Tribes

Hearing about the future used to make me envious. It seemed like so much cool stuff was going to take place after I was dead and gone - technological breakthroughs, medical breakthroughs, space exploration. And I had hope the human race would progress and mature. There'd be less prejudice and hate and greed and anger - we'd have replaced our worst impulses with acceptance and love and generosity and kindness. I really felt like I was going to miss out on a golden age for humanity.

Yeah, I don't really feel that way anymore.

As a species we like to point to our big brains and claim to be the most intelligent life form on the planet. We're capable of creating impressive technology, great art, complex philosophies and grasping mind-bending physics. We've traced history back to the beginning of time, mapped the universe and split the atom. That we've done all this in the blink of an evolutionary eye makes these feats even more impressive. We truly are intelligent beings.

If only we weren't so goddamn stupid.

Being intelligent and being smart are entirely separate traits. Intelligence is a measurement of brain power (like the strength of the processor in your computer), while being smart is a measurement of behavior (what you use that processor for). Human beings are equivalent to the most powerful computer in the world being used solely to play Candy Crush and look at porn.

For all our advances and accomplishments we're still primitive beasts. Homo sapiens have only walked the Earth for the past 200,000 years. Dinosaurs were the dominant life form for 165 million years. (And in that entire time never even managed to invent the TV. 165 million years with no TV! Can you imagine?) This means our big, intelligent brains have progressed at a rate far surpassing our abilities to use them responsibly. Like a toddler with a bazooka.

We still wage wars for territorial power and control. We still kill in anger or to gain the possessions of others. And most tellingly, we still feel most comfortable living as part of a tribe.

We may no longer be huddled together in the African desert, battling other man-apes and waiting for the arrival of an evolution-boosting black monolith (I may have seen 2001: A Space Odyssey too many times), but we are still tribal animals. This manifests itself in our tendency to bond with those who share our traits, interests and beliefs - as well as our tendency to hate and distrust those that don't.

Because we're the alpha species on the planet (if you ignore viruses) and are no longer part of the food chain, we don't need to huddle together for survival. With the exception of British royalty, we've branched out from our immediate, inbred circles and are free to choose which tribes we'd like to be a part of.

Modern tribes take many forms. They can be based on family, race, gender, religion, politics, nationality, sexual preference, profession, diet, wealth, schools, sports teams, TV shows, movie franchises, musical genres - the list is endless. Anything that people can identify themselves with or as can become a tribe. Anything that attracts people with common traits or beliefs.

Now, tribalism can be a good thing when used intelligently. It can unite people behind a common cause, it can bring like-minded individuals together to create social organizations, it can give strength to those in need of support and assistance. The most intelligent use of tribalism would be for us to realize we are all a part of the same tribe, with identical needs, desires and dreams.

If only we weren't so goddamn stupid.

Being primitive beasts, we haven't been able to shake the dark side of tribalism - the insistence that anyone outside our tribe is an other. Not to be trusted. Not to be accepted. Often to be hated.

In its lesser forms this can manifest itself as name-calling against the fans of rival sports teams, or arguing the superiority of either Star Wars or Star Trek. But in its more extreme and harmful forms we know tribalism by the names racism, sexism, xenophobia and intolerance.

Before social media exploded and removed our blindfolds it was easy to pretend those darker forms of tribalism were isolated, or even diminishing. After all, we were surrounded by our own tribes, only rarely exposed to the screeching and chest-beating of others. But - as the events of the past few months have conclusively proved - tribalism is alive and flourishing, with no sign of loosening its grip on the stupid part of our big brains.

So as I watch men threaten women for daring to voice their opinions... white police officers repeatedly escaping even the appearance of justice for killing unarmed black victims... bigots trying to deny the rights of others based on sexual identity... people misinterpreting the texts of multiple religions as an excuse to subjugate, brainwash and even kill for wealth and power... human beings hating one another for such ultimately trivial differences as race, gender and spiritual beliefs... I no longer feel envious of those who will experience humanity's future.

Barring the arrival of an evolution-boosting black monolith, I kinda feel sorry for them.

#america #history #race #religion #mensrights #womensrights