Introduction:
Personally I view the major difference between religion and spirituality in that religions are "groups" or communities, generally, - while spirituality can be independent and individual. As a Baptist woman once said, "Religions are of man! Spirit is of God!" Very powerful group-related instincts with tremendously powerful emotions tend to be connected with group related ideologies and behavior. Much of the "Christian" ideologies against LGBT and gay, psychologically is without doubt rooted to a great extent in the ingroup-outgroup syndrome and group related instincts connected to ideological functions - as opposed to the expressions of compassion with likely are rooted in the anterior cingulate as opposed to the amygdala.
However all groups - political. ethnic, or nationalist all display at one time or another the extreme emotions connected with group-related instincts - i.e. Hitler and Stalin, etc.... Trump's nationalism is obviously tapping into the extremely powerful emotions connected with patriotism - perhaps in the most cynical display of puppet-mastery in history since Trump is an ultra narcissist and couldn't care less about a single American (except himself) much less America.
An excerpt of a study done by Rosnadia Najwa from her article Spirituality And Discrimination, stated, "These findings reaffirms the notion that people with higher spirituality levels hold rigid distinctions between themselves and their cultural groups and people who do not belong to their cultural groups (Wrench, Corrigan, McCroskey & Punyanunt-Carter, 2006). A meta-analytic review on religious racism by Hall, Matz & Wood (2010) has found that members of religious groups tend to harbor prejudiced views of other races, as people of other races may appear to belong to religious out-groups. The 2010 study supports our hypothesis where spirituality is positively correlated with social dominance. Another reason for this relation is stated by Jackson & Hunsberger in1999 (as cited in Smith et al., 2007) that formal organizations like religion tend to create in-group vs. out-group relationships and can develop a strong tendency to differentiate their own faith from others that might generalize to other social division; like race (Altemeyer, 2003)."
Hopefully this snapshot conveys an idea of the pervasiveness of some innate processes clearly related to instinctual processes. At a time it would clearly be an evolutionary adoptive trait for groups to have strong bonds. However, the world has come to the point where balance and tolerance must exert influence and persuasion, as it were - instead of having politicians like Trump (and many others like him) deliberately playing into the powerful group-related instincts with their overpowering emotions to stir up anger and hatred - first against minorities (the Republican rally in North Carolina chanting "Send them back" against four duly elected minority American Congresswomen) - and now against the Chinese.
In an article on 5-23-2020, Trump, GOP go all-in on anti-China strategy, Scott Wong stated that "Republicans are amplifying President Trump's anti-China rhetoric on Capitol Hill and in campaign ads across the country as the White House seeks to blame Beijing for a pandemic that has devastated the U.S. economy and killed almost 100,000 Americans." (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/elections-2020/trump-gop-go-all-in-on-anti-china-strategy/ar-BB14v8nz?ocid=spartandhp) Politicians have been tapping into the super-strong emotions connected with patriotism, nationalism, religion, and ethnic groups for centuries, Hitler being one of the most transparent manipulators with his monumental patriotic displays. Trump is just, by far, the most cold calculating and cynical puppet master in history.
Commentary
It is a paradox. Spirituality is about connectivity and even "oneness" yet group related instincts are all about making distinctions between "us" and "them." In humanity it would seem like an eternal struggle of Sysyphus rolling the stone up the "connectivity and oneness hill," only to have it roll down again in racial or other trivial or skin deep distinctions. It is pervasive throughout human history and culture. The ultra-powerful emotions of group related instincts are present in religious, political, ethnic, national, and yes..even sports groups. In Europe from time to time there are violent clashes and riots between opposing soccer teams and groups - actual riots.
Taboo and Truth: Groups and Group Related Instincts
First, it is crystal clear that that human beings have descended from great apes and chimpanzees, Second, ethologists such as Frans de Waal have done studies in which they have observed well known primate rituals such as mutual grooming. Though there are some academic "selfish gee" skeptics about any possible true compassion or reason directed interactions between primates, some consistent acts of "reciprocity" have been observed in the behaviors of monkeys, great apes, and chimpanzees. I might note that the developmental psychologists Piaget argued that "reciprocity" is a pivotal skill acquired in order for children to graduate into taht wonderful 'dimension' of adulthood. Some reciprocity has also been observed specifically in the hunting behaviors fo monkeys by a couple of primatologists. A final proof of connections between primates and monkeys is that groups do, in fact, hold together for the greater part, so one must necessarily conclude that there is some connection or bond between members of the group, or the groups would cease to exist. In any case, one must assume that the great apes and chimpanzees had some minimal innate group-related instincts.
In spite of the act that it is absolutely crystal clear that homo-sapiens have descended from great apes and chimpanzees, in some corners of academia there is a serious taboo against "instincts," and it seems most psychologists can't seem to handle the fact that human beings gave instincts (though Joshua Green's "trolley" experiment demonstrated more primitive emotional brain processes were involved in behaviors of avoidance of interpersonal conflict). Even in research of animal behaviors some academics have rather arbitrary and rigid restrictions against anything "instinctual." In my research I even ran into one academic who argued that "imprinting" is not shaped by instinctual processes, but "learned " behavior. As Saul Mcleod observed in the article,Konrad Lorenz's Imprinting Theory,"This process [imprinting] suggests that attachment is innate and programmed genetically.... .Hess (1958) showed that although the imprinting process could occur as early as one hour after hatching, the strongest responses occurred between 12 and 17 hours after hatching.
