mass psychologically-generated callous conformity, indifferent to harm caused to others.” The harm can range from “lockdowns” to mass extermination. In the case of the latter, “inhumanity” may be substituted for callous conformity.

Which still leaves the questions: “Why?” and “How?”

Various attempts to name this syndrome have been made: group psychology, groupthink, the madness of crowds, or true believers in a mass movement. Tulip mania, the current situation is not, though “herd conformity” is a phrase I have used before to describe it. Most recently, the terms “mass delusional psychosis” or “mass formation psychosis” have been offered.

“Delusion” is correct because in its simplest definition delusion means belief in something that is false, whether it’s “I’m probably going to die if you breathe anywhere near me” or “I’m Jesus Christ.”

And the syndrome is “mass” because so many people worldwide have gone along with their authoritarian public health and political leaders.

But these followers are not psychotic in the sense that they completely withdraw from reality, suspending conscious control over life and allowing the subconscious to take over.* Because thinking errors are the cause of neuroses, all psychological problems can be said to some extent to be delusional.

“Inhumanity,” according to Merriam-Webster means “being cruel or barbarous” and “the absence of warmth or geniality.” The past two years have certainly seemed inhumane, at least to those who have been harmed the most: children, small businesses that have closed and workers, if they still have a job, many of them single moms, who have to mask up to serve the laptop elite while the latter dine and shop. Then there are the non-virus related deaths, many by suicide.

Callous indifference, indeed! (See my post “They Just Don’t Care—Rationalization and the Need to Look Good.”

Who exactly am I talking about? The intelligentsia in particular: mainstream media, leftist teachers and professors, certain left-leaning entertainers and business leaders, politicians, and the public health cadre of unelected deep staters.

The latter two may even have a worse psychology. The past two years seem to have brought out their inner totalitarian, as in “we’re telling you who you can have in your home and when or if you can travel. Obey!”

Other people, such as the laptop elite who support the intelligentsia’s doctrines, would have to be included. The cause of all psychologies varies widely, in this case likely ranging from plain ignorance of the doctrine’s consequences to deliberate envious glee for those harmed (akin to many Germans during World War II).

Today, most people are just scared, thanks to the unrelenting propaganda campaign waged by the intelligentsia.

The root of the syndrome is psychological dependence, a psychology that does not depart completely from reality as a psychotic does, but one that shifts reality to other people as their source of beliefs and values. It is a passive acceptance of what those significant others think, feel, and do—a suspension of independent judgment to go along to get along . . . with the crowd.

We all often fail to seriously investigate, because we learn from books and other people and can’t escape the need to rely on experts.

But why the suspension of independent judgment? On the mass scale, this is where there is again a wide variety of reasons. The culture’s philosophy contributes in large part to explaining Simon’s observation of “pervasive obedience.” Germany’s duty ethics of self-sacrifice to the state (or Führer) eclipses independence. “It’s your duty to obey.”

The United States holds a nearly as strong duty ethics based on its predominant Protestantism. Just look at attitudes toward the military draft: “It’s your duty to die for your country.” (Should a big war break out, a new draft would be passed in a heartbeat by Congress and supported by the public. See The Ominous Parallels.)

For over 120 years, American culture has been assaulted and battered unendingly by the progressive left demanding that to be moral we must sacrifice ourselves to the collective, the group, the state.

And in non-Judeo-Christian cultures, asceticism and self-denial are widely held doctrines, with authoritarianism not even questioned.

Hence, worldwide, pervasive obedience.

Psychologically, independence derives from a strong sense of personal identity and self-responsibility. Courage, integrity, and self-esteem are consequences. Parental and formal education (the “how” of this issue) are both crucial in helping us develop these traits, but preaching self-sacrifice and victimhood erodes or blocks the development of independence.

“Dependent personalities,” as I have written before (p. 105), “gravitate to groups as the source of their identity, such as their religion, nation, race, class, ethnicity, or private clubs. They gravitate to the government as their caretaker.”**

Depending on the level of deficiency in self-esteem, dependent personalities will blindly accept whatever the government and its public health officials say, even if they are asking us to give up our rights.

It takes a confident mind to stand up to the irrational onslaught we have been going through over the past two years.

Perhaps the best explanation of mass gutlessness is the bureaucratic state. Bureaucracy is how governments manage their affairs and rules and laws are their tools. “Rules are rules” is the battle cry and “I don’t make ‘em, I just enforce ‘em” is what we have been up against for many years.

Those who respond by saying “Oh, okay”—without understanding or questioning what is being asked of them—encourage the totalitarians to continue with more total control.

The rules and laws—far too many of both in the United States, for about a century—all allow both citizens and bureaucrats to rationalize what they are doing as good. “I’m just following (or enforcing) the law.”

Rationalization is a strong defensive habit that allows us to make excuses for our behavior. Criminals thrive on it. So did many Germans in Nazi Germany.

Deference to authority comes first. Then, the obedience. Rationalization does not require or allow examination.

