Do you think people can be clannish toward others?

At my job, one particular department in one of the hospitals is VERY mush so. They’re impossible to work with and have a really bad attitude.

Yes, absolutely. Any group of people that identifies as a group will behave this way to some extent. Obviously most don’t do so to the extent you describe, but it will happen at some level. Psychological studies have found that simply assigning people to groups at random will result in some level of clannish (I usually say “tribal”, and I don’t know what the accepted psychological term is) behavior. We do it because we have evolved to. What first made primates successful, and made our intelligence a useful evolutionary development, was forming tight knit and complex social groups. Tribalism or clannism strengthens the group bond, and this results in reproductive success.

The town I live in currently used to be quite “narrow minded” to say the least. They were well known for not accepting all types of folks… to put it kindly. Thankfully, that has really changed and it’s not like that anymore.

I think some folks are just threatened by new people and ideas since they’ve never been around them before. Instead of trying to understand or appreciate other folks’ differences, they fear them or are just plain intolerant. It can be a generational thing too. If your parents didn’t like certain types of people or beliefs, you automatically don’t either. It can be a vicious cycle.

No doubt about it. This behavior seems to be written in our genome. The squabbles over Immigration in our country are just a manifestation of this tendency on a grand scale.

The existence of clans is a given, but there are variables: A) How narrowly defined the clan is, and B) how tightly controlled admission to the clan is.

Some individuals feel the need to define the clan as a small, strictly delineated group, and then set the bar for admission into the group very high, sometimes so high that entrance into the group becomes impossible. This kind of mentality comes from either fear of outsiders or a need to feel special, or a combination of these.

Others are far more inclusive in defining the clan and are more likely to welcome new members without posing harsh initiation standards. There is risk associated with this kind of openness, in that members could be admitted that are disruptive to the social order of the group.

As in all things, a healthy balance between the extremes needs to be found.

Yes, but I’m sure it’s all in good fun….

@Harp Excellent points. I really cannot improve upon that except to add that sometimes clans are an illusion. It is just familiarity that looks like a clan until a person gets to know the customs and inside jokes etc.

@Dog But those customs and inside jokes are “clannish”. They serve to separate group members from outsiders. Those who share them may be willing to accept outsiders, but they still know who they are. It’s not the level of clannishness described in the original question, but it is still symptomatic of clannish behavior, and it certainly enables clannish behavior.

@Snarp excellent..totally agree!

I disagree that jokes themselves are clannish. All humans will experience funny things and share them.

Now if the jokes are kept secret then it is a closed relationship and the clan label fits. For example: If someone asks about something another is laughing about and the response is “It is an inside joke” that is clannish (and dickish)

Alternately if the jokes and such are public knowledge that is open to all then it is not clannish.

Clans are different than cultures. If a person moves to a new country and makes an effort to learn the language and history they will assimilate into that country and find friends. If they move to a country and do not try to understand the culture that does not make the culture clannish.

I would think it stems back to our natural urge to want to resist change. When one is used to things being the same for so long, being around the same people, the same routine, and when something totally alien comes and tries to assimilate itself with what one is used to is a prime example of a person’s inner desire to cling to familiarity and shun difference.

Those sorts of people just have to realize that they have to open their minds and see that not everything or everyone that is new is a threat to the way they go by things.

I’ve lived in a very small town in Texas and I’m almost certain they had lookouts posted on the edge of town alerting the towns folks of any “outsider” about to cross their boarders. I had relatives who had been in the town for hundreds of years but I was still an outsider. They were very suspicious and very cold. You could hear the chatter when you approached the door to the little store but when you stepped through the door it was so quiet you could hear a pin drop. It was all very Stephen King.

@Silhouette LMAO….lookouts posted on the edge of town alerting the towns folks of any “outsider!” love it!

Many small northern New England towns are like this. Very tight knit and resent “outsiders”. Some will go so far as to harass newcomers to make them leave. This is very easy to do if the town officials are in on it. If the Town Clerk, Constable, Building Inspector, etc. all want you “out” you’d better put your property on the market, pronto.

@Cotton101 Thanks. It really was creepy, like Mayberry Methtown everyone was just a tad twitchy and paranoid.

Growing up in the suburbs outside of NYC and DC I think it was not clannish at all. It was so diverse, people from many different states and countries. Of course there was some of the typical high school cliques going on, but rarely were people actually exclusionary or mean to each other. It was more like some people hung out together because they were similar, but not to leave others out.

I lived most of my adult life in various parts of FL and since it also is diverse and most people move to FL from somewhere else, we were all in a similar situation.

Living in the midsouth now, I live near Memphis, has been the closest I have ever really come to people acting clannish. But, I do find that they are welcoming to new people, it does’t seem like they are on the lookout for outsiders. All is good as long as politics and relgion never come up. But, if those things do come up things change fast. People seem unable, unwilling, to really listen to or discuss these topics. They seem to be very accustomed to being surrounded by people who think like themselves and I find they look less at it like we have different opinions, but more like it is us against them.

Also, race is a much bigger issue here then any other place I have ever lived in the US. The only time I really see whites and blacks socializing together is work related events. I don’t have kids, but have heard other parents talk about race related problems in schools. It seems like the white people are in one clan, the blacks in another.

@JLeslie Lived in Memphis for 10 years in my early years. If you are near Memphis now, can certainly appreciate your comment about clannish people.

Thank you J!

@Cotton101 I just looked at your profile, I had not realized you were living so close to me. My husband works with many Ole Miss grads.

@JLeslie wow, in what capacity J? Hey, love my Rebels!

I sent you a PM

In France, if you come from one city and travel or stay at another, they treat you like shit. Just cuz you were born in Limoges and not Bordeaux. I’d say yes.

Same in Québec, but not as bad…until you hear about how they feel about the rest of Canada.

Let’s not even get started on Islam.

people fear anything outside of their norm no matter where you are…and when a stranger is introduced that screws it all up and makes them kinda stand offish or puts them on the defence…outside influence tends to do that to people escpecially in the office or church or somewhere that a group of people may tend to gossip

@Gossamer Some people actually enjoy meeting people from other places, are genuinely interested in them, their customs, culture, and welcome them into their group. The people most like this I have found are those who are already in a diverse group. For instance my husband is from another country and most of the people we know are from other countries, or have a spouse from another country. They are not from the same place as my husabnd, but other countries besides America.

I guess people are like that because they like their own surroundings and don’t like to socialise with others. I don’t like to meet new people, I don’t like to go out, but that doesn’t mean that in situations like work, that I am mean to people. I am very polite and try to get along with people, but I do not want to socialise with them out of work. People don’t seem to understand that, but I just like to live my life, simply and quietly.