The clincher would be that in a test to ensure imprinting had without doubt taken place, Lorenz mixed two separate groups of goslings - one which 'imprinted' on their mother, and one which "imprinted on him - beneath an overturned box. When the box was finally lifted the two distinct groups separated and did in fact return to their respective "imprinted" 'mothers.' If it had been a question of learning, some fallibility and error could be presumed. But this one academic adamantly refused to embrace any idea tainted by instinct or imprinting. Recent research by Bargh and Skihstrom have shown that some unconscious processes have similar roles in the human brain. (article published 2018 https://www.simplypsychology.org/Konrad-Lorenz.html )
Academic Taboo
Yet, In a social psychology textbook over 700 plus pages long, there is not a single reference to “instincts.” In his book Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors, Carl Sagan stated, “After being raised from childhood to believe that our ancestor, our “Creator”, is king of the universe, it is most difficult to now accept that we actually come from the lowest forms…mud, slime, and mindless beings too small to be seen with the naked eye. This concept of a creator, a very old and comfortable conceit, a safe and politically correct view of our world and its creation, has really been crumbling for centuries. Science has provided the greatest service by awakening us to our true circumstances." E. O Wilson, the sociobiologist also heavily criticizes religion for clinging to the "creation" and "Creator" paradigm, and rejecting the "science" of evolution! It seems pretty hypocritical for science - in the guise of psychology and social psychology to turn around and then state, effectively, 'Evolution is perfectly fine for those lower animals but humans are absolutely "exempt" and human beings could Not Possibly have inherited any "instincts" from the great ape and chimpanzee ancestors. As Carl Jung so astutely stated, the theories and psychologies of psychologists are, at the core “subjective confessions.”
If there is one thing social psychology has unquestionably shown, is that there is a distinct ingroup-outgroup tendency or syndrome, in which ingroupers view their group as positive while seeing the outgroups in negative ways. Nothing incites passions more than religious, ethnic, or nationalist issues. A threat to the group greatly intensifies the tendency of the ingroup to negatively view the outgroup. History has shown that during times of conflict, ingroups vilify and dehumanize the outgroup. While behavior amongst ingroupers is generally civil and positive acts are not infrequent, behavior toward outgroup members can frequently be hostile and sometimes takes the shape of completely unrestrained violence. Since of the nature of the extreme vilifying of outgroups is characterized by emotional expressions of hatred and malice, so it would seem self-evident that powerful emotions and group related instincts are involved.
Extreme violence toward outgroups is not an occasional act, but a consistent theme of human behavior throughout history. Genocide was, on the face of it, the national policy of the early Israelis. Deuteronomy 7:2 states, “And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them.” Deuteronomy 2:34 states, “And we took all his cities at that time, and utterly destroyed the men, and the women, and the little ones, of every city, we left none to remain. Chapter 31 in the Book of Numbers details the genocide of Midianites by the Israelis. The Israelis slaughtered all the male Midianites, keeping women and children as plunder. Then Moses ordered that all the women and children be massacred with the exception of girls who had not slept with a man. The Bible records that thirty-two thousand girls survived. For the record, it should be noted though, that several archaeologists believe that the policy of genocide was more myth than reality. They state that there just isn’t archaeological evidence of a massive genocidal invasion.
The Holocaust is, of course, the most notorious of the genocides. The massive scale of the genocide makes it pretty much unimaginable for the ordinary human mind. There were 42,500 facilities and 200,000 people involved in the extermination. Operations in the concentration camps were run just like factories. It was a systematic extermination. Generally it is believed that 6 million Jews died in the death camps. Besides operations in other countries the total of people killed in concentration camps totals around 11 million. That includes various groups like Jehovah Witnesses (who wouldn’t swear allegiance to Hitler – another example of the influence of ideology), the mentally ill, free masons, Romani, and homosexuals. Some estimate the loss of Russian civilians resulting from direct action by the Nazis in USSR territory to be around 7.4 million, and another 4.1 million are believed to have died due to famine and disease. Everyone knows that Jews were exterminated, in part because it was done so systematically and in such cold blood, as well as the fact that it is estimated that 2/3rds of the European Jews were exterminated. However, in raw numbers, the Russians, as well as the Slavs, were also hurt very badly – and much of that was also done systematically.
Inter-group Conflict, Group Related Instincts, Powerful Emotions and Extreme Violence and Brutality
The Soviet Union also carried out systematic pogroms against ethnic minorities. During 1932-1933, Stalin ordered that all the crops and livestock be seized in Ukraine. The famine that followed is responsible for the deaths of over seven million people in Ukraine, as well as one million in the north Caucasus.
The Rape of Nanking, as it is called began on December 13, 1937 which was the day the Imperial Japanese Army took Nanking. Massacres, rape, looting, and arson followed for the next six weeks. The estimates of Chinese dead vary widely, ranging from 60,000 to 200,000, which included large numbers of women and children. As many as 20,000 Chinese women were raped. There were eyewitness reports of Japanese soldiers bayoneting pregnant women in the belly. Captured Chinese soldiers were shot, blown up, buried alive, burned, beheaded, and even used for bayonet practice. It was brutal. It was a frenzy of madness – a mob urged on by the officers.
