What do you know? David Brooks was thinking about Eric Hoffer’s classic book yesterday, too.
The best source of wisdom on this general subject is still “The True Believer,” by Eric Hoffer, which he wrote back in 1951.
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Mass movements, he argues, only arise in certain conditions, when a once sturdy social structure is in a state of decay or disintegration. This is a pretty good description of parts of the Arab world.
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Next, mass movements denigrate the individual self. Everything that is unique about an individual is either criticized, forbidden or diminished. The individual’s identity is defined by the collective group identity, and fortified by a cultivated hatred for other groups.
There’s a lot of self-renunciation going on here.
Any Southern Baptist capable of stepping outside him- or herself for a moment will recognize the truth of that second highlighted portion; their sermons are nothing so much as long beratings. Other groups striving for control keep their members in line the exact same way.