In Praise(-ish) of Conformity

David Sloan Wilson

In the school where I attended second grade, our classroom was two doors down from a kindergarten class. The kindergartners had to walk past our door to reach theirs. Several of my classmates had a favorite taunt they employed whenever the kindergartners wandered too close:

Kindergarten babies!
Stick your head in gravy!
Wash it off with bubblegum
and send it to the Navy!

I resisted singing along as long as possible. First, because it seemed just mean, running little kids down for being little. Hell, I'd been a kindergarten baby just two years earlier. Then, because I'd just moved into that area myself, and had as little in common with my classmates as with the kindergartners.

Yet before long, the dirty looks from my classmates became overwhelming. My silence marked me as an outsider. And be real, I had to interact with my classmates daily, while the kindergartners remained virtually strangers. What else could a kid with few friends do? To my later shame, I started singing along with the bullies’ taunt.

We're accustomed to thinking of “conformity” as something weak-minded people do, a zombie-like behavior. We often couple conformity with the word “mindless.” Yet evolutionary biologist David Sloan Wilson, in his book Darwin's Cathedral, lists conformity as a necessary precondition to build human society. We can't get along unless we accord with others’ behavior and expectations.

Several benign actions serve to advance productive (rather than mindless) conformity. Small talk is one, though I cringe to admit it. Clichés in speech and writing are another, since they let speakers share a background of reference. As any football fan, science fiction convention-goer, or political party devotee knows, engaging in chants and songs is a powerful group-building act.

We see this in religious songs. When Lutherans sing “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,” or Methodists sing “O For a Thousand Tongues To Sing,” they confirm their group identity. These songs contain the germinal forms of their group theology, but for religious purposes, the lyrics are secondary. The point is, we sing them together.

Colin Kaepernick

Nobody would mistake “Kindergarten Babies” for secular hymnody, but it serves the same point. By singing it together, we confirmed we'd passed beyond the ignorance of infancy (“those who dwelt in darkness have seen a great light”). We also confirmed our identity as mature, diverse minds prepared for life's strange and dangerous exigencies. Duh, we were seven!

One of today's most inflammatory issues deals with the correct way to handle a national identity song. Must we all, as one side contends, stand to attention in absolute unison? Or may we, as the other side contends, kneel and pray as our conscience dictates?

This isn't a thought experiment. The two sides feud for control of how we express our group identity. One side says we're a martial people defined by our loyalty to the hierarchy (remember, the national anthem is a military song). The other says we're a people of morals and principle, and sometimes we're most American when we defy the American state.

Arlie Russell Hochschild, in her book Strangers In Their Own Land, interviews several people living in strongly conservative areas. She discovers that many have what, to her, sound like progressive values. Some are committed to environmental protection, others to economic fairness, others to their own causes. Yet in the voting booth, time and again, they vote for the party that opposes their pet issues.

Arlie Russell Hochschild

Hochschild, a scholar, avoids attributing intent to this disconnect. I have no such restraint. Like me, swallowing my principles to sing “Kindergarten Babies,” they'd rather get along with the people they have to live with every day, than be morally pure and lonely. This uniformity makes these individuals into a people.

But does it make them a people they'd like to live with?

The difference between productive conformity, and mindless conformity, is often visible only at a distance. I don't mean physical distance, outsiders standing around passing judgement. I mean time distance: I now regret singing “Kindergarten Babies” because I'm an adult who knows the difference between building community, and buying fifteen minutes’ peace. Once-popular actions like Operation Iraqi Freedom, mean something similar to the nation.

In short, we need conformity to survive. But we're lousy judges, in the moment, of the difference between productive and mindless conformity. We need constant guidance and reminders, and even that isn't foolproof. I have no answers yet. But I think I have better questions, and that's maybe more important than facile answers at this point.