Tribalism is arbitrary. Henri Tajfel’s experiments showed

Posted on: February 3, 2025 at 07:22:39 CT

that arbitrary establishment of groups resulted in people immediately behaving preferentially towards the in group and discriminated against the out group. In his experiment they were told they were being categorized by those who consistently over estimate how many dots appeared on a screen and those who consistently underestimated the number of dots on the screen. The second condition is they were told some were better at estimating the number of dots and others were worse at estimating.

They were broken up into four groups at random, having nothing to do with the individuals ability of estimation of the dots on the screen. The experiment that followed showed that these four groups preferred other in the group and their action discriminated against those not in their group. All based upon a categorization that was not based in reality, but what they were told. It was their beliefs about their group. Traits that they thought they shared in the group did not exist and they had more similar traits with people in other groups.

This highlights the problem with perpetuating tribalism as you do. Commonalities with people in the out group that are ignored solely because they are the out group. Conformity within the in group based not on reality but the illusion of belief.

And yes, education is a way through this. But some, like yourself, choose ignorance.