There is a long list of genocides that have taken place in the world since World War I. Everyone has heard of the Armenian Genocide that the Turks committed during and after World War I. Not many are aware of the Greek Genocide, the Assyrian genocide, or the massacres of the Dersim Kurds, which were also committed by the Turks. Historians view the genocides as ethnoreligious genocides committed by the Young Turks. The Young Turks were a close-knit, elite political group that rose to power in the Turkish struggle for democracy. The Armenian death toll far exceeds the others and numbers about one and a half million Armenians.
Armenia has the oldest national church in the world, Christianity being declared the state religion in 301 A. D. Archaeology has also discovered the oldest leather, skirt, and wine producing facility in Armenia. Of course, Turkey was by far predominantly Muslim. A complicating factor was that, at the time, Turkey was at war with Russia, and the Turks believed many Armenians were aiding the Russians.
In 1915, the Turks arrested 250 intellectuals and leaders then took huge numbers of Armenians on a forced march. Without food or water, the Armenians walked hundreds of miles to the desert in Syria. On the way there were numerous massacres. The Young Turks targeted the Assyrian population living in northern Mesopotamia. They deported and massacred Assyrians and it is believed that around 750,000 Assyrians died between 1914 and 1918. Greeks had colonized and settled in Anatolia, especially on the seacoast and islands for over three millennia. You would have thought that in three millennia peoples would have adapted and adjusted. But the Ottoman Empire persecuted, deported, and massacred Greeks. The Greeks were Christian. It is believed that around 380,000 Greeks died. The Kurds were victims of a massive resettlement law. The end result was deportations and massacres. The estimates of Avi Kurds killed range from 13,000 to 40,000.
The Holocaust is, of course, the most notorious of the genocides. The massive scale of the genocide makes it pretty much unimaginable for the ordinary human mind. There were 42,500 facilities and 200,000 people involved in the extermination. Operations in the concentration camps were run just like factories. It was a systematic extermination. Generally it is believed that 6 million Jews died in the death camps. Estimates on the percentage of the European Jewish population vary from two-thirds to four-fifths. Jews were not the only target. Between two to three million Soviet POWs died from mistreatment and malnutrition. There were also systematic killing of ethnic Poles, Slavs, and Serbs. In Russia, thousands of villages were utterly destroyed and their inhabitants killed. Besides operations in other countries the total of people killed in concentration camps total around 11 million. Those totals include various groups like Jehovah Witnesses (who wouldn’t swear allegiance to Hitler – another example of the influence of ideology), the mentally ill, free masons, Romani, and homosexuals. Some estimate the loss of Russian civilians resulting from direct action by the Nazis in USSR territory to be around 7.4 million, and another 4.1 million are believed to have died due to famine and disease.
The Soviet Union also carried out systematic pogroms against ethnic minorities. During 1932-1933, Stalin ordered that all the crops and livestock be seized. The famine that followed is responsible for the deaths of over seven million people in Ukraine, as well as one million in the north Caucasus. During 1937-1938, Russians executed 120,000 ethnic Poles. In 1944 huge numbers of Chechens were deported to Siberia. As a result, 700,000 people died. Most were Chechens, but there were large numbers of other ethnic minorities that died. This was enacted by Stalin as punishment for those Chechens who fought with the Germans. For similar reasons Stalin deported the entire Tatar population of Crimea. After reconquering the Baltic countries at the end of World War II, Stalin deported large numbers of Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians to Siberia. Many died because they lacked basic clothing and supplies.
The Rape of Nanking, as it is called began on December 13, 1937 which was the day the Imperial Japanese Army took Nanking. Massacres, rape, looting, and arson followed for the next six weeks. The estimates of Chinese dead vary widely, ranging from 60,000 to 200,000, which included large numbers of women and children. As many as 20,000 Chinese women were raped. There were eyewitness reports of Japanese soldiers bayoneting pregnant women in the belly. Captured Chinese soldiers were shot, blown up, buried alive, burned, beheaded, and even used for bayonet practice. It was brutal. It was a frenzy of madness – a mob urged on by the officers.
Of the violence that accompanied the Partition of India, historians Ian Talbot and Gurharpal Singh write: “There are numerous eyewitness accounts of the maiming and mutilation of victims. The catalogue of horrors includes the disembowelling of pregnant women, the slamming of babies' heads against brick walls, the cutting off of victims’ limbs and genitalia and the display of heads and corpses. While previous communal riots had been deadly, the scale and level of brutality was unprecedented. Although some scholars question the use of the term 'genocide' with respect to the Partition massacres, much of the violence manifested as having genocidal tendencies. It was designed to cleanse an existing generation as well as prevent its future reproduction."
