Group dynamics

How groups behave and go wrong: norms, facilitation, hierarchy, institutions, cults

A topic in the tpot Community Archive, drawn from 7,559 posts.

Trusted voices in Group dynamics

Ordered by the trust Group dynamics's own network concentrates on each poster, most first.

  1. RichDecibels — trusted by 152 posters here
  2. visakanv — trusted by 166 posters here
  3. nosilverv — trusted by 144 posters here
  4. eigenrobot — trusted by 106 posters here
  5. QiaochuYuan — trusted by 113 posters here
  6. TylerAlterman — trusted by 124 posters here
  7. DefenderOfBasic — trusted by 105 posters here
  8. goblinodds — trusted by 100 posters here
  9. patio11 — trusted by 94 posters here
  10. AskYatharth — trusted by 92 posters here
  11. the_wilderless — trusted by 94 posters here
  12. vividvoid — trusted by 98 posters here

Top posts in Group dynamics

Ordered by the recorded like count from the source corpus; a like is not an endorsement.

  1. Well, maybe I opened Pandora's box when I called out @michaelcurzi after vibecamp. I stand by what I said about the need to be kind and welcoming to awkward people, but it was wrong of me to insult… (vividvoid) — 54 likes
  2. one of my recurring talking points to anybody who's willing to listen: any small group of people loosely-but-truly aligned on something can create powerful vectors by producing public-facing work… (visakanv) — 48 likes
  3. if you take a bunch of those people and say “here is a space which is much more tolerant of divergent social behaviour, you are less likely to be punished for being yourself intuitively” they can… (RichDecibels) — 41 likes
  4. speaking as a specialist in non hierarchical organising, it is very confusing to discover in me a growing respect for hierarchy and understanding of the role it plays in nearly all groups of people (RichDecibels) — 40 likes
  5. This sounds like a trivial observation and it isn’t: No organization which makes its people pay for coffee wants to win. (patio11) — 36 likes
  6. a group is ruled by the conversations it can't have (RichDecibels) — 32 likes
  7. Never forget - people don’t imitate the leader, they imitate the first follower. They don’t act like Jesus, they act like Peter. Cheerio (nosilverv) — 32 likes
  8. it turns out sincerely believing the world is going to end really fucks people up and it really fucks group dynamics up. there is a reason end-of-the-world narratives are an attractor for unhealthy… (QiaochuYuan) — 31 likes
  9. the way people in society talk about "experts" is exactly the same way kids talk about "adults" (DefenderOfBasic) — 31 likes
  10. have you considered just fucking *deciding* with your homies to "get" "good" collectively and smash through the problem to create a new golden age for humanity (myceliummage) — 30 likes
  11. sorry someone should've told you this already but: the first words you say to a group are an intensely powerful magic spell (RichDecibels) — 30 likes
  12. “The tactics for getting status WITHIN the group are directly opposed to the tactics for spreading the message BEYOND the group” In groups where this dynamic is particularly strong, it stunts their… (the_wilderless) — 30 likes
  13. good example of the general vibes and tactics used to haze people into fucked up social orders and institutions without ever having to defend them you just mock people who don't know the scam is a… (natural_hazard) — 30 likes
  14. today I’m thinking about “How To Be a Vibe Mechanic” - a practical guide to making awesome groups I want to name what does an excellent host/facilitator/group process designer is paying attention to… (RichDecibels) — 29 likes
  15. being kind to everyone is short term good but long term anti social, if they're not getting feedback about their impact on the group they'll keep being unnecessarily annoying (RichDecibels) — 29 likes
  16. I learned that you rarely build anything worthwhile that way. The “best” case scenario: you win over other disagreeable people. A few years of this & it becomes the world you live in –… (visakanv) — 28 likes
  17. If you're not against "if you're not with us you're against us", you're against us. (Malcolm_Ocean) — 28 likes
  18. there's this truly unfortunate trap you can fall into of being both 1) annoying, and 2) visibly vibing as very fragile such that if you were told you were annoying you'd fall apart, get really sad… (QiaochuYuan) — 28 likes
  19. groups have extraordinary capacity for coordination with entirely implicit norms, but as soon as you start adding explicit structure, there’s a mental bug that will activate in some people where… (RichDecibels) — 28 likes
  20. culture war shows up in local community groups as a strategy game. there are two end states: Fundamentalism (the group can only tolerate one perspective) and Pluralism (the group won't tolerate… (RichDecibels) — 27 likes
  21. if you want to hold open the space of pluralism you have to welcome the people with fundamentalist tendencies, be respectful, warm and convivial with them... and give no quarter to their ideology.… (RichDecibels) — 27 likes
  22. my friends threw a "flirting party" for 250 people yesterday and no one managed to do any flirting — the women got defensive and the men got frustrated and it was 230 people too many. my conclusion… (myhandle) — 27 likes
  23. I'm training myself to see the superorganism that's made of people, seeing groups rather than individuals as the fundamental unit, shifting my identification out of self and into relationship, out… (RichDecibels) — 27 likes
