What is the reason that human beings can be "sheeple"?

[DSeid]

I would argue that evolutionarily “conformity” and “cooperation” as different aspects of the same trait.

Given intelligent social creatures, individuals in a group having some tendency to conform to group norms, beliefs, and behavioral expectations, is requisite for cooperation, trust, and altruistic behaviors. Caring about others comes packaged with caring about what others think of you and wanting to belong. Essentially no social group could exist unless there was some tendency to follow the rules of the group.

Of course such is not absolute. And culturally some societies value “individualism” more than group “collectivism” and some the other way round. Some fascinating workthat tracks those tendencies to agricultural legacies.

@Science 09 May 2014

Large-Scale Psychological Differences Within China Explained by Rice Versus Wheat Agriculture

… Over the past 20 years, psychologists have cataloged a long list of differences between East and West (1–3). Western culture is more individualistic and analytic-thinking, whereas East Asian culture is more interdependent and holistic-thinking … Cross-cultural psychologists have mostly contrasted East Asia with the West. However, this study shows that there are major psychological differences within China. We propose that a history of farming rice makes cultures more interdependent, whereas farming wheat makes cultures more independent, and these agricultural legacies continue to affect people in the modern world. We tested 1162 Han Chinese participants in six sites and found that rice-growing southern China is more interdependent and holistic-thinking than the wheat-growing north. To control for confounds like climate, we tested people from neighboring counties along the rice-wheat border and found differences that were just as large …

… The rice theory is an extension of subsistence style theory, which argues that some forms of subsistence (such as farming) require more functional interdependence than other forms (such as herding). At the same time, ecology narrows the types of subsistence that are possible. For example, paddy rice requires a significant amount of water. Over time, societies that have to cooperate intensely become more interdependent, whereas societies that do not have to depend on each other as much become more individualistic.

In the past, most subsistence research has compared herders and farmers, arguing that the independence and mobility of herding make herding cultures individualistic and that the stability and high labor demands of farming make farming cultures collectivistic (1). We argue that subsistence theory is incomplete because it lumps all farming together. Two of the most common subsistence crops—rice and wheat—are very different, and we argue that they lead to different cultures.

The two biggest differences between farming rice and wheat are irrigation and labor. Because rice paddies need standing water, people in rice regions build elaborate irrigation systems that require farmers to cooperate. In irrigation networks, one family’s water use can affect their neighbors, so rice farmers have to coordinate their water use. Irrigation networks also require many hours each year to build, dredge, and drain—a burden that often falls on villages, not isolated individuals. … In comparison, wheat is easier to grow. Wheat does not need to be irrigated, so wheat farmers can rely on rainfall, which they do not coordinate with their neighbors. Planting and harvesting wheat certainly takes work, but only half as much as rice (9). The lighter burden means farmers can look after their own plots without relying as much on their neighbors.

One point of clarification about the rice theory is that it applies to rice regions, not just the people farming rice. It is a safe bet that none of our thousand participants have actually farmed rice or wheat for a living. Instead, the theory is that cultures that farm rice and wheat over thousands of years pass on rice or wheat cultures, even after most people put down their plows. Simply put, you do not need to farm rice yourself to inherit rice culture. …Han China is a fitting natural test case because it has traditionally grown both rice and wheat but is more ethnically and politically unified than, say, Europe or sub-Saharan Africa. China is over 90% Han Chinese, and the same dynasties have ruled over the wheat and rice cores for most of the past few thousands of years, which controls for some of the major variables that confound East-West comparisons.

Within China, the Yangtze River splits the wheat-growing north from the rice-growing south (Fig. 1). For generations, northern China has grown wheat, and southern China has grown rice. …

… The rice theory can explain wealthy East Asia’s strangely persistent interdependence. China has a rice-wheat split, but Japan and South Korea are complete rice cultures. Most of China’s wheat provinces devote less than 20% of farmland to rice paddies. None of Japan’s 9 regions or South Korea’s 16 regions has that little rice (except for two outlying islands). Japan and Korea’s rice legacies could explain why they are still much less individualistic than similarly wealthy countries. …

The more we traditionally needed to work together the more our cultures promote conformity and the less we need to work together the more we prize individualism.

[Bryan_Ekers]

@kayaker

That’s just what people do.

Nice.

[spamforbrains]

If you don’t cooperate with the group you end up dead?

