Tribe Talk — Effective, But How Useful?
Once upon a time, connection to and support from a tribe was quite important to survival … or comfortable survival. Those days are long past, but the tendency to think and act in tribalist ways certainly remains. Not sure what I’m talking about? Think about the illogical ways people get emotional and biased regarding sports teams, the colleges they attended, their political parties, and even websites they feel connected to.
Those are distinct examples, but even more so (and perhaps more subconsciously), we form identities of ourselves inside our heads that align us with certain social, cultural, and political ideas and often make us instinctively opposed to anything that challenges those ideas.
An obvious example of “tribe talk” is what Donald Trump has done in his run for the GOP presidential nomination, and it’s one thing that stimulated this article. As Nate Silver writes, “Trump’s main differentiator was doubling down on cultural grievance: grievances against immigrants, against Muslims, against political correctness, against the media, and sometimes against black people and women. And the strategy worked. It’s a point in favor of those who see politics as being governed by cultural identity — a matter of seeking out one’s “tribe” and fitting in with it — as opposed to carefully calibrating one’s position on a left-right spectrum.”
But this kind of talk isn’t relegated to Trump, and isn’t relegated to Republicans, and isn’t relegated to politics — it is extremely embedded throughout society, so much so that it is almost invisible to us. (Just read the article linked at the end of the last paragraph — which I read just before starting this paragraph.)
We see it a great deal in energy and EV discussions. The ironic thing is that certain subcultures actually go against their own well-being due to this tribalism. Everyone benefits from cleaner air, cleaner water, and a stable climate. A small number of people don’t necessarily benefit from the coal, oil, or gas industry shrinking, and the rich among these industries have been so effective at shaping the narrative of the Republican party (or similar parties in other countries) and conservative media that support for polluting industries is a significant part of “being a conservative” or “being a Republican” … even though these industries greatly harm hundreds of millions of people who support them.
That is all fairly old news to many of our readers, though. A more interesting and less visible thing for me is the way certain identities and communities/tribes have formed around various electric vehicles. This is not new to the car world, but it is interesting nonetheless, especially to someone like me who is historically an auto industry outsider (with a background in sociology).
Tesla has obviously developed a strong following of “fanboys” and “fangirls.” Some are very emotionally invested in the company and will get quite upset if the company is criticized. Some practically assume the company can do no wrong. Many are hugely critical of and essentially disgusted with all other automakers, or at least several other automakers.
But if you venture into forums for other EVs and automakers, you will find similar allegiances and emotions as well. There are Volt & GM fanatics. There are i3 and BMW fanatics. There are LEAF and Nissan fanatics. And many of the members of these tribes are very anti-Tesla. I think that’s largely for reasons I discussed last week, but maybe it more simplistically comes down to people aligning with their tribes. That would explain what seems like illogical anti-Tesla emotions due to Tesla “having too many fans” and getting too much media attention.
But coming back to the Tesla fans, it’s important to also recognize that many seem convinced that the other automakers can do no good. Naturally, they have gigantic ICE divisions that threaten the future of our society, but several of them also have large and committed electrification teams that are doing their best to push the cutting edge of technology, particularly EVs. Should we be so cynical and/or tribalistic that we generically bash all of these other efforts?
OK, I am well aware that Tesla has 400,000+ reservations for the Model 3 and no other automaker has anything like that for an EV, and there are logical, practical reasons for that. A short chat about those matters is coming next… but it doesn’t take away from my points mentioned above about reactive, tribalistic comments about other automakers.
The challenging thing — as someone who doesn’t just see my role as narrowly being a writer but as also being a community organizer and moderator (in various ways) — is that I think combative, close language takes us away from a collective effort to improve society and advance technology. This is especially true when it trickles up to the top executives of a company, but I think we can realize that the ways in which we as a public discuss these matters influences our progress as well.
So, long monologue in a nutshell: Let’s try to be reflective about how we discuss cleantech, EVs, and everything else. Let’s focus our words on the content worth discussing, debating, and sharing — not ad hominem attacks. To a degree, it is useful to question and try to discover what the motive is behind someone’s work and words. But if we want to advance all parties for the benefit of society, let’s not jump to conclusions that turn a group effort into a civil war.
