* You may not have ever seen a lynch mob form, but your genes are very nervous about developing a reputation as the least loyal person in the group. For reasons you don't understand, you display social signals that the group is important to you.
I think the fear is not of a lynch mob - we evolved in situations where we relied on the group for survival, and ostracism meant a much higher risk of death, whether from predation or starvation. Alternatively, any violence, even between individuals, had a higher risk of death due to bacterial infection etc.
Sure, but the example being portrayed seems to be focused on a party where one feels no obligation to stay (for friendship, socialization, intoxication, or future expectation):
---
"You are at a party, and you get bored. You say “This isn’t doing it for
me anymore. I’d rather be someplace else. I’d rather be home asleep. The
people I wanted to talk to aren’t here.” For whatever reason, the party
fails to meet some threshold of interest. And then a really remarkable
thing happens: you don’t leave. You make a decision: “I don’t like this.”
If you were in a bookstore and you said, “I’m done,” you’d walk out. If
you were in a coffee shop and said, “This is boring,” you’d walk out.
You’re sitting at a party, and you decide, “I don’t like this; I don’t
want to be here.” And then you don’t leave. That kind of social sticki-
ness is what Bion is talking about.
And then, another really remarkable thing happens. Twenty minutes
later, one person stands up and gets their coat, and what happens?
Suddenly everyone is getting their coats on, all at the same time. Which
means that everyone had decided that the party was not for them, and
no one had done anything about it, until finally this triggering event let
the air out of the group, and everyone kind of felt okay about leaving."
---
At least that's how I'm reading it? This is confusing - why would anyone stay longer in such a situation? How is this different from the coffee shop or bookstore example?
I feel like this is going in circles. The quote doesn't explicitly say, "None of the following reasons for staying apply, and you have no obligation to stay", it is letting you imagine the myriad reasons you might hang out longer than you want out of some sense of obligation.
If it is really unimaginable to you that someone would not leave a social event the minute they're bored, this whole concept of groups might be a little alien to you. Maybe you're autistic, in a way that's very different from how I am. I don't know at all; I don't know you. But I can say confidently that it is normal behavior to hang out a little longer than you really want to at a social event.
For me this doesn't sound confusing. Last time I was at a gathering, what was described (bored but not leaving, waiting for coats) happened. If it were a bookstore or coffee shop, i would have left the moment i got bored.
Maybe i'm susceptible to group pressure. I know a lot of people are.
The funny thing is, afterwards I was halpy that I left as one of the latest.
I don't know how you got "no obligation to stay" out of that, when the message is that they (and everyone else) felt obligated to stay for general social reasons (social sticki-ness).
The best part about having MS is that I can leave any social event at any time and it's not considered rude. As an introvert, I don't miss the 'do I leave?' decision-making flowchart.
>Why would someone stick around at a party they don't like? Is this really what normally happens?
The reason was in the paragraphs leading up your excerpt: >, and so he decided that the unresolvability of the question was the answer. To the question “Do groups
of people behave as aggregations of individuals or as a cohesive group?”
Bion’s answer was that human groups are “hopelessly committed to
both,” which is to say hopelessly committed to individual identity and to
group membership.
Or put another way, the desire for social conformity can contradict private preferences.
If the bored person leaves early (fulfills a personal preference), he/she draws extra attention to himself because they're the only making an exit. This can also embarrass the host. So a reasonable rationalization is to avoid embarrassing the host (social conformity) and just suffer some temporary boredom.
But the above social calculation changes if multiple people decide to leave. Now, there's "safety in numbers" and leaving early is emotionally easier. Sure, the host still might be embarrassed but there's no longer a single party-goer to point disapproval at.
Another version of the above is clapping and standing ovations at presentations. If all the audience members expressed their true opinions, there might be 75% clapping and 25% not clapping. But polite society has an unspoken rule where everybody claps. Likewise when some think that clapping by itself is appropriate but a standing ovation is not. But then a few stand up ... and now everybody stands up.
