The Role which Conformity Should Play in Society - Essay Example

Conformity is something that is ever present in society for a number of reasons. Different experts have differing ideologies on what this means to society. Walker Percy believes that conformity is a negative thing because it takes away from the experience of the individual. When the individual conforms to the ideas that have been set forth by others, he or she is effectively giving up his or her sovereignty because he or she is basing his or her experiences on a comparison to the experiences of others. James Surowiecki, on the other hand, believes that if a group of people follow a set of criterion, that they have much more wisdom than any individual can possibly have, meaning that the group’s decisions will be far greater than the individual’s. While each of these arguments have merit, conformity should be a mix of the two ideologies. Individuals should have the ability to decipher things for themselves in the manner that is set forth by Percy, but they should also remember that the group has a great deal of wisdom as well. It should be up the individual to decide if he or she wishes to conform in any given situation and this individual should not have to feel like he or she is missing out on any experience if he or she decides to conform. According to Percy, conformity is dangerous because it predefines an individual’s thoughts on something before he or she has had the chance to experience this thing. The example that he uses is how an individual would view the Grand Canyon. When approaching the Grand Canyon, the individual will already have a preconceived notion of what he or she believes the Canyon will be. This, in turn, means that his or her experience will be a comparison between these preconceived notions and the reality that he or she is experiencing. This type of conformity can take away from life’s experiences because it means that these experiences are based on a comparison to the experiences of other and, therefore, are not legitimate experiences. Percy believes that people should have the ability to go into these types of experiences fresh, as this is the only way in which to truly experience something. Percy furthers this idea when he states that individuals will often sacrifice their own experiences in order to gain acceptable of them. He uses the example of two friends boycotting the popular areas on a Mexican vacation and only going to secluded places that they had never heard of. These two friends have a great time on this vacation, but they then feel the need to tell an ethnographist friend about these experiences in order for him to validate them. This means that these two individuals wish to conform to the ideas on this expert, as they do not truly believe in their own experiences. Percy believes that this type of conformity is dangerous because it creates a caste system where the expert has the ability to shape the reality of everyone else. The individual loses all sense of ownership over his or her ideas, which is dangerous because it eliminates individuality. At the same time, however, conformity can create a sense of comfort in an individual, as it allows for the individual to know what to expect when heading into a situation. The two individuals who went to Mexico and stayed away from popular tourist destinations had no idea what to expect, leading them to believe that the worst could possibly happen at any time. Conformity contains a sense of comfort because it allows of individuals to have an idea of how their future will turn out. Percy would argue that it is a mistake to combine the past and future with the present, since it takes away from the experience as a whole, but it can also be argued that the sense of comfort and safety makes up for the loss of experience. It can also be argued that the wisdom that is held by a crowd of people is far greater than the wisdom of an individual, making this conformity the best thing for everyone. James Surowiecki believes that if a crowd has a proper elements, that its decision will be much better than a decision that an individual would be able to make. The elements that are needed by these crowds are diversity of opinion, independence, decentralization, and aggregation. If the group has all of these things, then there is an increased chance that any decision that is made will be a positive one. The group must also avoid things like homogeneity, centralization, division, imitation, and emotion in order to come to the best conclusion. If this argument is used, it could be argued that the reason why the Grand Canyon is interpreted the way that it is in popular culture is because that is how people want to interpret it. The popular tourist spots at the Grand Canyon are popular because these are the places that the crowd wishes to see and, therefore, they are the places that tourists should go to. Also, the popular tourist destinations in Mexico are popular because people want to go to these places, not because an expert has stated that they are nice places to visit. Surowiecki would argue that as long as the crowd that has chosen these places has followed the proper criteria, that these places will be better than anywhere that an individual could choose. This is called collective wisdom and it could be viewed as a positive form a conformity. At the same time, however, Surowiecki’s ideology does not do enough to factor in how influential certain individuals can be over a group. While he does state that independence and diversity of opinion are necessary, these things are very difficult to attain because every group will always have leaders and followers. It is a very difficult thing to have an entire group make a decision and not be influenced by one or more members of that group. The members of the group would have to be kept separate until a decision was made because human beings are influenced through interactions with other human beings. There will always be different levels of knowledge on a subject within a group, which takes the argument back to Percy’s ideology that the expert can influence the layman into making a decision. By taking elements from each of these ideologies, it is possible to come up with an argument that conformity is necessary in society in order to create the environment that human beings feel comfortable in. Percy would want people to just go wherever they wish, without following any guidelines that have been set forth, since he believes that this is the only way to experience life. Surowiecki, however, would argue that the group will make better decisions than the individual and, therefore, this sort of conformity leads to wisdom. Conformity, therefore, should play a role in society where it is present as a guideline in order to increase the human comfort level, but should not be strictly adhered to in all situations. It is acceptable to go against the grain in some situations, as the experience of the individual remains an important part of life, but the wisdom of the group should not be ignored either. It remains up to the individual to determine if each situation requires group wisdom or individual experimentation. Truly experiencing life depends on knowing what your limitations as an individual are and them conforming to the group when there is a knowledge gap. Sources Percy, Walker. The Message in the Bottle: How Queer Man Is, How Queer Language Is, and What One Has to Do with the Other. New York: Farrar, Straus. 1975. Surowiecki, James. The Wisdom of Crowds. New York: Doubleday. 2005. Read More