Myanmar (Burma) was originally a British colony that became an independent nation in 1948. While Myanmar was established as a democracy, it became a military dictatorship after a coup in 1962. What distinguishes Myanmar is that Myanmar has the largest number of ethnic groups for its population. Myanmar has actually between 130 and 135 distinct ethnic groups. The distinguished anthropologist, Clifford Geertz, who studied the histories of emerging nations, concluded that religious ideologies, ethnic ideologies, nationalistic ideologies, and political ideologies are primordial forces that greatly affect events in emerging nations. It would seem somewhat self-evident that group related instincts are integral to ideologies. In fact, it would most likely be the ideologies which form and maintain groups. With that many ethnic groups it isn’t surprising that Myanmar has had the longest running civil war. There have been conflicts with the Kachin (Christian), the Shan, the Lahu, the Karen, the Kayah, the Chin, the Burman, the Mon, the Kaman, and the Zerbadee.
There is an ongoing conflict between the Rohingya (Muslims) and the Rakhine (Buddhists). Violence erupted after the gang rape and murder of a Rakhine woman by Rohingya men in May 1012. That set off an ongoing cycle of violence. Hundreds have been killed and thousands of homes burnt down and has left hundreds of villages decimated. The conflict has created tens of thousands of refugees. Some Buddhist leaders have been inciting Buddhist to action. The 969 Buddhist group is the primary agent. The 969 represent the nine attributes of Buddha, the six qualities of his teachings, and the nine attributes of the monks. The Buddhist monk Wirathu is the leader. He calls himself the “Burmese Bin Laden.” A Buddhist without compassion is not much of a Buddhist. In the Four Noble Truths of Buddha, Dukkha (suffering) is caused by desires and passions – by craving for and clinging to what is pleasurable and aversion to what is not pleasurable. By stirring up the passions of Buddhist he is creating suffering and condemning the Buddhists to rebirth. Myanmar is 89% Buddhist. It is interesting that neither group has full citizenship and are basically considered as immigrants from Bangladesh. The Rohingya have suffered severe persecution, and large numbers are emigrating in small boats.
Recently I connected with Moung, a Rohingya refugee who is at the Kutupalong refugee camp in Bangla Desh. It is the world's largest refugee camp. It is in Ukhia, Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh, inhabited mostly by Rohingya refugees that fled from ethnic and religious persecution in neighboring Myanmar. The camp began informally in 1991, after thousands of Rohingyas fled from the Burmese military's Operation Pyi Thaya (Operation Clean and Beautiful Nation). The two refugee camps of Kutupalong and Nayapara had a combined population of around 34,000 registered refugees in July 2017. (Wikipedia) Beginning August 25, 2017, extensive attacks upon Myanmar's Rohingya in Rakhine state, by Myanmar's military and local civilians, drove hundreds of thousands of Rohingya to flee Myanmar, into Bangladesh, swelling the camp.
Closer to home, in 1937, Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo ordered the execution of Haitians living in the Dominican Republic. The Parsley massacre, known in the Dominican Republic as "El Corte" (the Cutting), lasted approximately five days. Trujillo had his soldiers show parsley to suspected Haitians and ask, "What is this?" Spanish-speaking Dominicans would be able to pronounce the Spanish word for parsley ("perejil") perfectly. In Haitian Creole, the word for parsley is "persil". Those who mispronounced "perejil" were assumed to be Haitian and slaughtered. The program resulted in the deaths of 20,000 to 30,000 people.
Sir Ronald Wilson was once the president of Australia's Human Rights Commission. He stated that Australia's program in which 20–25,000 Aboriginal children were forcibly separated from their natural families was genocide, because it was intended to cause the Aboriginal people to die out. The program ran from 1900 to 1969.[308] The nature and extent of the removals have been disputed within Australia, with opponents questioning the findings contained in the Commission report and asserting that the size of the Stolen Generation had been exaggerated. The intent and effects of the government policy were also disputed.
In 1972, a rebellion of Hutus in Burundi massacred about 1200 Tutsis. The president who was Tutsi turned the largely Tutsi controlled army loose. Estimates vary from 80,000 Hutus killed to 210,000 Hutus killed. Civil strife continued and the conflict boiled over into Rwanda. In 1993, a Hutu (Hutus are the majority in Burundi, but he was assassinated. The Hutus massacred about 25,000 Tutsi’s and the Tutsis responded – resulting in about the same scale of death and destruction as the 1972 civil strife.
Other countries that have experienced ethnic conflict are Zanzibar, Guatemala, India, Bangladesh, North Korea, Equatorial Guinea, Indonesia, Laos, Ethiopia, Iraq, Tibet, Congo, Sri Lanka, and Somalia. I included all these examples of ethnic conflict and persecution to illustrate that it is natural to form groups and that uncontrolled intergroup conflict driven by instincts is very common. For the Hutu’s and Tutsi’s to go after each other with machetes, killing women and children, is not a rational act. For a Japanese soldier to bayonet a pregnant Chinese woman in the belly is simply not rational. These are emotional expressions of a group related instinct. A characteristic of group related instincts is that the actions of the ingroup toward the outgroup operate with a complete absence of any restraint. While ingroup interactions generally show some restraint and limits, ingroup actions toward outgroups operates, when unleashed, show an utter disregard for any humanitarian concerns and show unrestrained aggression and violence toward others. That kind of behavior simply cannot stem from rational processes and must have some instinctual basis.