(Commence throwing of tomatoes, or təˈmɑː.təʊz if that’s how your tribe pronounces the word.)
Related:
Calling Anti-Renewables Campaigners NIMBYs Is Often Inaccurate And Always Unproductive
Climate Change Deniers Are Getting Angrier, & Here’s Why
Why People Hate Elon Musk So Much
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I cherish my tomatoes, Well said
In other aspects of clean tech, tribalism does not extend to identification with particular brands. Bloggers do not extol SunPower’s modules over Trina’s. The contoroversies over FCEVs are conducted in terms of the technology rather than companies and products. A little critical distance from Tesla would be welcome to this reader.
Cars are inherently much closer to consumers than solar panels. And much more differentiated. (There’s been plenty of claim that solar panels are now commodities.)
I think there are notable differences in solar panels, but they are much harder for us to figure out, and definitely much less obvious to the consumer. They also have much less effect on the consumer.
Cars are really quite emotional products for people. We are definitely trying to remain objective in our evaluations. And I think we are. But there’s always going to be more to compare and contrast, and thus make judgement calls on, than with solar panels.
very good analysis
I believe the intensity of this ‘tribalism’ was stoked by the disrespect Tesla got from those other car companies. I will use GM as an example- the more they fight Tesla, the more emotionally polarized I become for Tesla and against GM. I want to see a nice variety of worthy EVS out there, but it is really easy to notice everything that is hate-worthy with the upcoming Bolt.
Good point. GM and other automakers have made not-so-pleasant comments about Tesla many times, which certainly doesn’t help, and Elon has at times done the same, but seemingly with more content/practical criticism behind that. Many fans take these things to bigger extremes, but as long as there are tribal attacks occurring on the top level, it would be practically impossible to keep that from occurring among the customers.
I think many of us wish there were 4+ serious companies trying to be #1 in the EV world. That would make for much more enjoyable discussions. I’d rather that than Tesla being far and away the leader any day!
Solar panels and wind turbines have become so “generic” that most of us have no idea why one brand might be better than another. Most of us would shop for best price/value when buying solar panels and won’t ever be involved in a “which turbine” decision.
Cars. We buy them.
I’d be very glad to have another manufacturer give us something to get excited over. I can get a little enthusiasm going for the Bolt, but GM has failed to bring the rapid charging. The Leaf seems to be charging too much for the range they offer. The rest, compliance cars for the most part. I defend GM, Nissan and other brands when I see something said that seems to be wrong. But I come up empty when I look for some manner in which any other company is moving EVs forward in a timely manner.
I’d be glad to cheer for another company. All they have to do it to give me cause….
Definitely. I’m quite confident we are in the same boat. 😀
I think it’s still very important to discuss the merits of different companies and their work. Hence this post quickly being followed by this one: http://cleantechnica.com/2016/05/14/5-simple-things-automakers-need-compete-tesla/
😀
“Cars. We buy them.”
Sure and no one is parading sit on a solar panel 😉
GM’s conspiracy with the dealers to suppress direct sales is actually getting quite annoying. Otherwise I would be all “go GM”.
I believe in being fair to all parties in all circumstances. Giving credit where credit is due is important.
It is against my nature to be a fan of anything or anyone…except for possibly Noam Chomsky. I personally dislike tribalism, provincialism, nationalism, and imperialism.
Thanks for the analysis, Zach. Was it straight from the soon-to-be CleanTechnica Think Tank? 🙂
haha, I wasn’t thinking about the Think Tank. 😀 But I was hoping to do reflective pieces like this once a week. It is the most enjoyable type of writing for me, and hopefully can help people beyond the cleantech industry. I am quite confident it will be helpful for me. 😀
My primary wish is to have a sustainably* happy society+, that continues to evolve its knowledge, technology and capabilities.
