Robert Frost famously wrote that home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in. The word “tribe” is far harder to define, but a start might be the people who you feel compelled to share the last of your food with.
~Sebastian Junger
Sebastian Junger is referring to a time that he was back packing in the United States and was approached by a stranger as he sat on the side of an overpass. The wan was a fill in worker at the local coal mine that lived in a broken down car. On this day he was not needed so he didn’t need the lunch that he had packed. Junger remembers the man saying “I saw you from town and just wanted to make sure you were okay” As he offered him the lunch that he probably got from the local church and Junger now felt obligated to take. Junger later states that he thinks of this man often to this day. “He’d been generous, yes, but lots of people are generous; what made him different was the fact that he’d taken responsibility for me. He’d spotted me from town and walked half a mile out a highway to make sure I was okay. For reasons I’ll never know, the man in Gillette decided to treat me like a member of his tribe.”
ISOLATION
Humans are not meant to be isolated, individually or even as a family. We were not meant to stick to our selves, work, pay taxes and die. Modern society sells us on the supposed benefits to living an isolated and physically disconnected life, or it creates situations that require it in order to succeed or in the case of most, just to get by. Our species is now the most digitally connected that it has ever been but we have grown apart physically. This goes against how humans have developed and lived since the beginning of time. They need to be part of a tribe, in person and real, not digitally in some computer generated universe or via a phone on some social media platform that barely mimics human interaction. People often talk about the nuclear family and the single family unit, but this is not enough, A support network of 10 is better than a support network of two.
Today, for most people tribe has become a superficial synonym for “loyal customer.” The Empire in one way or another has watered it down to a trendy marketing buzzword, and removed any substantial meaning it once had, taking any example of surviving tribalism and portraying them as barbaric or uncivilized, labeling them a cult, gang or terrorist organization and calling them extremists. While true in some instances, it is in appropriate to apply the label to all groups, especially from a society that champions so called “equality and acceptance”.
BARBARIANS OF OLD
Groups considered barbarians throughout history were not necessarily people that had no moral codes, criminals, cannibals or savages as they are often portrayed today. They were simply groups separate of the empire of the time. Maybe their morals or codes or culture did not completely align with that of the current empire or maybe they did and they just wanted to live separately, this on its own didn’t make them evil, or criminal it just made them different and separate. They took care of their own, and cared little for anything or anyone else, and wanted to be left alone. This behavior or the desire for it today makes you extreme. These depictions were perpetrated for the same reason that it is today for people who go against the narrative. Its an attempt to keep the Empires citizens from deserting the Empire or what ever cause it is pushing at the moment.
The Empire continues to defame and disgrace tribal societies even in this supposedly all inclusive, all beliefs are welcome time period we are supposed to be living in because the existence of tribes is inconvenient to the Empire. Specifically the aspects of it that require everyone to fit into one of a few different boxes that it uses in its systems as well as it’s demand that we are supposed to put everyone else above ourselves and our own people. The future The Empires is pushing us into doesn’t require the re-imagining of tribe it ultimately demands the end of tribe. According to the Empire we are not supposed to have any beliefs, relationships or anything more important to us than that which it decides is important.
WHAT IS TRIBE
Until I read Tribe by Sebastian Junger I didn’t even know that it was something I was missing. I knew I was missing something, and that I was looking for it, but reading Junger’s book gave it a name, or at least part of it a name. Now after reading it and a host of other books I have started to form a picture of what I would consider a tribe.
A tribe can take on many shapes and sizes depending on their circumstances and your own personal views on the subject. You could already be part of one and did not consider it that, or you may have to build it from scratch. A tribe could be your family friends and relatives depending on how close you are or this could be a team your part of along with your families such as a police department, military unit, or a sports team. It will all depend on how bonded the group is, whether you feel responsible for each other and whether it meats your image or definition of a tribe as well as some factors that you should consider.
HOW BIG IS IT?