Group Formation and Ideologies
Human beings have formed groups since the beginning of time – tribes, coalitions, political groups, social groups, nations, empires, religions, cults, and countless clubs. Sports are very popular and sports teams are prevalent throughout the world. The proliferation of sports teams is a quintessential illustration of the human predisposition to form groups. The number of groups formed in human history would be near endless. It would seem self-evident that human beings have a predisposition to form groups. Roy Baumeister, a prominent social psychologist states, “The need to belong is one of the most basic and powerful needs, as well as one of the most social.” (culture p.107) So, it would seem that humans have some distinct group related instincts, and that group related instincts are connected closely with group-related instincts.
The history of all the major religions displays the human predisposition to form groups. Besides being originated as groups, all the major religions have historically splintered into separate distinct schools and sub-groups, each with a different theology or philosophy. Islam divided into Shia and Sunni with a significant Sufi influence. Buddhism has two different major schools of thought: Theravada ("The School of the Elders") and Mahayana ("The Great Vehicle"). Rather early in the history of Christianity split into Eastern Orthodox Church and the western church which became Catholicism. Monastic orders formed. First, the monastic order of St Benedict formed, followed by Franciscans, Dominicans, and Jesuits. During the Reformation, various forms of Protestantism branched off. There are a plethora of splinter groups: Marcionites, Paulicians, Manicheans, Christian Gnostics, Hussites, Bogomils, Lollards, the Moravian Church, Quakers, Shakers, Amish, Mennonites, Hutterites, Puritans, Jehovah Witnesses, Calvinists, Anabaptists, Church of Scientology, and so on. In Russia, during Tolstoy’s lifetime (1826 – 1910), there were numerous groups: Old Believers, Khristovery (Believers in Christ), Skoptsy (self-castrators), Skakuny (jumpers), Stranniki (wanderers), Pustynniki (hermits), and Beguny (runners). (p 271) Wikipedia lists hundreds of separate Protestant churches.
Then, there are a very large number of religious cults, many of which hold extremist views. ISIS and al Qaeda are examples that jump to mind. You may have heard of the Branch Davidian cult, the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project led by Jim Jones, Order of the Solar Temple, or the Heaven’s Gate cult. All except the Branch Davidian cult, who all died defending their compound against the federal government, engaged in mass suicides. The scholar, Nicholas Wade argues that the fact that the emotional religious convictions of the cult members overcame their instincts for self-preservation forcefully demonstrates how powerful religious beliefs are. Another cult you are probably familiar with would be the Westboro Baptist Church. The Westboro group is categorized as a hate group. They are anti-gay, anti-Semitic, and anti-politician. They made national news in their protest of the funeral of a gay marine. They were also famous for stomping on the American flag in their protests. Throughout history, religion has lent itself to very destructive purposes. Jesus Christ died on the cross for one thing – the forgiveness of sins. Jesus Christ taught love and compassion. Yet, the Westboro Baptists are utterly hateful and sadistic in their treatment of gays and Jews. The Westboro ideology was/is the complete anti-thesis of Christ. The Baptist World Alliance, the Southern Baptist Convention, the Evangelical Church, the Methodist Church, the Baptist Church, and the Reformed Church have all condemned the hypocritical actions of the Westboro group.
The interpretive aspect of religion and rendering that interpretation into absolutes is one of the less attractive aspects of religion. The Scriptures lend themselves to interpretation. The Bible has been used to justify slavery and racism. In commenting on the academic and religious racist ideology, Martin Luther King Jr. states, “Soon the doctrine of white supremacy was embedded in every textbook and preached in practically every pulpit.” (Chaos or comm) The Kenneth Copeland Ministries Eagle Mountain Church had an outbreak of 21 cases of measles because people put their faith in God rather than science. Interpretation is built into the concept of a God who directs events on earth. After an earthquake in Iran, a Muslim cleric declared that the earthquake was a punishment from Allah because of the promiscuity of Iranian women. ISIS is, of course, a good example of interpretation that produces rigid and absolute judgments, as well as unrestrained violence and destruction.
Many governments keep lists of cults and religious groups. The number of groups and cults is much too lengthy to list. The French government lists thirty groups and cults among which is the League for Catholic Counter-Reformation. Cult formation isn’t confined to Western Civilization. China has a quite lengthy list of cults and groups. The history of humanity is a history of group formation. People consistently form groups. That’s what people do. And each group has its own distinctive ideology.
Powerful Emotions in Group-related Instincts: Illustration form Australian Aborigines
Anthropologists, in their studies of primitive cultures, observe group behaviors in what are, in a sense, more ‘natural’ surroundings. In 1899, Sir Walter Baldwin Spencer and Francis James Gillen published the classic anthropology work, Native Tribes of Central Australia, an extensive and detailed study of Australian Aborigines. The book created quite a sensation in the scientific world, and while there was no consensus as to what conclusions could be drawn, there was a definite agreement there was an abundance of material. They made a good team. Spencer was a biologist by training and Gillen had established a rapport with the Aborigines, in part because he had that rare ability to see things from another person’s perspective. Spencer was a professor of biology and the two spent several summers living and working with the natives.
