Strength By Fitness
The primal impact of pack mentality . Welcome to another fact-based article from Strength by Fitness.
Let us talk about that fascinating aspect of us humans that´s called pack mentality in this article. You see, as evolved, educated, teachable, and acutely intelligent as the human species are, we are also, just as primal as every other animal species that still roam this planet.
The primal impact of pack mentality is why omnivores are still seen as more socially acceptable than plant-based people. Omnivores at large produce lower levels of contempt, and anger in others.
With that, comes a lower illogical lust to harm that person based on nothing but their food preference in the general population.
This, of course, is both perplexing and interesting, because why would someone else’s food habits cause an emotional fight or flight reaction in other people when those food habits do not represent a physical threat?
“Plant-based people elicit fear, contempt, and anger in the meat-eating participants in the study,”
Coach Mike, Strength By Fitness
We can certainly dislike others’ habits.
But disliking someone’s habits no matter the reason is not the same thing as becoming angry and so emotionally upset with someone that you would want to physically cause them pain.
So, how can it be that vastly more sustainable food choices are in general causing a measurably more hostile response in people around the world?
Sadly, hostility towards people who are living a healthier life is nothing new, pure raw peer pressure and a desire to belong to the larger social click is a powerful driver all by itself.
Even when the larger group is clearly in the wrong.
We can get all philosophical and historical about this subject and talk about witch burnings around the world, in old world Europe, in the new world, north America, Asia, Africa, past and present. And we can talk about the oft-repeated, and still-existing clash between science and religion.
Predator persecution, and why incredibly beneficial animal species such as foxes, wolves, beavers, lynx, and eagles are hunted and killed, often with strong emotional pillars as the driving force.
Or we can focus on something as important but more down to earth as how unsustainable omnivore food choices at large make people feel more relaxed compared to someone who´s adopted the far more sustainable food approach that is having a plant-based food life.
We could also talk about regular alcohol consumption vs not drinking any alcohol.
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Perhaps you can see a pattern already?
I am asking you that because there is a pattern throughout all of history.
As such, today we have the curse of endless, daily food consumption in excess, and indulging in what can only be described as a weekly gluttonous frenzy far beyond what our bodies need us to eat versus eating healthy high-protein, high-satiety foods within our real energy balance.
This is not a far-fetched comparison at all, and these types of personal life and food choices exact very different responses in the general public.
It´s why advertisements work so well for all the unhealthy food and lifestyle habits you can imagine.
It´s a play on our primal need to belong.
On an individual level.
Countless of healthy fit living people who wish for nothing more than to enjoy their perfectly healthy meals in calm and joy can testify how less active and healthy-minded people stubbornly will try to get you to indulge in their energy-rich, nutritionally poorer, lower satiety food choices too instead of accepting that you can eat your two very different meals together and still have a good social time.
If you are meeting up in a restaurant, healthy fit living people very often have to dodge and deflect increasingly stubborn requests to drink some alcohol. And if you are a plant-based person you often get asked to just try the meat, have some fish, or order some fried shrimp, steak, or bacon.
And if it´s time for dessert, healthy fit living people still have to dodge other’s requests to see you try a slice of cake, a pudding, some ice cream, a plate of cookies, or something else that is covered in nothing but low-quality junk nutrition and energy.
No, there is nothing wrong with having a treat.
So this article isn’t about that. Remember, no one has to be perfect, train perfectly, or eat perfectly.
A healthy life is not about perfection.
So the occasional treat is ok. But the hostile pack mentality towards healthy fit habits is not about a healthy fit living person occasionally having a treat.
It´s all about that interesting, primal driver that is pack mentality and how it most often propels unhealthy habits as the thing to do and desire and subjugate others too.
Unhealthy lifestyle habits can, therefore, in some ways be considered contagious.
The same thing applies to the mere ongoing, never-ending act of staying healthy and fit versus becoming yet another person who´s fully embracing the sedentary and out-of-shape way of life.
Across all these examples I just mentioned and many more the “social click” metric is a sad flaw in the human psyche, I am saying sad because it sadly far more often promotes the less healthy behavior as the socially acceptable and right thing to do.
This is extremely illogical, and unfortunate because it is a major driver behind obesity, alcohol consumption, smoking, vaping, drug abuse, poor health, lower-quality old age, and just plain sedentary, and unhealthy lifestyles.
No, it is true, no one has to exercise or consume healthy foods.
But eating too much, eating foods that are too rich in energy and lacking in satiety, protein, and nutrients harms human health.
So the sad aspect of it has nothing to do with superfluous metrics such as body fat and body composition. It´s sad because most of those poor health outcomes could easily have been mitigated through better, ongoing habits, so when the opposite keeps happening it is a quality of life thief that really should not exist.
So in the end, peer pressure and a longing to belong to a pack of your peers is a primal key pillar in maintaining this unfortunate ecosystem of poor human health and poor lifestyle habits across junk food, a lack of exercise, to little sleep, no work/life balance, drug abuse, smoking and alcohol.
Coach Mike, Strength By Fitness
People foster each other’s poor habits instead of encouraging a lasting change to a healthier way of life.
So, instead of rooting for each other to make healthier habits and slowly craft a higher quality lifestyle that will allow us all to age gracefully with far better outcomes in health, physical, and cognitive capacity people succumb to that primal pack mentality. Fostering each other’s poor habits instead of encouraging a lasting change to a healthier way of life.
In the end, making it far easier for people on average to reduce other people’s healthier habits compared to being the one that changes your own unhealthy habits. So much so that I consider it to be one of the main reasons why so many fail at some point to maintain a healthier lifestyle for the rest of their life.
It´s for many much easier to give up and join the far bigger pack of people with substantially worse health and aging outcomes. Clearly, not better, but much easier, for a lot of people, since we ancient homo sapiens are for all our accolades and modern-day achievements nothing but primal pack animals on the inside.
Or as this quote from the cited study summarized it.
Plant-based food habits are seen as environmentally friendly, health-conscious people who adhere to high moral standards, and are worthy of admiration. But on the contrary, they also elicit fear, contempt, and anger in the meat-eating participants in the study, who as a result socially exclude and even show aggression toward them.
Cited study.
1. Pack mentality drive hostility towards healthier habits.
Meat alternative consumers still frowned upon in Europe: Analysis of stereotypical, emotional and behavioral responses of observing others – ScienceDirect
You can also read this article over at Medium if you are a paying Medium Member.
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