I have no particular interest in the climate (i.e. I’m not passionate about it), but climate change is a major threat to my primary wish, hence I’m passionate about seeing it dealt with. As per my primary wish, I do have an interest in seeing industry (including power generation) and transport progress, but they’re all currently contributing in a very bad way to climate change. Since that bad far outweighs the good, I passionately want to see industry and transport improve and avoid climate-damaging approaches.
I have no particular interest in Tesla, but they are clearly disrupting the auto industry, and as a consequence, electrification is occurring much quicker than it otherwise would. For me, Tesla is a means to an end, not an end in itself. Fans of Tesla (like fans of Apple before them) have gone beyond tribalism, and moved towards idolatry. I can’t stand idolatry — it’s spectacularly dangerous. I won’t engage in it, but in this case I’ll tolerate it, because what’s at stake (i.e. my primary wish) is just too important.
Then there’s tribalism, competition and the market. The market is based on competition, and competition often leads to tribalism. Good-natured tribalism doesn’t have to be any more problematic than a good-natured sporting rivalry. If it pushes forward the EV market, then I see no problem with good-natured tribalism. I do have a problem with petty tribalism. (Good-natured tribalism is about improving yourself in response to others; petty tribalism is about tearing others down.) Some of the disparaging comments I’ve seen around on the efforts of other companies such as BYD, Nissan and BMW do no-one any good, and certainly not the original commenters. To be clear, though, EV tribes seem much more well-behaved than other tribes I’ve observed.
* I’m not using sustainable as a shorthand for ‘environmentally sustainable’, but rather in the dictionary sense of the word.
+ This extends to anything sentient, in proportion to the amount of sentience.
“Fans of Tesla (like fans of Apple before them) have gone beyond tribalism, and moved towards idolatry.”
I don’t buy that at all. Apple was one of two very workable systems for personal/office computing. Apple had some advantages but Windows based systems had others. (I ran a business with early Apples but had to move to Windows because Apple didn’t support businesses and large databases.)
In this case there is Tesla. There are no other 200+ range EVs. There are no other rapid charging systems. If someone steps up with an equally workable offering then Tesla’s “fan base” will split with the other company getting a share of the business based on its attributes.
The EV market looks to be changing rapidly, so you could very well be right.
For the time being, I do see some evidence that a blind faith is developing, a necessary precursor for idolatry. Aside from increasingly fervent internet commenters who brook no criticism (note: not from this site), there are the 115,000 people who lined up for hours (some for a day or more) and handed over $1000 for a registration on a car they hadn’t seen and that won’t be available for 18 months. Of course, they weren’t acting entirely on blind faith: the deposits are refundable (no strings attached), and those making the registrations had some idea of what to expect in the car (price, range, charging, type of car). But they committed in the face of lots of unknowns. And that’s very strongly suggestive.
I’m not very concerned about this, though. Things are going to change rapidly over the next 5 years, and while I believe Tesla will still be the key EV player (and increasingly auto player), who knows what competition they will have.
Tesla is likely to build a lot of brand loyalty. Brand loyalty is a real thing with cars, possibly more than any other product (except Apple stuff).
If Tesla sells a million cars before a real competitor emerges Tesla is going to have a huge advantage going forward. Brand fans tend to sell their brand to friends and relatives.
I’d say that those 400,000+ who reserved a Mod 3 weren’t operating on blind faith. (Man, was that a great album.) But people who saw what Tesla was producing with the Mod S and yearned for an affordable version for themselves. That’s really different that putting down money on a car company (like Elio) that has yet to deliver a product.
Agreed about Apple anyway, Bob.
Windows was a real mess. The history there was weird. Windows (which was garbage) came from Microsoft and ran on MS-DOS. MS-DOS ran on PC Compatibles and IBM sold PCs. Companies trusted IBM (reasonable), so they bought PCs, so they used DOS. Then they bought PC Compatibles, so they used MS-DOS. Then they bought Windows because it was made by the makers of MS-DOS…
….*and because Microsoft deliberately sabotaged every competing windowing/multitasking system for MS-DOS*. They wrote special code into MS-DOS to break all their competitors. This is highly illegal and extremely unethical.
