If there was not evil in the world, it would be necessary to create it. The single best way to unite people is not a flag, a god or a leader, it is an enemy. People are most united when they have a common person/people/idea to fear, hate or fight against. We lived as a country for years fearing and hating “The Communists” and now it’s “Terrorists”. For as much as people need a god to thank for unexplained blessings, they also need a “devil” to blame the bad things on.
When we as a whole are without someone to blame we begin infighting more and start to fall apart. The “Red Scare” of the U.S.S.R. lasted for as long as that country did. But the “Radical Islamic” scare has not lasted in the same way because of the heavier media coverage and lack of clear definition of the enemy. After 9-11-01 we had a clear enemy in Osama Bin Laden and we all united under that banner. Contrary to popular sentiment we did not rally under the US Flag, in truth we united under a common enemy.
If you look at the Republican Party in the U.S. they are trying to keep that banner up in hopes to distract us. They try to bring up Terrorists and Al Qaeda to unite their party and anyone that will listen. They know that if we have a common enemy we will get tunnel vision towards anything else. They also use this technique during elections to unite their party around the common enemy of Abortion/ Homosexuals/ ”Big” Government/ illegal aliens/ taxes.
The Democrats try to go at everything from an “Intellectual” stand point and do not present a common enemy but hope to somehow unite people under common agreements. A group of 5 people can barely agree on pizza toppings let alone more complex ideas that are involved in government. For as much as Barack Obama would have us believe he united people under a banner of “Hope” in truth he united people under a banner of George W. Bush as a common enemy and the idea of “Changing” the status-quo. People did not unite under one set definition of what things should be changed to but rather the non-specific idea of change from the current state.
When it comes to actually fighting wars the idea of defeating a common enemy or evil comes to the forefront. Men do not die for “Freedom” but rather they die to defeat some evil/enemy that they are told threaten that freedom. We are told that our fallen soldiers did so defending our freedom but when we lost in Vietnam did we lose any of our freedom?
When you examine the Civil War, to President Lincoln we were fighting to keep the country united but that’s not what the people that fought the war were thinking. To the North they were stopping the evil of slavery and quelling a rebellion. But to the South they were fighting against the evils of Washington DC trying to infringe of state’s rights and take away a key element of their economy.
There is a psychological trait we all share from evolution that causes us to want to band together when we spot a common enemy. That same trait however causes us to become selfish when it comes to good things such as money or food. You might think charity is selfless but only people with enough food or money for themselves do acts of charity to stamp out the evil of hunger or poverty. People will generally make sure they are provided for before committing acts of charity. Yes there are examples of poor people committing charity but usually that charity is giving time or acting as an agent to collect charity from others that do have more.
Humans by nature unite under fear not love. This may be a Machiavellian way of thinking but in my observation it is true.
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