Indeed, at their extreme, group dynamics fuel our worst impulses. Racism begets discrimination. Extremism breeds hate. Nationalism leads to war. In perhaps the most distressing example of modern history, an ill-advised but well-timed media campaign in 1990s Rwanda set a match to kindling to generate an uncontrollable forest fire of violent ethnic cleansing, a ferocious genocide of neighbor against neighbor and friend against friend, which did not dissipate until the fuel was spent. The fuel was 800,000 Tsutsis who were brutally slaughtered in 100 days.
The tendency for individuals to fall into the trap of class affinity, group alliance, and team loyalty is so inbred, so powerful, and so irresistible, it takes very little effort to tether it toward almost any nefarious end. Such an appeal to our base instincts, then, is simply fuel to the flame.
In so many examples in history, Stalinesque, Hitlerian, and Mussolini-like despots rose to power by harnessing this natural wellspring of support to bring eventual catastrophic harm to themselves and the people they governed. They just didn’t realize they were standing in a pool of kerosene when they lit the match.
From The Ailing Nation, Chapter Eight: Acceptance