Summary Of The Article 'Group Minds' By Doris Lessing

Blind obedience is the naivety of people who act as sheep and follow the lead of the blind. Doris Lessing was a renowned fictional novelist of the 20th century (Lessing 652) and lived during an exciting time when questions of the normal aspects of human life were beginning to be understood. Lessing’s article "Group Minds" presents an argument that we know how people interact in groups, ignorance of how groups are governed is dangerous, and we can make changes to help the future generations. Lessing asserts her thesis that humans are social animals (652) and society lacks the knowledge of how group mentalities are governed (653). To show the validity of her argument Lessing writes about experiments that have been previously conducted (653).
The size of the group, Asch discovered, was a deciding factor to the effectiveness of a group which usually peeked with three individuals versus one individual (657). Milgram’s initial experiment, performed on Yale undergraduates, showed up to 60% were completely obedient to the authority (634). Further replicated experiments showed similar results, such as, “one scientist in Munich found 85% of his subject to be obedient” (Milgram 635). The results are vile to think that conformity occurs so easily and, more so, are so common an occurrence. Lessing states, “There are indeed glorious individuals who stubbornly insist on telling the truth as they see it, but most give in to the majority opinion, obey the atmosphere” (653). Also Lessing states, “It is the hardest thing in the world to maintain an individual dissident opinion, as a member of a group” (Lessing 652). Clearly Lessing is correct to say we have obtained data that shows how human interactions is governed, and the impact of social compromise. Lessing states, ”[…] we all live our lives in groups […Everyone is] always seeking groups to belong to, and if one group dissolves, they look for another.” (652). Why is it important to know that as a collection of people we
Lessing states that we must separate ourselves from emotion, think about what we know rationally and begin the process of teaching our children the lessons we have learned (654). It is only by virtue of knowledge that we will free ourselves from the bonds of ignorance (Lessing 654). The great philosophers of ancient times believed that the power of knowledge would free us and create a utopian world free of pain. Fromm elaborates that we seek groups and obey because there is protection, forgiveness, comfort, and other artificial hedonistic pleasures (624). In order to go against the grain of herd mentality, a person must be a “fully developed individual” with the capacity to think and feel for himself (Fromm 624). Essentially, we must leave behind the age of immaturity and cultivate a society directed towards refinement. While the impact of what she is suggesting is grand I do think that the wording was poor. She describes this education of our children as a simple talk, but she fails in defining the age range intended. It may have been more effective to write that we will incorporate these lessons in the school systems and allow the children to develop under the established