We are more tribal than we are willing to admit

Some of the most successful companies in the world today operate on the principle of interconnection and interdependence born of global thinking.

As New York Times columnist, Thomas Friedman points out, “Uber, the world’s largest taxi company, owns no vehicles. Facebook, the world’s largest media owner, creates no content. Alibaba, the most valuable retailer, has no inventory, and Airbnb, the world’s largest accommodation provider, owns no real estate.”

The founders of these companies have cleverly manipulated our indispensable interdependence by connecting us with each other by using the internet — the genius of networking!

We live on a globe not in a cave. As tenants on a globe, our thinking should be global too.

Very often tribalism and nationalism inhabit our minds, resulting in fear of the other, which leads to prejudice and hate.

According to Albert Einstein, “Nationalism is an infantile disease, the measles of mankind.”

At Einstein’s bed side was an undelivered speech for Israel’s Independence Day which began: “I speak to you today not as an American citizen and not as a Jew, but as a human being.”

After the September 11 terrorist attacks, I heard someone declare on television: “I only care about America; as far as I am concerned, the rest of the world can go to hell.” Such tribal thinking while living on a globe contradicts the very ethos of the Earth. And that is why we have so many problems on Earth.

When we hear the word “tribe” we usually think of the uneducated, unsophisticated, scantily clad people who live in the Amazon jungles and remote African villages. We think of the American Indians who belong to tribes such as the Miccosukee tribe, or the Seminole tribe or the Navajo tribe. We will never consider ourselves as members of a tribe. We think we are modern, civilized, sophisticated, and smart people living in a developed country.

Hello, news flash: All of us are more tribal than we think.

Tribal mentality is hard wired into us, which is fostered in our earlier years by our family tribe, our religious tribe, our social-class tribe, our race and ethnicity tribes, our country tribe, our language tribe, and our gender tribe.

Each of these tribes is interested in its own survival and creates a series of ideas and concepts in our minds. These ideas occupy our unconscious mind and can easily dominate our behavior towards others.

Tribalism is pervasive, and it controls a lot of our behavior. Tribalism is more emotional than rational. Think of the inhumane things we do in the name of tribal unity.

Wars are essentially cruel tribalism.

Genocides are tribalism on steroids. Remember the genocide in Rwanda in 1994? The Hutu tribe eliminated the Tutsi tribe, by killing a million people.

Racism is based on tribal thinking.

Religious superiority is based on tribal thinking.

Xenophobia and homophobia are the results of tribal thinking.

Political systems in most countries are based on tribal thinking. For example, in America, there is the Democratic tribe and the Republican tribe. Each tribe holds on to its views and opinions without budging or compromising. Think about the uncompromising attitudes towards any type of gun control. It is coming from tribal thinking based on fear and greed.

(from Cosmic Kindergarten: Earthly Lessons for a Heavenly Life)