The country is now in the grips of a mysterious bout with polarization not seen for generations in American society. Hate and anger seem to have displaced civil discourse and honest disagreement. For some strange reason, we are an unhappy people in a time of impressive prosperity.

The economy is having less impact on public opinion than ever before. Usually, presidential failures and successes ride with the economy. But not in 2020. Why not?

Keeping the Peace

Discussion of politics has become so polarized that families don’t even dare talk to each other about public issues. People who want to preserve their friendships are now talking mostly about the weather.

Polarization has brought us to the brink of a nation of narrow-minded true believers who cannot condone the compromise that is critical for negotiation of differences in a diverse society. The political institutions that have sustained social harmony are being tested and they are failing.

Even though most people have never heard of Eric Hoffer, he was the guru on the cults of true believers who gained his fame in the 1950s for his observations on the rise of communism and fascism in Europe.

Because we have seen a rise in true believers in modern politics, it is time to recall Hoffer’s wisdom to consider some speculations to explain why this is happening in America.

Trump Didn’t Do It Alone

Many liberals think that Trump alone is responsible for the true believer drift in society, but Hoffer has a different assessment,

“No matter how vital we think the role of leadership is in the rise of a mass movement, there is no doubt that the leaders cannot create the conditions which make the rise of the movement possible.”

In other words, polarization is a manifestation of the public mind. We can only conclude that something amiss in the whole body politic.

Hoffer alleges that a true believer “cannot be weaned away from his cause by an appeal to reason or moral sense” and fears “compromise and cannot be persuaded to qualify the certitude and righteousness of his holy cause.”

He claims that “a rising mass movement attracts and holds a following not by its doctrine and promises but by the refuge from the anxieties, barrenness and meaningless by an individual existence.”

The Need for Belonging

This is an interesting observation because society has been promoting and accepting the spread of individuality as a vertue.

Is the need for belonging more important than individualism? After all, the Good Book says that it is not good for humans to be alone so He created a second one and told them to go and make more on their own. They were delighted.

Hoffer believed that when “we lose our individual independence to the corporateness of a mass movement we find a new freedom – freedom to hate, bully, lie, torture, murder and betray without shame and remorse.”

Another question: has the decline of Christianity released people from the discipline of church morality? We see a lot of hypocrisy and immorality in the current polarization.

Preaching In Vain

Hoffer declared: “What a task confronts the American clergy preaching the good news of a Savior to people who for the most part have no sense of sin.” Pope Francis recently reiterated that allegation.

As long as we really believed in sin and judgment, we were restrained from appropriating worldly values by the idea of being accountable down the road (or up the stairs). Most of us have surrendered to sin by laying it all on God’s grace that forgives everything. No sin; no discipline.

We are out of space with the causes of polarization and true believing still mysteries.

Lloyd Omdahl is a former lieutenant governor of North Dakota and former political science professor at the University of North Dakota, Grand Forks.