Anyway, as a result of these anti-trust violations by Microsoft, companies started producing software for Windows (rather than for one of the other competing windowing systems which ran on MS-DOS).
So people started buying Windows because of the installed base of software for it. Which is basically the only reason anyone buys it; it’s a truly garbage product, and by any technical standards totally unacceptable.
Business that could afford an IT person may have gone with something other than Windows. For people running small scale Windows was the option.
And Windows was not nearly as bad as some make it out to be. If you were using mainstream software lockups/crashes were somewhere between infrequent and never. Windows had a lot of people putting out niche software without adequate testing.
I don’t know how large a database Windows would support. My largest ran to only 200k records and that ran just fine.
Great stuff. Resonates very well with my feelings and approach as well.
I think it’s funny when people accuse me (and others I know in this CleanTechnica community) of being thoughtless fanboys. I am constantly evaluating these companies and technologies from what I think is an objective place, and I am quite positive these other people are as well. If hydrogen fuel cell vehicles were the best option for cleaning up our transport and approving our society, I’d be all for them. Same of oil was our best path forward, and Shell was doing wonderful, industry-leading things to help humanity.
And agreed on competition and superficial tribalism. If it is good-natured, in a positive attitude, and about improving each other, it can be valuable. If it is divisive and harmful, it’s not my preference.
I remember being positive about BP under Lord Browne, before the ginned-up sex scandal removed him and his idiot successor scrapped all his “beyond petroleum” plans.
I totally agree with not disparaging good faith efforts; Bad.
But note that Elon also brings something new to the game: He has evidenced throughout his life that he’s very concerned for the survival of mankind. He feels strongly that pushing EV’s as one way to get us off fossil fuels is vital.
Part of Tesla fanhood for many is buying in to this concern and wanting to be a part of helping him achieve his goals. Whether you could do more good with your money by, for instance, contributing to solar power for developing countries, is another whole issue; at least you’re doing something you feel is positive for the future of humanity.
Thank you for writing this article.
We need to applaud any and all attempts to move our society in positive directions. In that sense it does us no good to slam GM and the Bolt for it’s shortcomings in comparison to Tesla for instance. GM is creating a milestone by offering an affordable (sub $35k), 200+ mile EV and beating everyone else to the market. Is it a Tesla? No, but a comparable model from Tesla won’t be deliverable for at least a year after the Bolt. Keep in mind that Tesla has been notoriously late in delivering new models.
Unless they have announced differently, the Bolt is priced at $37,500.
A recent article here referencing Bloomberg news suggested one reason for missed deadlines is that Elon knowingly sets virtually impossible deadlines to get things done the fastest. Every project becomes a Manhattan Project.
I haven’t seen a lot of “slamming” of the Bolt here. Pointing out less desirable characteristics is not slamming. Comparisons are not “slamming”.
We all are tribals. The way forward is to enlarge tribe as much as possible. To make it inclusive not exclusive. And that’s a thing at which US was very good. Or still is I hope.
But they (Nissan, BMW, VW, GM…) are not ready. They are warming up, they aren’t racing in EV game.
If they were… every of them can spend 10 times more on infrastructure than Tesla. But there are only Tesla superchargers.
For now their cars are daily commuters, not ready for road trips. So it’s high compromise. Car is about independence – can go where and when I want. Not true with anything except Tesla (close to everywhere in reasonable meaning). Buying Leaf has high lost opportunities cost if it’s only car.
Yes. All good, solid points based in logic. I definitely value these comments and discussions, and followed up this article with one on those topics.
We see some tribalism even among renewables advocates. Wind vs solar, expansion of hydro vs other environmental concerns, advocacy for storage vs rejecting storage by balancing.
The “car wars” aspect of the debate probably runs higher because there are some strong brands involved.
A call for a bit of calm is a very good idea. The people here especially, because we tend to be more passionate in our ideas, its part of the reason we are even here.