  24. The critique of disagreeableness going around - that it can be done without malice - is true, if you can muster the self control. You can air grievances and settle disputes without being… (vividvoid) — 27 likes
  25. Re: Hanjo and Ananda - spiritual practitioners have to be accountable to the community they work with. If they're not, the best case scenario is that they're ineffective, and the worst is that they… (vividvoid) — 27 likes
  26. spoiler alert: the feeling of cringe does not originate in you, it arises in the tribal body. cringe is the tribal policeman threatening punishment if you don't realign your behaviour with the… (RichDecibels) — 27 likes
  27. if you're grappling with a problem, and you seem to get stuck when you're trying to deal with it on your own, and you only make progress when you have the right people around, instead of beating… (RichDecibels) — 27 likes
  28. >the scene: the people who show up for the festival >the community: the people who stay behind after the show to help clean up, go for supper afterwards damn https://t.co/OY8x4n9XlQ (AskYatharth) — 27 likes
  29. I'm running a disagreeability club with @VividVoid_! it's a fun and moderately uncomfortable place to learn how to not fold at the first sign of conflict starts next month: https://t.co/dYYZfsxyWq (RichDecibels) — 27 likes
  30. People just LOVE to go to a place and then go find an EVEN SMALLER place inside of that place to be in. The VIP section at the club. The kitchen at the house party. (nosilverv) — 27 likes
  31. people trying to talk about tpot like it's one cohesive group is always really awkward your tpot is not my tpot we're a loose federation of people who value liberalism and tolerance, and people who… (goblinodds) — 26 likes
  32. tpot gatherings: majority young men, mostly v sensitive nerds, usually anxious round women (fear of being read as a creep) each event has a few grounded & openminded women enthusiastically… (RichDecibels) — 25 likes
  33. One.unsung joy of TPOT meetups is that absolutely nobody has any idea of the correct social protocols for this kind of event and half of the people are gamely attempting to feel it out and the other… (bashu_thanks) — 25 likes
  34. I FIGURED IT OUT I FIGURED OUT WHAT NORMIES ARE DOING https://t.co/GDb3jk7Ehq (xsphi) — 25 likes
  35. too many people talking about cults, too few people talking about friend groups that have an implicit pact to prevent each other from growing or doing something interesting with their lives (natural_hazard) — 24 likes
  36. Reducing an entire person's identity to “cult leader ✨“ is harmful and it's a term you need to remove from your vocabulary. “People who lead cults” or “people who have loyal followers” work much… (Prigoose) — 24 likes
  37. a central tension that must always existat fractal, i am curzi and andrew is vvwhen we let andrew lead too much, we get sociopaths - because he ignores red flags in the name of inclusivitywhen we… (Prigoose) — 24 likes
  38. never host alone the more responsibility you have, the more urgent it is to share it. abuse & corruption stem from excessive power disparity. community burnout stems from too much weight on too… (RichDecibels) — 24 likes
  39. Scenius' are also obsessed with unblocking each other's work! There are so many examples of this from my research. (unblocking as in: removing roadblocks to progress, and pushing each other's work… (__drewface) — 23 likes
  40. I noticed this had had a big effect on me the day I emerged from the building: I saw a stranger and I didn't pre-reflexively parse them as "potential enemy" but, rather, as "potential friend". This… (nosilverv) — 23 likes
  41. a move you can do to invite people to feel belonging: watch their participation in a group, tune into what parts of that you feel genuine gratitude for, let them know the distinctive contribution… (RichDecibels) — 23 likes
  42. The pinnacle defended-by-default is what we call the “normie”. An impressive set of solutions for hardening nervous systems against adversarial sensation magic — e.g. mental partitions, type safety… (johnsonmxe) — 23 likes
  43. "normie is short for norm enforcer" (RichDecibels) — 23 likes
  44. given how awesome microsolidarity summer camp was, I am now officially done with the attitude I've met at tpot gatherings where approximately all pre-mediated facilitation structures are rejected as… (RichDecibels) — 23 likes
  45. at almost every threshold there are a bunch of people who set up a basecamp where they discuss how to cross the threshold. some of those people do go on to cross the threshold, but those people tend… (visakanv) — 23 likes
  46. @QiaochuYuan @Klockwerklime @bahstgwamt @AdmiralOPG @chaosprime @vinayaki_ @nuanceexists @selentelechia world: hi, welcome to the world. you have to pick a tribe me: I choose everyone world: then… (visakanv) — 22 likes
  47. You may be tempted to be cynical about the motivations of everyone. But giving up on genuine compassion as a motivation is not just a tactical error: it's a misrepresentation of reality. Indeed, the… (algekalipso) — 22 likes
  48. communities can’t escape founder effects and nobody can escape their childhood religion. all you can do is deconstruct and reconstruct your relationship to it, one way or another (QiaochuYuan) — 22 likes
  49. getting kicked out of a group you desperately want to be part of is an unavoidable step on the road to adulthood (RichDecibels) — 22 likes
  50. The problem is that every developmental container (a subculture, school, friend group, job, etc) has a natural center of gravity, a stage or balance that it A) pulls its members up to, and B) holds… (the_wilderless) — 22 likes

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