> But the above social calculation changes if multiple people decide to leave. Now, there's "safety in numbers" and leaving early is emotionally easier. Sure, the host still might be embarrassed but there's no longer a single party-goer to point disapproval at.
Applies to so many things. In a somewhat conservative-ish community of people who grew up in the same small town/village, the first person to divorce their partner will become a village-wide scandal. A small wave of divorces following soon after will barely gather a remark.
Maybe I'm being weird about it, but what would it take to repeal the idea of social cost? If I'm being extra snippy about it, it seems like folks are not being held accountable for their feelings of social entitlement.
I think what it would take is for people to stop being social animals. I don't think the social cost is a bad thing, in and of itself. It's not a bad thing to remain at a party you don't enjoy as a kind of social gift to your friends (as long as you can remain without being a sourpuss about it). It's just another variation on how it's a good thing to take part in an activity you're not really into in order to benefit a friend. Other times, they'll do the same with you.
Compromise is mandatory in order to have a functioning society. This is a kind of compromise.
Humans don't always act rationally. In the moment, you often just do things (or don't do things). Afterwards you may try to rationalize it, but in the moment you don't or you can't. Sometimes you just stay, as simply as that.
Of course, maybe you're a person who always behaves rationally (or at least imagines they do). But people like that are uncommon. Most of us just don't behave rationally all the time.
I think it's important to distinguish what one might call "inauthentic behavior" and "behavior that goes beyond ones own personal preferences".
The party example is a good point. A very common thing is to go to a friends party as a show of support for their thing, and to, for lack of a better word, have numbers be good. But it's not inauthentic to support your friend's thing! Sometimes you do a thing because it's for someone else.
And when the wave of departures happen... there is a mix of "I also wanted to leave", but "oh I guess it's time to leave" is another, and "oh I'm not totally done but it's starting to end so" are all on the spectrum of possibilities, and ones that I've held.
I think this group behavior is ... authentic and human. Acting on what you are thinking, at its extreme, is kind of indistinguishable from having no impulse control.
I feel that people, these days, are more free to express their "inner voice," more often.
In some cases, this is good. In others, it is bad.
One of the rationalizations that I hear, for "hate jockeys," is "Hey, they're just saying what everyone thinks!".
There's a reason that we don't say everything that we think. We're actually experiencing object lessons, in exactly this, in society, these days.
In my case, basic courtesy is why I "behave unauthentically." It's not lying, or even dishonesty. It's basic human relations.
Extreme example:
I'm routinely dealing with the types of people many folks in "polite society" think should be euthanized. It sucks, when those people say what they think.
When we say "These people should be killed/hurt," then some folks take the rhetoric as support for their actions.
> I'm routinely dealing with the types of people many folks in "polite society" think should be euthanized. It sucks, when those people say what they think.
I do take your point overall, but in this kind of example would it not be better to bring it out into the open and discuss it? Granted it would likely be an unpleasant conversation, but they do hold an unpleasant opinion, so why not make them go through the unpleasantness of defending it?
Because they don’t actually need to defend it. We see that all the time, these days. When someone is called out on extreme rhetoric, they don’t bother to defend it. They just throw ad hominem attacks at those that question the position, and double down on their BS.
It works a treat. Trying to “call out” people, these days, simply gives them a new platform, and actually amplifies their hate.
The slightly more nuanced version of this is: Behave authentically when you're pro-social and mask when you're tendency is anti-social. The trick that's happening is that pro-social behavior is being applauded for it's authenticity when in fact, it's just pro-social.
"Always be yourself, but always be your better self."
People are complicated animals, just because I have a personal preference or a personal tendency, doesn't mean it is inauthentic to exercise self-control in pursuit of a larger, different goal.
> You’re sitting at a party, and you decide, “I don’t like this; I don’t want to be here.” And then you don’t leave.
Wait.. what?? Why would someone stick around at a party they don't like? Is this really what normally happens?