The essential nature of pride is that it is hurt very easily. More external the source of the pride, more brittle it is. Even in a stable and comfortable present, it finds historical reasons to get hurt. Insecure in its own existence. Born as it is out of desperation. A quick fix. A short cut. A childish solution to dealing with the complexity of the world. Which is why it has always been easy to organize large groups of angry people. The mob has always been at the door, threatening to burn everything down. It is only a rare mix of science, reason and good faith that sometimes succeeds in holding them off. And in these sparse moments, humanity takes the greatest leaps forward.
Our sense of identity forms in concentric circles of family, social groups, ethnicity, religion and nation. The wider the circle you draw from lesser the agency you have on your own will, more vulnerable you are to manipulation and more sensitive you are to hurt. A child’s world is very small, his parents are his personal gods. As he grows older, broader identities have to be assumed to navigate through the world and through life. So you join schools, clubs and Klans. With age and wisdom the circles should collapse until one is comfortable and content solely with his own self as an identity. No team colors, no pledge of allegiance, not even an American Express card.
But this narrowing of the circle of our identity can also become a cyclical process. In fact in most cases even the emancipated self cannot stand up to the simultaneous oppression and decadence of modern life. Circumstances vary but human frailty is universal. You fall back on community, born-again cults and extremism to reclaim an already failed institution, this time by force. In an era when individuality is marketed more than anything else, the world-wide resurgence of nationalism is precisely the failure of building self-esteem by buying sneakers.
At any given time, only a small percentage of a given population is truly wise. And wise people don’t have many children. Statistically, with every successive generation, their numbers keep falling until there is no wisdom left to keep society from utter ruin and chaos. And the process of civilization begins from scratch. Even if a culture manages to rise above its own pettiness, there are always ‘barbarians’ waiting to jump across the border. In the absence of an external enemy we invent one to feel superior against. Pride launches wars and wins elections. Most men fall prey to it, directly or as collateral. And you can’t debate with a horde carrying pitchforks. Hence, the truly wise address posterity instead of their peers. And the truly enlightened ones know that this too is futile.
May be there are more noble souls in the world than we think. But they prefer silence over arguments and non-violence over outrage. Eventually violence wins because it has entropy on its side. And politics for patronage. Even Socrates was put to death at the zenith of civilization under familiar charges of blasphemy and being an anti-national. Higher thought never has a chance to win over the mass stupidity of its time. But coupled with courage it can reach beyond the ages to stop mobs in the future from bringing complete ruin.
The mob has always been at the door. Only eras change, the conflict between collectivism and liberty remain the same. Technology speeds up both the good and the bad. Perhaps the Socrates of today need not be so idealistic. In the age of online lynch mobs, martyrdom is sometimes overrated. But in a Darwinian world survival is always success.
So the next time you see a large group of angry people shouting the gravest accusations against a singular individual who is unarmed except for a pen, know that history is merely repeating itself. And giving you a chance to be on its right side, this time…
