``Herd'' Mentality

The other sad thing about life that one realises as one gets older is the paradoxical lack of control over affairs, despite being in a better position to actually make good use of the resources at one's disposal. Think about it this way. When one was still a child, the environment that one interacted with was much smaller; there's mainly the home and the school, and possibly with the extended family members. Unfortunately, as one grows up, one's social circles increase in size, and slowly [but surely] one will find that control is utterly lost.

But I think I need to be careful with what I say. When I say ``control'', I mean being able to influence things and make things move along through personal intervention. It is clear then when one is still a child, the environment allows much control to be exerted, even if one did not realise that one could do that to one degree or another. Sadly, once one is aware of such abilities, the environment has changed and there is little opportunity to demonstrate/use one's abilities.

Part of the reason why this is the case is the cultivation of the ``herd'' mentality. As children begin their lives interacting with the world, they do not understand the concept of conformance, and thus present a more care-free outlook towards life; they are also insulated from the vagaries of life and thus have the almost-perfect conditions to be the way they are. But fast forward a few more years, and one finds that the child's individuality and antics associated with it are not as tolerated as before, and the child learns how to conform, either through physical conformance (like wearing uniforms/dressing in a certain way), or even psychological conformance (like creationism is the only truth to how life came about, and not evolutionism). By the time the child reaches young adult-hood, the damage has been done---he/she has developed the ``herd'' instinct, never truly wanting to explore the borders beyond what the ``herd'' mentality dictates.

For the most part, at least, from the perspective of governing bodies, ``herd'' mentality is a good trait for the masses, since it makes policing and governing them easy. However, from the social development standpoint, I doubt that having only ``herd'' mentality is sufficient for a society to progress beyond the level that it is already at. Think about it in another way, if everyone were to only follow the crowd and not innovate, life would not be the way it is now because the inventions that we have grown to rely on would cease to exist at such an early stage because no one would be willing to challenge the social norm and create something that the world has never seen before.

But what has all of this got to do with the control that I talk about before? Well, simply put, the rejection of the ``herd'' mentality will actuallly allow more control to be weaved back into a person's life. What do I mean, you might ask. If one does not readily conform to society's wants, then one is able to look at things from a critical perspective and decide if the said social norms are worth following. Here is an example of what I mean. Take a look at the UK currently. It is of no doubt that the UK has developed a culture of surveillance on all of its people, and not just the ones who are suspects to a case. In fact, you would be photographed by no less than 3 cameras while just walking along the street in London. What has happened here? This is the ``herd'' mentality being in effect---most of the masses do not understand the mumbo-jumbo that the people in power say, and due to their ``herd'' mentality, decide ``for themselves'' that what the government does is good for them and thus no one makes any noise/comment about the ramifications of having such an extensive surveillance network on all the people, whether you are suspicious of committing a crime or not. Of course, the other way of looking at this will be that dissenters to the plan were secretly incarcerated and thus prevented from airing their views, but this is already bordering on the line of speculation and I do not think that it is a worthwhile direction to take since conspiracy theories are just so easy to make.

I am not advocating that people go against their governments. I am saying that people should reject blindly following anything and to think for themselves critically, evaluating within their understanding framework if the said ideas are indeed worthy of being followed. That trait, unfortunately, is not readily seen in most people because their either do not care, or do not know how to care (i.e. cannot think critically). We live in interesting/terrifying times, and the longer that we do not wrest control of our lives and thoughts from the ``herd'', the more injustices can occur through the inactions of many.