Community is Born Out of Crisis, Not Out of Necessity

A SHORT HISTORY OF COMMUNITY (SORT-OF!)???

Community is a difficult word to grasp. We could venture back to our ancient ancestors who lived and developed their lives around being in tribes. It was this grouping that not only brought social cohesion, but also a sense of corporate and individual identity.

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Community in any manifestation is not just about whether one joins some special club, participates in activism that aligns with their personal politics, and/or some other phenomenon where we join groups because of something we might get out of it. But, why do we join, create, sustain and defend groups our favorite groupings? According to?social theory :

Joining groups satisfies our need to belong, gain information and understanding through social comparison, define our sense of self and social identity, and achieve goals that might elude us if we worked alone.

It’s important to remember that the reason why communities work is not because of its causes, but because we personally identify as people who align with the cause of that particular pairing. Our identity is defined by what we’re joining. If we think joining a group will make us look better , then we join it.

Communities don’t inherently breed cohesive identity; cohesive identity is bred out of a crisis. But, it’s important to define crisis here — which is to say, a common purpose or drive towards an agreed-upon goal. If there is nothing present in any group to bring a sense of unity, then gatherings are nothing less than a social group defined by a desire to make yourself look and feel good.

These types of communities exist only as a form of virtue signaling. If a group exists to present themselves as virtous (and nothing more — some religious groups could fit into this, as an example) - they are then only driven by the pleasure principle.

It was the Vienesse psychoanalst Sigmund Freud who argued that we all make decisions driven by what he referred to as the ‘pleasure principle ' - but, that it is a society that keeps this drive in check. If we all simply did what we pleased, communities wouldn’t be necessary, or in the least would be perceived as that annoying thing that we would all still need to be a part.

These kinds of communities do exist, but those are the types of communities that are developing a life philosophy that human existence is ultimately about hedonism. This then means that anything that is seen as virtuous is only because it helps fuel the overall goal of pleasure.

But, this is one method of how communities organize themselves.

Most groups require a form of membership or buy-in. The buy-in could simply be that you agree with their worldview and support it in your own life, choices, and actions. Sometimes the buy-in is the only expectation with no other rules. Others have unspoken social codes — for example, there might be a hierarchy to adhere to.

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