[T.M]

I have stopped going to my church’s Bible study group because they flock together on safe ground just rehashing what has been said before the thought of opening up the debate and pushing the boundaries is alien to them. It is the same with politics, there are the people who will only ever vote for the same party every election even if they do not agree with their mandate. I think that it comes down to a fear of the unknown, I have always thought or done something the same way and I am not going to change.
It is a flocking mentality hence the word sheeple

[DSeid]

Almost invariably the word “sheeple” is used by those who are upset that more are not conforming to the beliefs that they themselves have.

[DaphneBlack]

Most people don’t have the luxury and/or time for critical thinking, much less thinking about their authentic self or whatever that means. Most people don’t have the luxury and/or time for the curiosity that is a natural precursor for finding things that are against the grain or outside the norm.

[Sage_Rat]

Humans are pack animals, evolutionarily speaking. In order for the pack to work together, effectively, the majority have to submit to whoever is leading. We either do it willingly, or the pack will punish and castigate us for failing to do so.

I don’t think it’s a matter of our being “sheep-like”, it’s a matter of our being dog-like. Unless you have an alpha personality, you’re going to knuckle under. If you do have an alpha personality, then you’re vying for the throne.

[Peter_Morris]

peer pressure in the elevator

[T.M]

@DSeid

Almost invariably the word “sheeple” is used by those who are upset that more are not conforming to the beliefs that they themselves have.

The word sheeple is used by none conformist as they are tired of people who allow themselves to be led by the nose in the direction chosen by the alpha’s

[KarlGrenze]

But I agree with DSeid. Many times, people who use that term may themselves be part of a “pack”. If enough noncomformists (for one issue) get together, they will get the same flock mentality they accuse others.

One must admit that sometimes the “mainstream” IS OK.

And like mentioned before, humans are complex and most of us are conformists in some areas and “out there” in others.

[DSeid]

The humor in the irony of those who use the word “sheeple” cracks me up.

Remember the old “I’m a Pepper” commercials? It’s like that, a desperate attempt to conform to a particular norm of non-conformity. “I want to fit in with the other nonconformists!”

It is precisely an attempt to belong to an in-group and to identify an out-group “other.” That in-group conformity requires an other to stigmatize precisely because they do not conform to the identified in-group’s standards.

Really it’s very pathetic.

Simple test: are people who have beliefs that conform to yours “sheeple”?

[JRDelirious]

BTW the OP makes the point that they’re not advocating people just being contrarian for contrarian’s sake.

That said…

@GlowingDarkness

How come it’s not very common to find a person who goes against the flow not for the sake of it but because they can think for themselves and want to express their true self? Without concern of being called a; loser, loner, weirdo etc.

The people I’ve met who are such true independent free souls, do NOT go around referring to others as “sheeple”.

[Peter_Morris]

@Hermitian

Because waking up Sheeple is not without consequences.

Also this.

[AHunter3]

I have a higher-than-typical degree of authenticated non-sheeplish tendencies. I’m often considered to be self-immersed, ridiculously convinced of my own brilliance and specialness, and out of touch with reality, not to mention pathetically lacking in a wide array of social skills – not so much of the “behaves boorishly” or “gets violent” variety, but more of the “cluelessly opaque to little signals” flavor, if you catch my drift.

And in establishing my credentials to speak on the issue, I’ve given you some of the answer that you seek, but I’ll elaborate on it now.

a) In our culture (especially), we are raised to think of ourselves as autonomous thinkers, people who reach their own conclusions, form their own opinions, and make their own independent choices. The truth is nearly (although NOT 100% and that’s important) at the opposite pole: as individuals we use the people around us as much as we use our own eyeballs and ears – to corroborate our conclusions, to provide words that we then embrace or reject as the good ones to use the next time WE voice “our” opinion, to give us our ongoing reality check. NO, we are not entirely passive puppets, but there IS a “mass mind” that we participate in, and what we think of as our thoughts is something like 98% mass mind and 2% individual deviation, and a large chunk of the 2% itself usually takes the form of selecting and choosing from something ELSE that some other people, somewhere, think and have put into words or otherwise expressed.

