Every night I read stories to our three children. My oldest loves the Five Nights at Freddy’s universe and has me reading the graphic novels. It’s an odd place to find lessons for life, but sometimes they come from unexpected sources.
In one of the stories, a character slowly dying from blood loss loses consciousness and dreams of a conversation he had with his father about the dangers of “groupthink” — when we lose ourselves in the will of a larger whole. It’s the same phenomenon that has allowed for incredible atrocities: mass cult suicides, the Holocaust. When we submit our inner voice of right and wrong to the seemingly greater will and wisdom of a larger whole, we can be led down a path inconsistent with our own morals.
But it can be more subtle than those dramatic examples. To some degree, we all submit to groupthink when we take part in the internet. When we see enough people online saying something is right or normal, we can stop listening to our inner voice and defer to the wisdom of that many voices.
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