March 09, 2003
Hoffer on Space

In this more-or-less weekly feature, I will explore the applicability of Eric Hoffer's The True Believer -- Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements to space exploration and the space advocacy community in particular. I will follow the format of the book, with a summary of Hoffer's arguments in yellow highlight followed by my comments on their applicability to space advocacy. Some chapters may end up being combined with others or skipped over entirely.

IV. The Role of Undesirables in Human Affairs

This is one of those sections of the book which I will be summarizing with little or no comment. It's interesting material, it just isn't directly applicable to space advocacy.

"There is a tendency to judge a race, a nation or any distinct group by is least worthy members. Though manifestly unfair, this tendency has some justification. For the character and destiny of a group are often determined by its inferior elements."

The bulk of any group is in the middle, and is worked on by the extremes at either end. "The game of history is usually played by the best and the worst over the heads of the majority in the middle." The productive influence of the best -- the creative, the principled, the learned -- is obvious. The influence of the inferior is the opposite: they are willing to destroy, to flirt with chaos and anarchy, because they see their lives and the society around them as spoiled beyond repair.

This hatred of self and society makes them ripe for mass movements. "They also crave to dissolve their spoiled, meaningless selves in some soul-stirring spectacular communal undertaking -- hence their proclivity for united action." Lest it seem that the undesirables are merely a chaos-inducing force, Hoffer explains that they serve a regenerative purpose which would today be described by the term "creative destruction". If there were no malcontents in a society, that society would be calm and peaceful, but stagnant as well. "It was not the irony of history that the undesired in the countries of Europe should have crossed an ocean to build a new world on this continent. Only they could do it."

This latter argument is one with which space advocates and science fiction fans may be familiar, as it is a key element in the framework story of Robert Heinlein's Time Enough for Love. It also should be familiar to Americans generally, as this is (as Hoffer notes) what happened to Europe, and his happening now with other regions of the world: "malcontents", frustrated with conditions in their own countries, emigrate to the U.S. to seek their fortunes, forming a "brain drain" (on more levels than merely intelligence) that leaves their former homes less dynamic -- but more peaceful -- than they otherwise might have been.

Hoffer then defines a taxonomy of the disaffected, categorized in large part by different sources of frustration:

