There is a very perceptive comment in the first Men in Black film.
Edwards (the junior agent) says; “Why the big secret? People are smart. They can handle it.” To which Kay (the senior agent) replies; “A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky animals and you know it.”
Kay makes a valid point. Human beings frequently behave differently alone compared to being in a group. Individually, a person is ‘smart,’ able to consider issues carefully, weighing opportunities and challenges wisely. In a group, he or she ‘follows the group,’ leaving aside common sense, sanity, integrity, honesty, etc.
I find it interesting that, in the Bible, there are incidents where groups of people behave in particular ways. Also, their recollection of certain events is distorted. We are wise to be cautious, and not always take what is said at face value.
In Exodus 16.3, the Israelites, having just left Egypt and crossed the Red Sea, complain at the apparent lack of food. They recalled (!) that, in Egypt, “we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted.” This seems unlikely in the extreme. They were slaves and had been slaves for perhaps 100 years (my estimate). They had cried out for years at their desperate suffering. They certainly had not sat around pots of meat.
A little later, in Numbers 11.5, they remembered “the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.” Bizarre. These are foods that give flavour; they did not sustain. Again, it seems scarcely believable that slaves should enjoy such fare! Surely this is a case of unreliable collective memory.
Centuries later, Rehoboam, son of Solomon, was challenged by Jeroboam. Jeroboam argued that Solomon had made the people’s “yoke hard,” and urged Rehoboam to lighten their load.
Was this true? I think not!
Following the reign of King David, Israel had become the dominant nation in the Middle East. Solomon’s reign was largely one of peace, devoid of rebellion. His agents traded profitably with surrounding nations, adding to the wealth secured by David’s military campaigns. The description of Solomon’s wealth is extraordinary. The Queen of Sheba arrived and testified that Solomon’s wealth exceeded the glowing reports she had heard (1 Kings 10). The writer adds that Judah and Israel “lived in safety, every man under his vine and his figtree,“ during the reign of Solomon (1 Kings 4.25). This is a significant statement, prefiguring the glorious future of Israel (see Micah 4.4). This utopian existence was certainly not a heavy yoke of taxation which Jeroboam suggested.
It seems the oratory of Jeroboam, coupled with Rehoboam’s weak leadership, swayed the collective memory of the nation, leading to the rebellion against Rehoboam.
In the New Testament, the Ephesian people, stirred to ecstasy cry out for two hours “Great is Diana Artemis)” (Acts 19.34). The thought of reasonable debate was quickly forgotten.
No, people are not smart!