The bureaucratic state of Nazi Germany had gangs of secretaries typing orders to send Jews to the death camps. How could they do it? The explanation has to be that they thought they were doing something good! See “The Reductio of Bureaucracy” (Applying Principles, pp. 117-21) and William L. Shirer’s book.

Deference sacrifices independent judgment. Obedience makes one a follower and in extreme cases a killer.

Are we going to reclaim our rights, our personal agency, and, most importantly, our ability to reason to assert independence from the madness of crowds?

Or are we going to continue to go along to get along?


* Psychotics usually have episodes. They are not constantly “out of their minds,” living in a “waking dream,” as psychosis has sometimes been described. Even statuesque catatonics are aware of their surroundings and occasionally will respond to a nearby conversation before retreating to their trance-like states. And one psychiatrist asked a psychotic to “stop acting crazy now so I can talk to you.” The response? “Oh, okay.”

** Psychologist Edith Packer (p. 264): “Such people want to be taken care of, and in return they will gladly obey. A nation that breeds a dictator is a nation of people who are afraid of life.”

The Clouded Lenses of a Certain Political Derangement Syndrome

Columnist Roger Simon makes this comment about today’s leftist sympathizers who excuse the burning of America.

So they blame Trump—someone who occasionally does act like a father—for their own failures. And even though those failures have been going on for months.

It’s hard to believe they do this with a straight face, but they do.

Simon is talking about a certain psychological syndrome identified to describe our current president’s opposition.

The political derangement syndrome, says Simon, “has evolved from a neurosis to a psychosis. . . . They [the deranged] disbelieve what is in front of their eyes.” Rioting thus can be described as “mostly peaceful protests” and it’s all the fault of our current president.

To most rational observers today, it is astoundingly incomprehensible why anyone would ignore or tolerate the violence we have seen in the last few months.

Perhaps psychology can help us understand.

A syndrome is a collection of symptoms. What makes it psychological is that the symptoms derive from thinking errors, not physical conditions or environmental events, though both are often asserted as causes.

For example, a depressed young man jilted by his lover may feel anxiety and a profound sense of hopelessness with the underlying thoughts: “I’ll never find another girlfriend or ever be happy again. I can’t go on with life.” The young man then may as a symptom project his plight onto the young woman, blaming her while ignoring any role he may have played in the breakup.

His thoughts, however, are false because, considering the population of the world, a new lover can be found, though the effort likely will require putting himself in a position to meet members of the opposite sex. And as the song says, it “Takes Two to Tango” when it comes to successful relationships (1, 2). The false thoughts nonetheless cause the young man’s symptoms of anxiety, hopelessness, and projection.

Psychological problems, as a result, set up a clouded lens that distorts our perceptions. In worst cases, the lens can prevent us from seeing reality at all.

The clouded lenses with the additional defensive habits of rationalization and projection are what blind many derangement sufferers.

Columnist John Miltimore offers further understanding by citing Alexandr Solzhenitsyn’s linking of violence to falsehood, because violence, as Solzenitsyn points out, sooner or later “loses confidence in itself” and must lie to put on a “respectable face.” Says Solzhenitsyn, “Violence can conceal itself with nothing except lies, and the lies can be maintained only by violence.”

The reason, more precisely, that violence requires lies is that initiated coercion, which all forms of non-self-defensive violence are, cannot ever be justified; it must be covered up or rationalized.

To be sure, our postmodern culture of epistemological skepticism and moral relativism is a fundamental cause of the present lack of respect for truth and sincerity—the postmoderns, after all, have brought about the penchant for talking in “narratives” (or fictions, as I prefer to call them), rather than facts and knowledge.

The notion of lying to cover up coercion goes back at least to the “noble lie” recommended in Plato’s (totalitarian) Republic (1, 2) and probably to the first tribal chieftain who called himself master of the tribe.

The defensive habit of rationalization, which can be either subconscious or intentional, is the act of making excuses to justify one’s irrational thoughts and behaviors. This is what explains the otherwise astoundingly incomprehensible events of today.

Leftist sympathizers are the writers and politicians who fail to denounce the violence, whereas the actual rioters are criminal personalities who lie, cheat, and steal as a way of life and enjoy getting away with the forbidden. Leftist ideology justifies the rioting, because any form of socialism requires total coercion and control. (See Trevor Loudon’s columns on the Maoist role in today’s riots: 1, 2.)

Leftist ideology is what allows the sympathizers to excuse and tolerate the rioters, though some sympathizers may secretly be what Yochelson and Samenow (1, chap. 7; Applying Principles, pp. 280-83) call “nonarrestable criminals,” a criminal personality that lies, cheats, and manipulates others but does nothing overtly illegal. Some may want to be on the streets, tossing Molotov cocktails, but other internal psychological conflicts prevent them from doing so—or perhaps a modicum of health prevents them from being that deranged.

And blaming a father figure? Hmm! Without going too Freudian, projection and scapegoating derive from the need to blame someone—anyone—for one’s own insecurities, especially anxiety and anxiety’s source, low self-esteem. Projection is rampant in today’s political context and it comes mostly from one side.

Does this explain the seemingly unexplainable? It’s a start, but just how far down the rathole are we going to go?