b) Don’t like being a sheeple? Raise that 2% figure to, let’s say, 8%, and you’ll experience a large shift in the people in your life who find you very difficult to be around. You do so much of your own thinking that things that everyone else takes for granted aren’t part of your mental landscape, and that makes you unpredictable, it makes your attitudes and rationales and priorities weird-to-incomprehensible to them, and you freak them out. Oh, and THEY aren’t very useful to YOU any more for corroborations and as sources for good words and phrases to use to express your sentiments and whatnot. You’re finding
THEM unpredictable, weird and incomprehensible a lot of the time – and although the fact that they are almost in unison in their weirdness cuts down on their unpredictability somewhat, it adds to the creepiness factor to be in a world where everyone else is not merely weird but weird in the same ways.

c) Want to be really free-thinking and even farther from being a sheeple? Scoot that figure up to 20%. Whoa! Your mind is now chock-full of thoughts for which no existing phrases will suffice, so you’re making them up, perhaps using individual already-existing words but stringing them into phrases to define notions and axioms and concepts and things that are absolutely foreign to everyone around you. IF and ONLY IF you were a designated expert in your field and regarded as a genius, you would find SOME people in your field who would be able to eventually follow you well enough to grasp what you’re trying to describe, but ONLY for the material that is, indeed, in your specialized field. You will have truths in your head and upon them, based on them as a starting point, you will reach new conclusions, more truths. Then you will build upon those as well. You will lose track of which of your various understandings are different from what the people around you have familiarity with, and even when you’re trying to be patient and explain things to these strange creatures who are of your own species, they are going to treat you as a babbling lunatic. Oh, and since you don’t get to use other people for corroboration you WILL build some really rickety and faulty mental structures. Sorry, but no one gets to be sane all by themselves. We really do need interactive verification and suffer from unsuffiicent reality-grounding without it. No disparagement of your brain itself, that’s just what alienation does. Yeah, you’re an alien, that’s exactly what I meant.

[Dr.Strangelove]

There’s a certain degree of efficiency to conformity. A lot of societal norms are just arbitrary, with no benefit to one choice or another, but with substantial benefit to choosing one and sticking with it.

An obvious one is which side of the road to drive on. There’s zero difference between driving on the left vs. right. But there’s a huge benefit to everyone driving on the same side. Going “against the grain” is… ill-advised.

Fashion is not too different; most clothing is sufficient protection against the elements, and the colors and style make little difference here. Conforming means that your clothing is inexpensive and easily obtainable. Going against the grain requires additional effort. Of course some people gain value through non-conformity, which may make the cost worth it, but for most it’s a bad tradeoff.

[monstro]

Being “special” is an overrated experience.

I frequently hear people saying “embrace your uniqueness!” or some variation thereof. But it seems to me that rarely do these people ever know how it feels to be “abnormal”…to have people roll their eyes at the things they say, to always be excluded from the group, to always feel misunderstood. Enduring this kind of isolation requires a fortitude that most people lack.

The sheep that strays from the flock has to be more nimble and vigilant than the others, because there is protection in numbers.

[Chihuahua]

When debates like this come up, I like to think about airline pilots.

Air Traffic Control: “JL615 heavy, New York, fly direct Kennedy, expect visual approach runway 4R.”
Pilot: “Kennedy this is JL615, I am not a sheeple. Over.”
Air Traffic Control: “JL615 heavy, say again last.”
Pilot: “You don’t get to tell me what to do! I am my own person! I will never live for the sake of another man! You’re not my real dad!”
Air Traffic Control: “Ummm… Roger that JL615. Alerting rescue and fire.”

[JRDelirious]

@monstro

I frequently hear people saying “embrace your uniqueness!” or some variation thereof. But it seems to me that rarely do these people ever know how it feels to be “abnormal”…to have people roll their eyes at the things they say, to always be excluded from the group, to always feel misunderstood. Enduring this kind of isolation requires a fortitude that most people lack.

Amen… sometimes all that happens is the nail that sticks out gets the hammer and it stops at that, having inspired nobody.
Besides, the “sheeple” putdown does not even pause to consider the possibility that if the majority sat down and thought conscientiously about what is the consensus… they may still arrive at the same consensus!

[griffin1977]

I can see a pretty big evolutionary advantage to being “sheeple”. I am pretty sure proto-human groups who thought “hang on a minute, is it really a good idea to attack our neighbours”, were probably probably killed by our ancestors who just slavishly followed their leaders when they attacked their neighbours.