In their following work, The Northern Tribes of Central Australia, they tell of their good fortune in having the opportunity to witness the death and burial of a native of the Warramunga tribe. A middle aged medicine man, who had taken an active part in ceremonies, fell ill. In the Aborigines there are prohibitions against eating certain foods and it was well known about the man that he had indulged in eating emu and euro, a grave offense in the eyes of the older tribe-members. Several medicine men showed up to ‘cure’ him. Although people believed that the man’s sickness was caused by his disregard of tradition, the medicine men performed a ceremony to remove a “bone” from his body. “However, their efforts were of no avail and the man, who was really suffering from dysentery, died.” Their description of the aftermath of his death is quite gripping. While it is a lengthy story, I feel their first hand descriptions are worth quoting:
“Late one afternoon, just before sunset and immediately after the performance of several sacred ceremonies, we were all leaving the corrobboree ground when a sudden loud piercing wail broke out in the direction of the man’s camp. Every one at once knew that the end was near, and with one accord all of the men ran towards the camp as hard they could, most of them at the same time beginning to howl. Between us and the camp lay a deep creek, and on the bank of this some of the men, scattered about here and there, sat down, bending their heads forwards between their knees while they wept and moaned. Crossing the creek we found that, as usual, the man’s camp had been pulled to pieces. Some of the lubras (girl or woman), who had come from all directions, were lying prostrate on the body, while others were standing or kneeling around, digging the sharp ends of yam-sticks into the crowns of their heads, from which the blood streamed down over their faces, while all the time they kept up a loud, continuous wail. Many of the men, rushing up to the spot, threw themselves upon the body, from which the women arose when the men approached, until in a few minutes we could see nothing but a struggling mass of bodies all mixed together. To one side three Thapungarti (social class) men, who still wore corrobboree decorations, sat down wailing loudly, with their backs turned towards the dying man, and in a minute or two another man of the same class rushed on to the ground yelling and brandishing a stone knife. Reaching the camp, he suddenly gashed both thighs deeply, cutting right across the muscles, and, unable to stand, fell down into the middle of the group from which he was dragged out after a time by three or four relatives—his mother, wife, and sisters---who immediately applied their mouths to the gaping wounds while he lay exhausted on the ground. Then another man of the same class came rushing up, prancing about, and to all appearances intent upon gashing his thighs, but watching him, we saw that in his case it was merely a pretense. Each time that he pretended to cut he merely drew the flat side of his knife across his thigh, and so inflicted nothing more serious than a few slight scratches. Gradually the struggling mass of bodies began to loosen, and then we could see that the unfortunate man was not actually dead, though the terribly rough treatment to which he had been subjected had sealed his fate. The weeping and wailing still continued and the sun went down leaving the camp in darkness. Later on in the evening, when the man actually died, the same scene was re-enacted, only the wailing was still louder, and men and women, apparently frantic with grief, were rushing about cutting themselves with knives and sharp-pointed sticks, the women battering one another’s heads with fighting clubs, no one attempting to ward off either cuts or blows. Then, without more than an hour’s delay, a small torchlight procession started off across the plain to a belt of timber a mile away, and there the body was left on a platform built of boughs in a low gum-tree.
Next morning there was not a sign of any habitation to be seen on the side of the creek on which the dead man’s camp had been formerly been placed. The only trace left was a small mound of earth called kakiti, piled up on the actual spot on which the man had died…no one was anxious to meet with the spirit---the ungwulan—of the dead man, which would be hovering about the spot, or with that of the man who had brought about the death by evil magic, as it would probably come to visit the place in the form of an animal….
The next day was a busy one in camp, because, according to etiquette, there were certain mourning ceremonies which had to be performed, the omission of which would indicate a want of respect for and be very displeasing to the spirit of the dead man. Different men belonging to the Thungalla, Tjupila, Thakomara, and Thapungarti classes were lying hors de combat with gashed thighs…On one such man we counted the traces of no less than twenty three wounds which had been inflicted at different times. Of course everything is hedged around with very definite rules, and when a man of any particular class dies it is always men who stand in a special relationship to him who have to cut themselves….
….while the actual and tribal wives, mothers, wives’ mothers, daughters, sisters, mothers’ mothers, sisters’ husbands’ mothers and grand-daughters, according to custom once more cut their scalps open with yam sticks. In addition to all this the actual widows afterwards scared the scalp wound with a red-hot fire-stick.” (Parentheses mine, p. 316-322 northern)
Whenever the natives are asked why they perform a certain ceremony or why they behave in particular ways, the answer is always, “tradition.” These very painful displays have been enacted for thousands of years because of tradition. Perhaps this is why Christianity found such resistance in trying to convert the pagans – the tendency of people to prefer what is known and traditional over any new practice or ideology. The self-infliction of serious wounds is a pretty extreme behavior. The performance of these violent and painful rituals would clearly indicate that powerful forces and instincts are involved. In my mind, it doesn’t seem that the term, ‘the need to belong’ is adequate to describe these extreme behaviors. Need to belong simply doesn’t do these behaviors justice. “Instincts” would seem more appropriate since these group related behaviors must come from a very basic and fundamental source, if not the core of human ‘being.’ In any case, I thought the gripping description of the brutal and destructive behaviors of rituals involving death wonderfully illustrates the powerful and emotional nature of the forces involved in group behavior. It would seem an inescapable conclusion that the Australian Aborigines had a very strong emotional attachment to the group.