  1. The Poor
    • The New Poor: those who are not accustomed to poverty, who come to it by accident, upheaval, misfortune, or incompetence, and do not see it as an unalterable condition of their lives; those who are accustomed to poverty as an unalterably condition, but who, through some sort of upheaval or calamity, come to see "the transitoriness of the 'eternal order' ". They will be amenable to a mass movement which promises to restore them to that station they have lost, or provide them access to that station to which they aspire.
    • The Abjectly Poor: Those living on the margins of subsistence. They are often too busy with the day-to-day struggle of obtaining food and shelter to be concerned with a mass movement, and the more miserable their conditions the less likely they will be discontented. However, as their conditions improve, they are more likely to feel discontent and to militate for change -- what Tocqueville described as "the paradox of rising expectations". "Our frustration is greater when we have much and want more than when we have nothing and want some." The hope for the future described above plays a role in managing this discontent: a new mass movement plays on hopes for immediate change, while an established one extends the time horizon into the far future.
    • The Free Poor: Those poor who have unlimited avenues before them to better their lives. The freedom to choose is the freedom to fail, and for the free, failure and its consequences are their own responsibility. For those frustrated by their own freely-chosen failures, freedom can come to seem an intolerable burden, one which a mass movement can help them shoulder -- or eliminate entirely, by curtailing those freedoms at the root of their frustration, making them "free from freedom". Similarly, the disaffected free poor, sensing that "their lives are spoiled and wasted", will seek equality at the expense of freedom -- "The passion for equality is partly a passion for anonymity...No one can then point us out, measure us against others and expose our inferiority." Where you have freedom, the poor masses will crave equality, and where you have equality, only a small minority will work for freedom. Equality without freedom is a more stable ordering than freedom without equality.
    • The Creative Poor: Those poor who have an outlet in creative work. Artists and craftsmen, even ordinary individuals engaged in a creative pursuit, have an outlet for their discontent. The ability to regularly produce something new and valuable by their own hand reinforces self-confidence and self-worth, thereby immunizing them to a large extent from the lure of mass movements. When this creative ability fades, however -- in terms of individual talent, or a society moving away from handcrafts, etc. -- the once-creative individual or society becomes increasingly vulnerable to frustration and the mass movements which build upon it.
    • The Unified Poor: Those poor who are members of a small tight-knit group, such as a close family, tribe, religious community, etc. "The less a person sees himself as an autonomous individual capable of shaping his own course and solely responsible for his station in life, the less likely he is to see his poverty as evidence of his own inferiority." Group membership limits freedom of choice and helps to dilute the burdens and frustrations of failure. A member of a compact group is less likely than an autonomous individual to revolt against his circumstances, and is less likely to feel the frustration on which a mass movement thrives. "The ideal potential convert is the individual who stands alone, who has no collective body he can blend with and lose himself in and so mask the pettiness, meaninglessness, and shabbiness of his individual existence." Where these group ties have been broken -- either by circumstances, or by design -- a mass movement gains followers by acting as a substitute source of the sense of community and belonging which they have lost. Where these links are broken by circumstances, such as the diffusion of Western institutions and technologies into traditionally tribal societies, the resulting feelings of isolation in members of a society without experience with individualism and self-reliance can produce a reactionary mass movement against those outside influences which are severing the traditional ties. Just as mass movements can thrive in such environments when group ties are severed, they can be averted or controlled by encouraging and strengthening traditional group ties.
  2. Misfits:
    • Temporary Misfits: Those who have not yet found their place in life but still hope to find it, such as adolescents, new immigrants, recent college graduates, veterans, et al. They are restless, and frustrated by the fear that their best years may already have passed. This frustration makes them ripe for recruitment by mass movements, but they do not always make good recruits because their self-perception is not beyond repair -- "...the slightest evidence of progress and success reconciles them with the world and their selves."
    • Permanent Misfits: Those whose lack of talent or defect of mind or body prevents them from attaining the one goal they desire the most. Barred from that which they desire, they passionately and restlessly pursue any and every other goal that catches their eye, while never obtaining from these substitute pursuits the sense of fulfillment which their denied goal would provide. The only alternative means of fulfillment lies in the separation from the self -- only by immersing themselves completely in a mass movement, and handing over individual judgment and responsibility to the collective, can they break the never-ending cycle of misdirected passion and frustration caused the denial of their unfulfilled goal. The extreme example of this type is the individual with an "unfulfilled craving for creative work", those who once felt the joy of creativity, who have come to fear that their talents are fading and they will never produce anything worthwhile again: "Neither fame nor power nor riches nor even monumental achievements in other fields can still their hunger...Their unappeased hunger persists, and they are likely to become the most violent extremists in the service of their holy cause."
  3. Minorities: Minorities face similar frustrations to those of the affinity groups of the unified poor, centered around the choice of whether or not to assimilate into the majority. Those who work to maintain their identity as a member of a minority group will be less frustrated than those who work to assimilate, as they will find themselves (like the unified poor) a part of a compact group that "shelters the individual, gives him a sense of belonging and immunizes him against frustration."  In contrast, the individual attempting to assimilate stands alone, without a support community to help him handle prejudice and discrimination, and carries a sense of guilt for having turned his back on the group to which he belongs/belonged. The frustration caused by ordinary failures is made worse by the sense of isolation and the insecurities of being an "outsider"; when success does come, it can bring with it the new frustration of being an "outsider" in spite of one's success, or having succeeded only at the expense of sacrificing (via assimilation) an important part of one's identity.
  4. The Ambitious
    • The ambitious facing unlimited opportunities confront the frustration of not being able to accomplish every goal that is open to them. The sweetness of success is soured by the knowledge that much more that is possible remains undone, and in such a context no amount of success can ever be "enough". The frustration of the infinite prompts an "excessive readiness for self-sacrifice and united action."
    • The ambitious facing insurmountable obstacles feel the obvious frustration of having all their efforts come to naught.
  5. The Inordinately Selfish: The more selfish a person, the more easily he will feel frustration, and the more deeply he will feel his disappointments. If his disappointments destroy his excessive faith in his own self-worth, this deepness of feeling can cause a flip to the opposite extreme: selflessness. Having lost faith in the value of their selves and their own interests, the inordinately selfish redirect their selfishness to an external cause. They become its most fanatical proponents, their ostensibly selfless crusade being little more than a vehicle for a selfish pursuit of their lost self-worth.
  6. The Bored: Widespread boredom is a more likely indicator of the ripeness of a population to receive a mass movement than the level of economic or political oppression. In almost every period in which mass movements have arisen, there has been widespread boredom, which the organizers of the movement were able to tap into as a source of recruits and sympathizers. "When people are bored, it is primarily with their own selves that they are bored. The consciousness of a barren, meaningless existence is the main fountainhead of boredom." Those immersed a compact group, as described above, are not conscious of their separateness, and so are not subject to the frustrations of boredom. The separate individual is only unaware free of boredom when occupied with some sort of productive or creative pursuit or the bare struggle for existence -- "dissipation" and hedonism do little to relieve boredom. Where individuality and comfort are widespread, and rewarding pursuits are not available, boredom can spawn all manner of mass movements promising to give meaning and purpose to life.
  7. The Sinners: Those who sin and those they have sinned against often find salvation from a guilty conscience and a blemished life through participation in a mass movement. "Remorse and a sense of grievance seem to drive people in the same direction." To these people, the mass movement provides an opportunity to turn over a new leaf, to cast off an irreparably spoiled life. Crime can in some circumstances be a substitute for a mass movement among the bored, so it is no surprise that criminals form an important part of the early stages of any mass movement. Even when no sin or crime is in evidence, a mass movement can provoke a sense of shame or guilt as a means to gain members -- creating a malady and then offering the cure. The sin is defined as some aspect of the autonomy of the prospective member, and the "atonement" is to submerge one's identity in the collective identity of the movement.

Posted by T.L. James on March 9, 2003 05:20 PM

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