Researchers state the human brain can only maintain meaningful relationships with about 150-250 people at any given time. Now depending on what standard you put on meaningful relationship, as well as how the rest of your time is spent this number is going to fluctuate either higher or lower, most likely lower. This means that you can’t possibly know more people than that well enough to trust them even remotely. This limitation would have developed out of generations upon generations of humans living on this planet and caps the general size of what you should consider for your tribe. Now most people these days probably won’t anything near this limit if they really consider the people that would be close enough to be your tribe. This means that most of those 1000 Facebook friends some of you might have are not going to make the cut.
LOYALTY AND CULTURE
Now that we have an idea about size, Sebastian Junger’s story above sheds some more light on what tribe is, People that care enough about you and you them to take responsibility and care for each other, or “share the last of your food with them,” this means people that you can depend on and they you. In other words a certain level of loyalty not usually seen these days, which will likely make this the most difficult part of this endeavor. Finding loyalty is hard these days because it generally speaking is not rewarded in most instances. Loyalty these days typically is only spoken of in terms of frequent buyer programs. Spend more of your hard earned dollars with this one store only and we will reward you with a minuscule cash back reward or a discount coupon for further purchases. Loyalty among each other is not rewarded by any aspect of the Empire because it is against its interests and most people rarely think to reward it themselves.
In addition, a tribe is going to a have a culture all to their own, this doesn’t mean that the culture is going to be completely different from other tribes or even from society but it will likely have something unique to themselves. Whether, their rituals, customs, language or slang they will have to have some form of collective identity that makes them unique. This could the organization that you are a part of that brought them together such as the Special Forces for its team members and their families, or the rituals that their close relatives have such as how they pray before eating, or maybe they get together for a cigar every Saturday, or a BBQ once a month.
LONE WOLVES
Humans are social beings, the loner who actually likes to be alone, is an anomaly no matter how romantic the story of the wandering lone wolf hero may sound. Odds are in the majority of people after a certain amount of time being isolated is going to take its tole, all you need is to look at is statistics of mental health and suicides over the past few years to see the evidence of that.
Human beings who have no collective identity, no strong alliances, sense of belonging, or people they can depend on become drifters dependent on the larger system of The Empire that rules from the top down. Some people fill this need of collective identity and belonging with sports teams, religious brand fixations or their country. However as The Empire slowly crawls toward its goal of universalist identities and and as brands continue to disappoint their customers, if they are not getting it from their tribe, people will begin to loose what little sense of belonging and collective Identity they have left in their lives. This is one reason that you see people join gangs, cults, frat houses, or ideological movements, it gives them that sense of belonging.
YOUR TWO OPTIONS
Now the way I see it your tribe is going to fall into one of two categories based on how I see it rolling out for other people, and that will slightly change how you go about finding or building it. Your tribe is either going to be or at least start as basically a club or maybe a brotherhood or mens group type organization. You might be able to find en established one, or you might have to build one. This could be as easy as just adding some formality to your already close friend group if you have one. Nothing else about your life really changes other than you are looking for a group of close friends or maybe relatives that you want to be around more often and be closer with than just face book likes and half assed comments on each others pictures.
Your second option is going to look like something more closely resembling what a Tribe has resembled for most of history. These typically go by “Intentional communities” and have been popular for years in certain groups of people and are no becoming more and more popular in the both the freedom community and just everyday life as poeple seek to recapture some form of community in their life or simply check out of the rat race. These groups usually have a large property or grouping of properties. The members live close to each other, work for common goals, they might have their own education programs for kids, or business they run such as farms or gardens. They may have dietary restrictions or other exclusivity based on faith or politics. They can also be “family compounds” where many generations of relatives live on the same land. This can easily grow out of the first option if your group decides to or you can try and go straight to this if it sounds good to you, As Jack Donovan put it,
What ever your us is and whatever your tribe is its just an idea in your head until you have a group of truly interdependent people who share the same fate. That’s what a tribe is. that’s what a community is and that is the future of identity in America.
~ Jack Donovan