Patriotism and Group Related Instincts
You may think, ‘Well, those are primitive peoples after all.’ Yet, our connections with our groups are just as strong. Every American can remember when they heard of the 9/11 attack. And every American who was alive when John F Kennedy was assassinated can remember when they heard that JFK had been shot. I was in junior high school at the time. When the announcement came across the public speakers, the girl seated next to me started crying. I couldn’t understand that. I didn’t know President John F Kennedy personally and at that age, politics were somewhat removed from my immediate personal life. Years later, when I mentioned that story to a friend of mine, she told me that she cried when she learned that President Reagan had been shot. The reason that people remember so vividly exactly where they were when these national (group) crises happened is because of the very strong emotions involved. Emotions play the primary role in the formation of memories. The emotions from these times of national crisis were so intense that the emotions seared those events into memory. People have an emotional attachment to their country. And perhaps people also develop a more emotional attachment with the leader. Think of the massive riots that erupted after Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated.
Patriotism is a powerful force. Millions of Americans display the American flag at their homes or on their car or truck. All Americans could be said to be patriotic – though in varying degrees. Veterans and others have been to known to shed tears when the Star Spangled Banner is played. After the Al Qaeda 9/11 attack, which produced a massive surge of patriotism, President George W Bush’s approval rating went sky high, rising to 86%. Only President Truman had a higher approval rating (87%) when World War II ended. When a group is attacked or threatened, the group rallies and pulls together. It is really an automatic reflexive action. After the Rhineland massacres of the Jews during the First Crusade, the different schisms of Judaism got together and worked out their differences. Patriotism, and group-related instincts are very strong. Even Tolstoy who was a fanatical pacifist, observed that he felt the strong feelings of patriotism during The brief Russian-Japanese War in 1903.
During World War I, there were 11 million military casualties and 7 million civilian casualties. If Genghis Khan or any of history’s conquerors had faced those kinds of casualties, I seriously doubt if they could have held their armies together. Yet, modern nations seem to have that capability. World War I was a slaughterhouse of men on a huge scale. Men marched directly into machine guns. The 1916 Battle of Somme was one of the most senseless butchery of men. Though originally planned as a joint Franco-British breakthrough attempt, the German offensive at Verdun drew off the French forces. In one day, the British lost 60,000 men – in a single day! Those kinds of numbers are mind boggling. The total loss of life in the Battle of the Somme for the British was 623,906 men. German casualties reached almost 600,000. And there was no breakthrough. Over ½ a million British men died for nothing. While desertion was a crime which carried cognitive significance, I would argue that there must be a strong emotional attachment as well. The reality of the British soldiers was that, in the end, they were British. Their identity was tied to being British. It is well known that groups play a pivotal role in giving people their identities and shape their behaviors. Emotions involved in patriotism – and genocide – are very powerful.
Contemporary Illustration: Russia, Ukraine & Crimea
Russian President Putin’s annexation of Crimea on behalf of the Russians living in Crimea resulted in very high approval ratings for Putin by the Russian people. In a discussion of the Russian intervention, my cousin, Hugh, thought the sanctions would have an effect and the Russian people would force Putin to back down. I argued that sanctions would have little or no effect on the Russian people. The Allied bombing of civilians in Germany and Japan, which killed tens of thousands of civilians, had no effect on civilian support of the war efforts. In fact post war studies showed that civilian resistance actually increased as a result of the bombings. Because of the emotional attachment that people have with their country, people will make incredible sacrifices for their country and home. In spite of sanctions, Putin’s approval rating still remains high. In terms of the ingroup-outgroup syndrome, the sanctions were an attack on the group, so the ingroup (Russian people) pulled together. Patriotism is a powerful force in human behaviors, and strong emotions characterize patriotic displays.
