Groups in "The Ragamuffin

The concept of a "group" in psychology is not the same as what we call it every day, it's not just a bunch of unrelated people staying together and calling it a group. They have to have some ****ing common goal, or reason, etc. They have to be consistent in these ways. They have to be consistent in these ways for it to be a group.

Such groups will all have some ****-same characteristics, but of course, groups will also have their own characteristics. ***The first is that it is easy to lose the sense of personal responsibility. When we exist and think as individuals, we tend to consider a lot of moral and legal norms, so that we can restrain ourselves and not act arbitrarily with our desires. However, when people become a group for certain purposes, the responsibility is dispersed because the group is an anonymous one, so the individual as one of them will no longer need to take responsibility, and will completely lose the sense of responsibility to restrain the individual, and the term "the law is not responsible for the masses" illustrates this point very well. Specific examples of this can be seen in the mob groups' vandalism and looting incidents.

Secondly, it is easy to contagious, the group's personal opinion will often easily contagious each other's feelings and actions, and even prompted individuals to sacrifice their own interests to achieve the interests of the group, which is difficult to happen in the individual calmly thinking, but in the group is very easy to fall into such fanaticism. People in a group are easily influenced and hypnotized by the words of the leader or by certain spirits, so that they give up their ability to think altogether and are eager to act on the basis of simple slogans. This is true of revolutionary events and army battles.

To be more specific, these characteristics can be seen in most groups:

Different groups tend to have these characteristics, but groups also have their own idiosyncrasies due to differences in composition, goals and reasons, etc., and this is all a matter of case-by-case analysis.

In the process of reading, I felt that the author has a clear bias towards regions, populations, and women. Certain regions, certain populations of human beings, as well as women and children, are naturally incomprehensible, impulsive, and paranoid in the eyes of the author, so when describing the characteristics of a group, the author often uses women and populations as analogies. This concept is undoubtedly wrong and needs to be criticized in today's point of view, but since the author naturally wrote it at that time, it shows that this was the common view in the society at that time, which also shows the change of people's viewpoints. It is no wonder that in the preface, the author tries very hard to explain why he had this opinion and to show that even if it is biased, it is still flawed.

Groups always have an object of worship, and in ancient times, this object was the god of various religions, the emperor who broke new ground, and the hero who saved the country, as evidenced by the temples, temples, sculptures, and paintings that can be seen everywhere. Of course, emperors and magi often deliberately strengthened and capitalized on this sentiment, both to satisfy the individual's sense of being worshipped and to bring about the convenience of ruling. Even in modern times, in modern times when people honor reason, this phenomenon has not been eliminated, only that the object of people's religious beliefs has changed, while this religious feeling has not changed.

Let the group to make some events or produce some opinions, there are indirect factors and direct factors, indirect factors are the environment and state for a long time, has been in the subtle influence of the group's thinking and mood, which is in preparation for the outbreak, and direct factors may be a certain event, a certain first shot, and so on, which let the group brewed for a long time of the mood of the instantaneous outburst, which produces great energy, enough to change the dynasty.

Among the indirect factors, some are universal. For example, different races have their own long accumulated and inherited habits of thought and styles of behavior, which can also lead to different views and reactions to things. "Tradition" is another indirect factor, and history has shown that tradition cannot be changed instantly, but can only be followed while slowly improving, so that progress can be made, the ancient change of law and modernization are good attempts, but too quickly will only produce a big rebound.

It's interesting to note that it's the group that keeps the traditions, and it's the group that reforms the traditions. If you ask me, it's all about profit, just in different directions. "Time is also an obvious factor, as it takes time for any change to be conceived, and time for it to come to fruition.

"System" is also a factor that influences group behavior. It's not simply that groups do things differently under different systems. Rather, it is to say that the institution is something that is not as important as we think it is.

This is a very thought-provoking statement. When our country encounters problems, it's easy to wonder if our system has natural flaws that bring about class inequality and exploitation. In fact, the system is just a veneer, what really brings different results is actually the style of race. The same kind of **** and system can bring about high prosperity in the United States, in other **** and countries in the Americas, the extremely similar system only produces a pathetic and chaotic life, some of the most democratic countries are still living under the rule of monarchy, while authoritarianism, which behaves very arrogantly, exists in some of the **** and system countries, why is that? Race is our character and systems are just a borrowed coat, a temporary disguise. If brutal wars are waged to establish these systems, it is hard to say how much good will come out of the results, and the supernatural forces that endow these systems with the power to create happiness will backfire on the minds of the group to indirectly cause turmoil.

"Education" is also a major factor in the author's view, as he is dissatisfied with the education in France at the time, which is still going on today, and globally. The author thinks that this education system is very useless, when young people need to experience the society and master some abilities and emotions that cannot be learned from books, it is totally meaningless to use the duck-type teaching to make young people memorize the overload of knowledge that they will forget after a month. On the other hand, the author believes that this kind of education method is not useful, but makes people unable to live in peace and contentment, unable to be satisfied with the work at the bottom of the ladder, and every educated person is not willing to be a simple laborer or a farmer, but wants to become a government official, or learns "bad" socialism from the education, which is rather a side effect to the society. In the author's opinion, it would be better to let young people go to the workshop in their teenage years to learn and experience the real society and work skills, so that they can also stay in their workplaces peacefully, and if they are gifted, they can also stand out from the crowd. There is only good and bad to be said about this view, and it is no wonder that the book has been criticized.

