Continuing down the line of thought and discussion on this hypothetical example of dehumanization (after an initial 4 waves of hate) and how rumors seem to be a connection between the two sort of large stages (i.e. hate and then dehumanization). False rumors are part of mechanism of control and abuse that is prevelent among hate groups and interconnected clan members. When aggression mixes with religion, race, clan, politics, etc. you may find a type of extremism seeping in which makes aspects of the environment intentionally toxic and charged.
Let us kind of explore a crazy little example! Your enjoying time with friends and everyone is getting along splendidly. There have been incidents in the past of group aggressions, rumor spreading, putting people at risk, harming kids and elderly, so on and so forth (We are not saying this specific person is putting someone at risk but there has been a history of it by some clan members.). Basically it was a large scale group aggression because someone told their leader "no".
Some person you never met before starts staring at you, displaying micro aggressions, and you overhear them talking negatively about you. You scratch your head in confusion because you know nothing of them and they know nothing of you. 🤔🤷 You don't have any issue with them and never met them but they seem to know alot about you even though none of it seems to apply (i.e. the hate narrative from rumors.).
Keep in mind its an example so it doesn't matter if it is true or not. We are just assuming it is true for the moment to illustrate a point. That is why you should not jump to quick conclusions. Let us say it is clear it is about you and you further find out they are associated to the same group of individuals who have a history of spreading rumors and bullying people they don't like and/or don't want in the community. Its like immature poeple trying to ruin something that is sacred to our society.
Certainly you would raise an eyebrow....
Let us go back to the odd display of behavior that lacks civility and good taste. Now, much of that misbehavior is not based in the person/people they are/have targeted. The target (s) could be super nice, kind of a pacisfist, capable physically/actualized sports player versus talk, friendly to everyone, fairly intelligent but also pretty honest even when they know they or the other person are not going to like what they are going to hear (I guess you would have to be a little of a philosopher to understand why someone would even try to get to the root of truths).
Perhaps a little jealousy and a few other factors are mixed into the motivations to create a toxic environment. There could also be some attempts to dehumanize and demasculate the target (assuming a guy) based on some groups members more shakey sexual image (i.e. lots of intentionally "manly" displays that are monochrome and seem more for shallow overintentional displays of imagery of manhood and not as something that moves across multiple realms of a persons values and life. People who have been texted to act with courage and integrity for the betterment of society even when placed under serious risk would be one type of manhood while another sign of manhood might be how many times you swear and stare kids down in a parking lot. Maybe not? 🤷 Manhood can't be summed up with items such as a truck, a dog, so on and so forth. Btw I love trucks as I'm looking to buy a 1970/80's truck to fix up, fishing, dogs, want to hunt more, hike, kickbox, so on and so forth so I'm not stereotyping. Half of me is country!). Why Poeple Spread Rumors?
Other people have complained about the group and its influence and how they are immune and protected in criminal behaviors. Prior complaints by community members were quickly retaliated against with intimidation, violence, and hiding of evidence to ensure the perpetrators are not held to account. The unwritten codes seem to be at play here and that immunity and immaturity toward our Constitution, human rights/civil rights and oaths have created an unsafe environment for good people that fall outside the clan's good graces. Encouraging a higher moral conscious and order has fallen on deaf ears but knowledge of other victims keeps piling up.
The Dynamics of Hate and Misinformation
Let us ask a few questions that we can explore some other time.
1.) Do the men that spread these rumors feel someone demasculated by the target? Men to men aggression. Maybe if we reverse around the sexes a litte would there be some other factor and that is why they spread rumors about female friends of the guy (i.e. trying to ruin their reputations even though they are just friends. The readers who are ladies should be somewhat offended that these people do this. Reputation is important)? One could think of how intentionally spread rumors create a group type of social damaging and bullying to force people to ostracize through fear of association.
2.) Is there a level of hate and bigotries involved or does it have more to do with clan loyalties? Fear that they could not have unchecked influence on their environment (including institutions)? Clans can be powerful things and hard to control. Extremism can be sort of amebic and where one starts and one ends is difficult to decipher. What might happen if the in-group clan becomes an out-group and the clan network and those who are misusing institutional authority collapses?
3.) What happens if they cannot intimidate/bully the victim (s), can only encourage the most shallow of people to ostracize, or that people general know the target and find them of higher character than the rumor spreaders? Would that frustrate their effort, would they escalate or would they quiet the rhetoric and go back to focusing more on themselves?
4.) Do we have checks and balances in place to handle these amebic group behaviors and at what point do these behaviors look intentionally harmful? What about the rights of all the victims or are they not particularly important?
5.) What kind of strategies do we devise that might limit such group aggression and ensure that the environment is safe and positive for everyone? Should that be for some or for all people? Are there differentiators based on locality, clan, race, religion, politics, etc.?
6.) Are there long term consequences to unchecked groups like this that warp the social environment in a way that impacts the business climate? i.e. disdain for outsiders, lack of retention of professionals that move into the area, declining population, mistreating people who want to move to the area, accepting only some type of people (homogeneous.) almost losing an anchor business, etc. (One might need to look at the literature to see if such groups can influence economic development. There is some research on corruption but I would suspect it would be similar with hate groups and/or clans and toxic environments.)
7.) Would a outside investigation and audit of cases and behaviors by clan affiliated officials lead to the discovery of new victims, save future victims, enhance trust, so on and so forth? Could it help retain good officials and attract the best talent? Could it reverse the trends of decline and rising crime by creating the highest functioning system possible? I guess it depends on how well you want these systems to run and what values they should align.
They are some good questions. I'm sure you can come up with a few of your own. Its sort of fun to explore these thought experiments and what markers to risks can be used for other places as well. These do create markers meaning that certain characteristics found in one place could indicate similar behaviors in others and that can lead to better management and avoidance.
*This is an ongoing thought experiment on dehumanization. It is second in a series that included hate. It is hypothetical for learning purposes only so take with a grain of salt. We can learn from exploring ideas and what things might look like using one strain of logic. There are others. The end result is positive but we have to get through the ugly stuff.
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