Everett Dean Martin: Crowd

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Everett Dean Martin: 116 quotes1 like

“Standardization develops a kind of mass mind, which in mature years renders men very susceptible to crowd appeal.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Meaning of a Liberal Education (1926), p. 74

“It will hardly be denied that a revolution, whatever else it may be, is a phenomenon of the crowd. I have endeavored to approach the historical survey of revolutionary movements from the standpoint of social psychology.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: Farewell to Revolution (1935), p. x, Foreword

“The crowd is a social phenomenon only in the sense that it affects a number of persons at the same time.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Behavior of Crowds (1920), p. 7

“The so-called natural sentiments of the average man are mostly the inherited prejudices of the once suppressed classes. The emphasis upon natural goodness is, psychologically speaking, unwillingness to submit such prejudices to wholesome self-criticism. Hence the democratic government tends to support each crowd in its delusion of infallibility. The crowd rationalizes its will to rule in terms of narrow and parochial ideas of righteousness and seeks to force conformity to such ideas upon all. The imagined vindication of the common man's notions of goodness is regarded as the ultimate triumph of righteousness. Hence democracy has always manifested a certain crusading spirit, and the democratic Utopia is envisaged as a sort of Roman peace with "righteousness" established by force rather than assent.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Conflict of the Individual and the Mass in the Modern World (1932), p. 22

“Crowd mentality is a kind of simultaneous psychosis which may take possession of any group.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: Farewell to Revolution (1935), p. xi, Foreword

“Crowd men have no sense of humor. It is very difficult to educate solemn and opinionated people.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Meaning of a Liberal Education (1926), p. 89

“Another method of escaping moral responsibility is to run with the crowd. The crowd never considers consequences; it is bent upon vindicating its principles at any cost. It is anonymous; in it the individual may not be held to account.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Meaning of a Liberal Education (1926), p. 195

“The attitude of authority discourages the spirit of search and criticism. Popular prejudice is entrenched. Non-essentials are over-emphasized. Crowd-mindedness, rather than independence of judgment, prevails.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Meaning of a Liberal Education (1926), p. 181

“The phenomena which we call the crowd-mind, instead of being the outgrowth of the directly social, are social only in the sense that all mental life has a social significance; they are rather the result of forces hidden in the personal and unconscious psyche of the members of the crowd, forces which are merely released by social gatherings of a certain sort.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Behavior of Crowds (1920), p. 7

“I use the term "liberal" not in the political sense, as if it meant half measures, but in its original sense meaning by a liberal education the kind of education which sets the mind free from the servitude of the crowd and from vulgar self-interests.”

Everett Dean Martin

Preface p. viii
The Meaning of a Liberal Education (1926)

“Psycho-pathologists very often have to deal with people whose thinking is thus “compulsive.” And when analysis is possible, it is usually found that such persistent ideas are associated with some unconscious impulse. It is characteristic of all compulsive thinking that it is not the outgrowth of conscious reasoning and cannot be modified by evidence. Persons whose thinking is compulsive often seek to “rationalize” it—that is, they resort to ingenious devices to render it plausible or to explain away that which would contradict it. This sort of thinking, as I have tried to show, is a common characteristic of the crowd mind. The thinking of the crowd is dogmatic as a result of causes which are similar to those which render compulsive that of certain neurotics. And dogma is a common element in religion.”

Everett Dean Martin

Source: The Mystery of Religion (1924), pp. 52-53