All of the above are indirect factors that take time to accompany the impact, so what are the direct factors?

The first direct factor is that certain words, such as freedom, democracy, motherland, socialism, and so on, often have a huge power, even if it takes a lot of information and literature to explain their meanings, even if groups of people don't always understand the meanings of these words, even if the meanings and understandings of these words must be different in different times, races, and social classes, but groups of people are able to understand them. Even though the meaning and understanding of these words must have been different in different times, different races, and different social classes, the group was able to visualize a magnificent and beautiful future that depended on the word, and to strive for it.

The second immediate factor is illusion, and this illusion, too, can be understood as faith. In the past, the faith of the group was in religion, rights, etc., for which the group built temples and erected statues, but now it is in philosophy and science. Science has been developed for so many years, but science has never been able to become the faith of the vast majority of the group, or the illusion of a better future for the group, because science has one of its essential disadvantages, and also advantages - science cannot lie. Philosophy, on the other hand, is similarly incapable of bringing about fascinating ideals, except in the hands of a small group of elite intellects.

The third is experience, which can bring proof to a group, but is often not immediately convincing, and the experience of the past is often not validly or firmly applicable to the present.

The fourth is rationality, but rationality is not the source of group behavior; as has been said before, groups ignore the reasoning process, and to disseminate rational arguments in a group is as pointless as trying to explain trinitarianism to a small child.

Once the factors are all in place, it is time for a leader to emerge to lead the group congregation. Although we are intelligent human beings, but after becoming a group, and the ordinary flock is not much different, the group needs the head of the sample, need a strong will, the goal is determined, the courage to charge the person, the group is happy to accept the leadership of this person, repeat and support him to say everything, to adhere to the good qualities of thinking and let him go to complete, they only need to follow on good, the group at the same time, but also happy to accept the leader of the docile The group is at the same time happy to meekly accept the leader's "slavery". The easiest way to break this group is to capture the leader, and as soon as the leader is gone, the group will immediately return to a state of bewilderment. There are three very effective ways for a leader to influence the group's perceptions: assertion, repetition and contagion. Assertion is the firm adherence to a point of view, without explanation or argument, which defeats other lengthy pieces of evidence. Assertion also needs to be used with repetition, only with constant repetition can the group get into the mind of the group, can make the group feel that if everyone around them is saying it, then it must be right, and the role of advertising comes from this. Contagion, as mentioned earlier, is something that the group is receptive to, and the leader needs to capitalize on it. The leader also needs to have fame. What is fame? Fame can belong to an individual or to an object. What belongs to an object, such as a monument or a famous book, has been given a unique reputation by history, so that people dare not scorn it. Belonging to the person, can come from the person's status, power, appearance, can also come from the person's own qualities, aura, made things, have a reputation for people, but also naturally easy to become a leader. However, it is also important to note that when a leader loses his or her reputation, he or she will instantly become the object of the group's suppression and dislike, and will be treated as mercilessly as those who have failed in the past. The group is merciless and has no memory.

Groups also have their own opinions, have their own beliefs, but the group's opinions are variable, often with the times, the development of things and the sudden change, or even the complete opposite of the transformation, this change is incredible, but also dazzling. Modern access to information is increasing, and groups are becoming more susceptible to the spread of opinion and thus contagion, but the good news is that reverse opinion spreads just as easily, so groups can easily be influenced back again. This swing makes for a headache for anyone trying to lead group opinion. As for governments, the information media used to be the channel for those in power to lead opinions, but modern society has too many sources of information, too many to control. But the group's opinion is not always right, if all the decisions are given to the group to do, get will not be the optimal solution to make the majority of people satisfied, so the absolute dictatorship and absolute democracy can not be long.

The author gives examples of special groups: criminal groups, juries, voter groups, parliaments, etc., to show that different types of groups (heterogeneous or not, named or not) have the same characteristics as those mentioned above: volatility, gullibility, exaggeration, and so on, and that they all have a prestigious leader who leads the group opinion with the triple axe of assertion, repetition, and contagion.

Group opinion is inevitably influenced by a variety of factors that are ultimately part of the nature of a race, and groups, in turn, are the process by which races are formed.

In order to **** the same ideal, a group of people come together to form a group, the group in order to **** the same ideal to develop civilization, thus forming a race. Gradually the importance of the ideals fades, the will of the individual overdevelops, and the race becomes a group of individuals who lack cohesion, led only by the leader in the leader. But the loss of the ideal causes the talent of the race to pass away, and the group becomes a rabble, lacking in unity, without a future, and possessing only those characteristics of the group which this book describes. With the arrival of the storm, it is immediately capsized.

Image from Takashi Murakami's work

Douban, The Ragamuffin

View Author Home Page