The Digital Acceleration of Herd Mentality - Bernard Goldberg

The Digital Acceleration of
Herd Mentality

“A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals
and you know it.”

It’s a memorable, often quoted line from the 1997 sci-fi
comedy, Men in Black, where Agent K (Tommy Lee Jones) explains
to his apprentice (Will Smith) why it would be a very bad idea
to reveal to the public that space aliens are living secretly
among them.

While there are many great one-liners in the film (that still
draw a laugh), that particular one has been remembered for the
inherent, societal truth it spoke. When an individual alone is
presented with new, consequential information, that person is
more likely to process it logically and rationally than if he
or she had consumed it in a group setting.

This paradox goes by lots of different names, but for the sake
of this column, I’ll use the term herd mentality.

Herd mentality is a product of peer influence. It compels

people to adopt behaviors and sentiment, not from autonomous
reason, but from the passion and emotions of those who
surround them. These emotions, in turn, lead to impulsive (and
often bad) decisions that wouldn’t have otherwise been made.

It’s been pretty easy to spot herd mentality throughout this
nation over the past few months, most graphically in the
rioting, looting, and vandalism we’ve seen in major U.S.
cities. What began as protests in the name of social justice
have turned into an excuse to spread violence, destroy
businesses, and destroy lives.

We’ve also seen it with the uptick in the cancel culture,
where dissenting, objectionable views are increasingly treated
as infectious diseases deserving of eradication.

And we’ve of course seen it in the way mask-wearing (to
mitigate the spread of COVID-19) has been turned into a
ridiculous culture war, with one side insisting that it’s a
heinous violation of their freedoms.

Herd mentality has a far wider reach today than even 20 or 25
years ago because of the virality and boundlessness of the
Internet and the 24-hour news cycle. In virtually no time at
all, something as simple as a contextless image or video clip
can create and accelerate a deeply misleading narrative among
a population.

We were reminded of a pretty famous example of this last week
with the settlement of Nicholas Sandmann’s defamation lawsuit
against the Washington Post. Sandmann was the kid we all
remember wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat in front of
the Lincoln Memorial, “smirking” as a Native American man
(Nathan Phillips) beat a drum and sang a chant just inches
from his face. The two were surrounded by other students from
Sandmann’s school, who joined in with the chant, smiling and
laughing.

I would argue (and did at the time) that a smart, reasonable

person watching that video for the first time — even if he or
she had a preconceived notion of someone who would wear a MAGA
hat — would want to know more about the incident before
forming an opinion of what they were seeing. A reasonable
person would wonder (not merely assume) what it was that
brought those people together, and why they were acting as
they were.

But blasted across the Internet at light-speed, filtered
through the political instincts of millions, and recklessly
reported on by media outlets (who suffer from their own form
of groupthink), Sandmann quickly became a national poster-
child for racial intolerance. Even after the facts came to
light, and it was clear Sandmann hadn’t done anything wrong or
even inappropriate, herd mentality kept many from ever
accepting that truth.

Another example from last week had to do with the
aforementioned war on protective masks. Dr. Anthony Fauci was
the target this time, after he threw out the first pitch at
the MLB season opener. Fauci, who has been vilified by many on
the right for putting forth COVID-era health recommendations
that are often politically and economically unhelpful, was
later captured in the stands by photographers not wearing a
mask.

Being that Fauci has been expressing the importance of masks
for months (while acknowledging that he downplayed it in the
early days of the health crisis out of a supply concern for
medical professionals treating the infected), detractors
decided that the photographs had exposed the effectiveness of
masks (which has been proven in study after study) to be a
hoax:

 Anthony Fauci is the biggest fraud in American history.
 https://t.co/ZHQjEQrk2f

 — Steve Deace (@SteveDeaceShow) July 24, 2020

Masks don’t work. Dr. Fauci said this and his conduct seems
 to confirm he still understands that there is no science that
 masks work to contain #coronavirus. https://t.co/4Zz6JOVOy3

 — Tom Fitton (@TomFitton) July 24, 2020

 Actions speak louder than months of incorrect words.
 pic.twitter.com/EUE6B0xz0a

 — Tim Young (@TimRunsHisMouth) July 24, 2020

It didn’t take long before I saw these same photos
(accompanied by the same sentiment) popping up all over my
Facebook feed.

Fauci’s a fraud!

Look, even he knows masks don’t work!

Why do I have to wear a mask if he doesn’t have to?

I suspect it’s not coincidence that this stuff came from the
same friends and acquaintances who’ve been insisting from the
beginning that COVID-19 is no biggie, and that every societal
sacrifice (or even mere inconvenience) we’ve endured for the
health crisis has been based on a delusion created by the
power-hungry elite. Even as tens of thousands of new cases of
the virus are reported each day, with the death count now
around 150,000, these folks keep feeding the narrative to each
other, and stoking conspiratorial doubt in others.

As a different buddy said to me, about the reactions to the
Fauci photos, “Don’t you love how people suddenly can’t
discern any obvious details when they smell a gotcha?”

As Agent K might respond, “A person would pick up on the
details… but people? Not so much.”

Those “obvious details,” in this case, would include the fact
that Fauci and his two companions were outside (where the
virus is far less transmissible), that no one else was seated
around them (aka socially distanced), that the woman to his
left was his wife (who he lives with and breathes the same air
as every day), and that the friend to his right was still
wearing a mask.

Additionally, a reasonable person might also consider the
length of time Fauci was without his mask. Could it have been
just a few seconds, perhaps right before or after he took a
swig from that water bottle pictured on his lap? According to
Fauci, that’s exactly what happened. He also revealed that he
had tested negative for COVID-19 just a day earlier.

But when people are frustrated or scared (as many of us are
right now), herd mentality impedes the ability of individuals
to take a step back, and look at things in an open-minded,
rational way. Perhaps this is why Fauci, U.S. Surgeon General
Dr. Jerome Adams, and the CDC felt they couldn’t be upfront
with the general public about masks when they were concerned
about shortages in March. I still think it was the wrong thing
to do, and created unnecessary confusion (that’s unfortunately
still being used by others as political propaganda), but
perhaps I’m a little more sympathetic to their predicament
than I once was.

Regardless, what makes herd mentality on the Internet
particularly concerning right now is that, with physical
gatherings remaining potentially dangerous for the foreseeable
future, the pre-existing cultural trend of social media
replacing our traditional institutions has been accelerated.
Many of the more focused organizations and establishments in
our lives, that bring us together and keep us grounded
(whether it be church, sports, live music, community
celebrations, etc.) are on indefinite hold. That means people
are spending more time online, latching onto viral themes and
joining righteous revolts against all kinds of perceived

injustices.

It’s not healthy, and in several cases (some described above),
it’s contributing to the prolonging of this crisis by
promoting reckless behavior that only adds to the spread of
the coronavirus.

If there were ever a time when people (especially those with
time on their hands) needed to further explore their own
individuality, it’s right now. Maybe that means taking up a
new hobby, going on some camping trips, or doing some (safe)
volunteering in the community.

If it keeps people from subjecting themselves to countless
hours of social media and cable news, it’s almost certainly a
good thing.

—

    Order John A. Daly’s novel “Safeguard” today!