The Remote
Despite being old enough to know better, I know almost nothing - indeed, less than nothing - about World War I or II. I can tell you dates that I learned somewhere along the way, and the basics that everybody has a vague idea about but I am clueless as to the politics of the time and how it all played out.
Out of sheer laziness (I couldn’t find the remote) I watched a documentary about Hitler’s propaganda machine and in every (wrong) way I can imagine, it’s amazing. The flags, the cars, the crowds... it’s like watching something almost royal in its fervour.
There are probably hundreds of documentaries in the world about that time period but what kept me watching was the innate ability of people to believe in something - anything - when they have empty hands.
All you need is the right words to start you off and if those words align with how people are feeling, you’re off to a pretty good head start.
Did you ever see Derren Brown’s “The Gameshow,” which aired as part of his Derren Brown: The Experiments series in 2011? It’s one of the most brilliant pieces of TV ever made about mob mentality, public shaming, and how easy it is to turn ordinary people into a bloodthirsty swarm of idiots if you just wrap it in enough “fun.”
The set-up is simple and diabolical: he takes an ordinary bloke (who, as it turns out, is a stuntman), wires him up with hidden cameras, and lets the guy go about his day. Meanwhile, in a TV studio, there’s an audience of hundreds of people, all wearing masks for anonymity, because nothing brings out your inner sociopath quite like a bit of facial coverage and a crowd.
They’re told they’re part of a fun “gameshow,” and at regular intervals, they get to vote on what misfortune should befall the poor sap on screen. Will it be a harmless prank, a spot of public humiliation, or something with actual consequences for his job, his relationships, his dignity? Naturally, every single time, the mob leans hard for the nastiest option. After all, nobody’s responsible if everyone is responsible.
I’m going to say that again and maybe come back to it later: nobody is responsible if everyone is responsible.
As the day spirals out of control, the crowd eggs itself on, and before you know it, they’re voting for things that, if you saw them on the news, you’d call the police. There’s something about anonymity and being one of the herd that erases all sense of empathy.
It’s Lord of the Flies with text voting.
And then comes the big finish: after a long, brutal day, the actor is chased from a pub by a pack of hired goons and, right in front of everyone, gets mown down by a car. The studio goes deathly quiet. The “banter” dies on its feet as everybody in the studio as a single unit realises what they’ve done.
Only then does Mr Brown step in to reveal that the victim is fine, and the whole thing has been a psychological experiment designed to show how quickly a room full of ordinary, perhaps even respectable, people, given a mask and a vote, can turn into a pitchfork mob with a smiley face.
It’s a party trick with a mean aftertaste, and the moral is about as subtle as a boot to the head: put people in a crowd, give them permission, and watch how quickly decency falls apart. All very Saturday night entertainment, but if you squint (and you don’t have to squint that hard) you can see the Nuremberg Rallies flickering behind the studio lights.
It’s an amazing piece of television but this kind of thinking is everywhere you choose to look throughout history. Take the Salem Witch Trials. Give a crowd a common enemy, and suddenly everyone’s got a torch and a taste for justice, even if nobody can actually explain the rules. Didn’t like your neighbour’s bread? Accuse her of flying on a broom and you’ve got yourself a Saturday night to remember.
We like to think we’re independent thinkers, but hand the general public a tasty, trending hashtag and a comment box and they’re baying for blood - virtually, of course - which makes it easier to pretend it never happened and that it was nothing to do with you. We all want to think we’d be the one person who stood up and said, “Hang on, this isn’t right”, but odds are, we’d be halfway up the barricade with everyone else, shouting for more.
So why do people do this? Why do otherwise normal folks - could be your gran, your boss, your own good self - get swept up in nonsense, whether it’s burning witches, shaming strangers, or voting for a bloke to be humiliated on TV?
I think the answer is much darker and much stupider than any of us would like to admit.
It’s because we couldn’t find the remote.
Most people don’t purposely go looking for a crusade, a hashtag riot, or a crowd to join because people are inherently lazy. It’s just easier to follow the noise than it is to dig around under the cushions, find the off-switch, and face up to the truth that you can’t think of anything constructive to do. Give people an empty evening, a free vote, or a chance to point at someone else for five minutes and they’ll grab it with both hands because, let’s face it, there’s only so long you can pretend to care about Escape to the Country repeats.
That’s how it happens. First, you’re just killing time, and before you know it, you could be killing something else.
History repeats itself not because we’re evil, but because we’re suggestible and unable to muster enough effort to change the channel.
And that, my friends, is how you end up with a world war. The mob wins because most of us would rather go along with whatever’s on than crawl out from under the blanket and find the remote.
It does make for some good TV though.