Yes, I think preferences regarding technologies or products based on objective (as much as possible) evaluation and comparison is still great, but people sometimes get overly emotional, heated, and aggressive about these things, which is counterproductive. I feel like it’s been happening quite frequently lately, so was hoping (but not too hopeful) that this would help to make the discussions a bit more civil and thoughtful… and help people in broader ways as well. 😀 It certainly helps me to be reminded of this.
Good article. After being a Republican for 38 years, I changed to being a Democrat. For me it was sensing that I didn’t leave the Party, the Party left me. But, I seem to be the exception, because many people that I correspond with that are climate change skeptics are unmoved by any scientific evidence I present from valid scientific resources. Thus, your article is right on target. Most people want to belong to a tribe and once they self identify with it, cannot change.
Yes, the will and thoughtfulness to go against the tribe has to be pretty huge… or you simply have to not be easily tied to “tribes.” It is easy for those of us not a part of one tribe to see how those people are being tribalistic, but not so easy to see when we are like that, and even if we do see it, to not rationalize it without warrant. I think we’re better off the more we are able to do so, though, and then presumably make more logical decisions.
What is so frustrating in talking to the “deniers” is that when I question about how many books they’ve read on the subject, it turns out they haven’t read a one. I have on my bookshelf about a dozen related to the subject and the political ramifications.
Obama has his faults, but when I question those who are rabidly against him, I ask them, “What is it about Obama that you don’t like?” The answer I get is “Everything!” I can’t get a specific answer. I probably know more anti-Obama things than they do, but support him for the positive things.
So, your article was a very good explanation for those of us trying to find an answer to the current discordant atmosphere.
1) Comes back to that issue of the ignorant being most convinced that they are right… or something along those lines. Is really sometimes a surprise to me that the species has gotten as far as it has!
2) Yes. I think it is basically just a result of the large “hate media” organizations that so many people watch and listen to. It is a bit terrifying to turn on the TV when I visit the US, and especially to see what happens to people like my grandparents. I have a handful of things I’m really not happy with Obama about, really not happy. But I actually think he’s one of the best presidents in modern history. It is very hard to have someone in that position who matches up perfectly with all of one’s ideals, but for most people, their approval of a president seems to be about “advertising” (from the political party they belong to and the media they watch) and simply how well things are going in their personal lives.
3) Thanks! Was just bouncing off of wonderful stuff I’ve read over the years, and my roots in sociology, which I love.
I just don’t know what to do with the sort of brainless denier. I also probably know far far more anti-Obama things than the average Republican does (I find Obama’s campaign of terrorism against whistleblowers to be reprehensible, and the program of lawless murders with drones is awful as well), yet the Republicans are so much more fanatically opposed to him… and not for *any* good reasons, either.
The fact is that humans are moved to act by factors that aren’t always rational. In my case, I have become a Bernie Sanders fan during the course of this election cycle. I notice that if anyone says anything negative about Bernie, I react emotionally and feel a need to defend him. It takes me a while to take a step back and try to rationally evaluate the criticism. When I hear someone attack the science of global warming, I have to take a step back and tell myself that this isn’t an argument over the science, but rather it is an argument over that person’s identity and social relationships, or what might be called “tribalism”.
I don’t see people getting emotional over whether GE or Siemens wind turbines are better, but I do notice that I will go out of my way to not buy a GE product because of the comments made by the GE CEO Jack Welsh 25 years ago about cutting workers and outsourcing. I formed an opinion about GE as a company a quarter century ago and it still influences my behavior today.
Great comments. This kind of reflection is *yugely* valuable, in my humble opinion. Appreciate you carrying it on.
I have yet to drink a Snapple because Snapple was a Rush Limbaugh sponsor 25 years ago.
(I have no idea if they continued to sponsor the great windbag. Haven’t listened to him in the last quarter century.)
Hopefully this makes you feel better. My wife and I too have supported Bernie Sanders to the extent that we never in the past have donated to any candidate, but we have for Bernie. I fear he started too late to get the recognition that Hillary has, and I think he’s right, the primaries are rigged. Independents cannot vote in many cases and who voted for the Super delegates?