Combat units or groups, while an extreme form of groups, would still reflect basic group behaviors. Occasionally I watch the military channel. Documentaries frequently interview veterans. Often, veterans comment how close they felt to their fellow soldiers. They say that they end up fighting for their buddy rather than fighting for any ideological reasons. One veteran said, ‘You aren’t fighting for mom and apple pie. You are fighting for your buddy next to you!’ Clearly, members of combat units develop extremely strong emotional attachments to the other members of their unit as well as to the group itself. While combat isn’t a ‘normal’ situation, the fact that soldiers develop very strong emotional attachments would seem to be an amplification of an otherwise ordinary characteristic of group behavior. If there weren’t a basic predisposition to form emotional attachment, then no emotional attachment would have formed at all. The psychologists, Elder and Clipp (1988), did a study of veterans of World War II, 40 years after the war. They found “the most enduring and strongest ties were found among veterans who had experienced heavy combat together and had suffered the deaths of some close comrades.” (p.518 need)
Peer Pressure and Group Related Social Influences in the Scientific FBI Laboratories
The point here is that even in areas one would think exempt from peer pressure and subjective personal-social influences turn out not to be, in fact, totally exempt from the pervasiveness of social influences rooted in group related instincts. Group-related instincts – and influences - can be found in even the most unemotional and “theoretically” objective environment. There have been several articles extremely critical of a very large-scale miscarriage of justice – and science – by the FBI hair follicle analysis laboratories. It seems evident that a problem in the system was that FBI agents would send hair samples to the laboratory with the message, it seems, that “We think ‘this is the guilty party’.” By the FBI’s own analysis, “An unfortunate reality of our criminal justice system is that sometimes, evidence presented as both scientific and reliable turns out to be neither……… Recent years have hosted shocking discoveries about the unreliability of microscopic hair comparison evidence used in criminal prosecutions and the damage to life and liberty caused by reliance on this shoddy pseudo-science……the FBI conducted an internal review of cases involving hair microscopy. The findings were shocking. According to the FBI’s own estimates, around 21,000 cases involving hair microscopy would need to be reexamined……. As of last year, no fewer than 74 defendants whose convictions involved hair evidence were exonerated as a result of post-conviction DNA testing. Some of these convictions date back to 1989. Combined, these exonerated defendants served 1,056 years of unjust, undeserved prison time.”( https://www.nylsimpact.org/fbi-hair-analysis-scandal/ )
Echoing, Carl Jung’s statement about psychological theories being to a large degree “subjective confessions” The FBI article states, “Human hair identifications are subjective interpretations of objective criteria.” The bottom line is that the “group” exerted a powerful influence and pressure of the laboratory technicians to ‘give them what they need.’ I have seen an article or two that revealed – believe it or not – that some DNA analysis laboratories have literally provided falsified information – in one case, as I understand it, stemming from the same problem. An article by Atlantic magazine that focused on DNA evidence stated that "In North Carolina, state and local law-enforcement agencies operating crime labs are compensated $600 for DNA analysis that results in a conviction." The article went on to say. "Dror and Hampikian gave the DNA evidence to 17 lab technicians for examination, withholding context about the case to ensure unbiased results. Dror and Hampikian asked them to determine whether the mixture included DNA from the defendant." Only one of the 17 DNA laboratory technicians, all of who were experiences, excluded the 'subject's' DNA form being a possible sample of the "defendant." ( https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/06/a-reasonable-doubt/480747/ ) Another article state that "contamination" is a serious problem identified by the FBI in 2012, but, as of yet, no review or re-analysis of polices by the FBI has been done yet. Peer pressure and the effects of the ingroup-outgroup syndrome would be very significant. The very low rate of prosecutor convictions of police (in-group) killings would likely be an influence there as well. "The problem, as a growing number of academics see it, is that science is only as reliable as the manner in which we use it." Subjective 'ideological' or peer pressures are unavoidable, not only in law enforcement, but in academia, as well.
The article also emphasizes that a lack of critical cross-examination was a contributing factor. “A troubling but significant revelation derived from case reviews is the underutilization of expert witnesses by criminal defendants. In a review of 137 post-conviction DNA exoneration cases, a defense expert testified in just 19 of these.” While science is “theoretically” a process of critical analysis of proposed theories, Freud and Maslow, though entire fabrications are still included in Psychology of Religion books. That is, in certain aspects psychology and the humanitarian academia are more ideology than science.
Materialism
You know that "Materialist Psychology" is a very real and pressing issue, when you read a 700 plus page comprehensive 'History of Psychology' by Morton Hall, and find there is not have one single reference to meaning, spirit, spirituality, religion, or even meaning! Materialist psychology has literally restricted human consciousness to the "firing of neurons ion the brain." On FB I have run into several who argue that all there is to the human brain is "conscious thinking." Now, psychologists like Bargh and Kilstrom have scientifically demonstrated that unconscious processes are incredibly significant in human thinking. Furthermore existential and positive psychologists have shown convincingly that people get their meaning socially and, in the end, in one way or the other from or through others. So a person's consciousness is intricately and inextricably connected to others. It would seem rather self-evident that to separate an individual from society and others is not a viable scientific proposition. But materialist psychology, which is prevalent among scientists and psychologist is widely accepted - without question I might add. So, like the issue of instincts, science and psychology has demonstrated an unscientific and very subjective viewpoint.
And it is worse when it comes to spirituality. I thought perhaps Morton hall was an exception in some way in excluding spirituality and meaning. But I looked at The 700 plus comprehensive manual about social psychology that I have, as well as the 700 plus page comprehensive Self and Identity Handbook that I have and there is not a single reference to spirit, spirituality, or religion. Of all the theories which Carl Jung describes as "subjective confessions" materialist psychology has to be, by far the most subjective - and the most unscientific. To take the position that spirituality does not exist - at all - which is what materialist psychology has done, is simply an incredibly unsound and unscientific position to take. As scientists often say, radical ideas would require necessarily some exceptional proof, and materialist psychology has offered no proof. In fact they haven't offered any arguments or proof at all. Materialist psychologists say "spirituality is superstitious nonsense" - and that is it - the sum total of the scientific proof that spirituality does not exist. Here is a link to a ' Critique of the Psychology of Religion' which seems to have avoided using scientific method as defined by Aristotle: https://www.spirittruthandmeaning.com/ideals-created-by-spiritual-processes-and-religious-beliefs-du...