Reflections on Tribalism

There are many forms of tribalism but the one’s based on religious zealotry have likely been the most destructive throughout the centuries. The war between Jews and Palestinians is current evidence.

I choose life over faith.

I have heard stories and reports about the Israel-Palestine conflict primarily on podcasts by Trish Wood and Bari Weiss (occasionally Ben Shapiro). Trish, a veteran investigative journalist, a Catholic and a Canadian citizen with Scandinavian roots, has no dog in this fight unlike Bari and Ben. Trish is simply a caring member of the human race who hates violence and war and reports from this perspective. I side with Trish on her reporting of this war.

In a Substack article entitled “Unspeakable”, Trish featured a 20 minute film that shows daily life in Gaza for Palestinians facing persistent assaults from Israeli bombing. The film reinforced my disgust for those Israeli leaders, and their American government backers, who seem intent on carrying out a revenge genocide.

How much of the divide between Israelis and Palestinians is over religious beliefs? Is the deep faith of their citizens simply the manifestation of mass formation psychoses that because powerfully rooted in the national psyche over countless generations of reinforcement? Does this explain why so many of them will sacrifice life itself to their religious convictions. Muslims and Jews are, IMHO, both victims of these psychoses and the senseless narratives about their ancestral homelands. Is the fight over these lands based on those beliefs really a sound justification for snuffing out so many lives?

War and Faith are undeniable linked.

I left the Roman Catholic faith over 50 years ago. I remember the senseless fighting between the Catholics and Protestants in Ireland. The terror attacks (“suicide bombers, 911, and more) carried out subsequently in the name of Allah has never made sense to me or anyone else who places human life above promises of a good afterlife.

Most of all, I have never understood the imperialist ambitions of major world religions over the centuries.

Nations have waged wars in the name of their “God”. Their leaders are then seen to proclaim that each person’s individual relationship with their Creator must be honoured and protected; that matters of faith are no one else’s business but that of the individual person.

I stay clear of religious zealots - you know, the people who are constantly advertising their faith as a merit badge or something of high virtue. They remind me of the zealots in middle Eastern theocracies who are so willing to attack others over religious beliefs.

On the other hand, I respect people of faith who practice it silently or within likeminded communities and who don’t go around quoting scripture in every conversation as if is universally-accepted truth.

Overt tribalism, in any form, is the root cause of the divisiveness I observe in much of humanity. The human species, however, has relied on tribal affiliations for survival throughout history.

A certain level of tribalism is to be expected but moderation is certainly more desirable than zealotry.