And to top it all off. Global warming and climate change is real despite what Exxon/Mobil has to say about it.
Same here.
I honestly think Bernie just intended to push the conversation to the left more. Don’t think he anticipated getting the support he got.
And like I said here (http://cleantechnica.com/2016/05/09/2-tips-hillary-clinton/), I think it’s not imperative that the incumbents take the desires of strong progressives into account a great deal more if they don’t run into some serious disruption in the Democratic party as well.
But yeah… money has far too much influence on most politicians. And politicians are well aware that there are systems in place to keep the political arena running more or less as it has been. But Trump and Sanders both shook things up enough that I think establishment politicians need to reflect on what they need to change, and then really do it.
The Democratic party makes its rules controlling how it picks its candidates. The Republican party makes its rules controlling how it picks its candidates.
Bernie belongs to neither party. He chose to run within the Democratic party system. The rules were there, he should have done the work necessary to get his fellow independents properly registered. No one changed any rules after he entered the race in order to freeze him out.
Right you are Bob. Folks can have a legit discussion about closed versus open primaries, but the fact is that nothing was “rigged.” You can choose to register in a party or not as soon as you’re old enough to vote. It’s your choice, not the “system” working against you.
Bernie could have warned his followers that they needed to change their registration from “Independent Socialist” or “The Paul Party” or whatever to Democrat long enough to vote in their closed state primary. They could switch back right after they voted and before the general in November.
The system is in fact actively rigged in some cases. See the delegate theft perpetrated in Nevada by Roberta Lange violating all procedural rules.
And I think we all know about the 2000 general election theft.
This isn’t really a functioning democracy at the national level any more. And in some states the state level is just as bad. Even my local party chair, an aged establishment figure, is saying she thinks the only hope is at the local level.
How do you feel about some of Sanders’ supporters harassing Superdelegates? Is coloring outside the lines OK if you’re a Bernite?
I know, rules are rules but it just seems that a total popular vote would be the fairest. When the country’s “democracy” was founded by the Patricians, communications were very difficult and having “delegates” made sense. However, now communications are such that CNN, in some cases, calls races the moment the polls close. They would call them sooner if they thought that that would not hinder people voting. It seems that we now have the capability of everyone’s voice be heard at a ballot box.
A jackass party official in Nevada — Roberta Lange — intervened in the state caucuses, violating all procedural rules, to steal delegates for Hillary Clinton.
I wouldn’t blame Clinton for this, except that she has come out claiming that it was all above board. And it blatantly was not, to the point where honorable Clinton delegates at the state caucuses were ripping up their credentials in anger. This is all easy enough to look up and in fact enough of it is on video to prove that Lange was NOT following the caucus rules.
Clinton is OK with stealing delegates. That’s… really not OK. My vote in the general election doesn’t matter, but there is no way whatsoever I am voting for Clinton. Election theft is a red line for me.
There was a problem in Nevada. What happened is not clear to me, what I’ve read so far has been so “hair on fire” that I can’t figure out the facts.
Worst case, IMHO, the Nevada primary vote was really screwed up.
Nevada has 35 delegates. 20 went to Clinton. 15 to Sanders.
I don’t think anyone would argue that Sanders won all 45, would they? But let’s call foul on Nevada and give him all of them.
That would the pledged delegate count from 1,768 to 1,748 for Clinton and from 1,494 to 1,514 for Sanders.
It would take the total delegate count from 2,293 to 2,273 for Clinton and from 1,533 to 1,553 for Sanders. Sanders would still need to win 88% of all remaining delegates in order to be the Democratic candidate in November.
BTW, Clinton received 6,316 votes to 5,678 votes. If Nevada had proportional delegate assignment Clinton would have received 18 and Sanders 17. Looks to me that Sanders “lost” 2 to 3 delegates at worst.
This is a reason to help Donald Trump become president?
You’d risk Donald Trump becoming president based on the possible misbehavior of party official in a minor state which seems to perhaps resulted in your preferred candidate losing out on a couple of inconsequential delegates?