association-based loyalty

[cellio]

When we were visiting my parents last week, my father asked me if I had heard that "[your] school's team won the [cryptic string of letters] championship". Huh? I said. It turned out he was talking about the football team from my high school, which had just won some regional tournament.

He seemed to assume in all seriousness that I would have some loyalty to this team or that I would care. My only connection to it is having graduated from that school more than 20 years ago. I don't know the players or coach, nor do I have any past association with high-school sports.

It's not just my father and high-school sports, of course. It's kind of expected that sports fans will root for the home team -- and that voters will vote for the local candidate, and that people will generally show some pride when someone who shares ethnicity, an alma mater, or the like does something noteworthy.

I don't care about such factors, however. For me, it's all about relevant factors, quality chief among them. Now I might end up knowing more about the similar person/team/company/whatever, and that may lead to favor, but the favor does not derive directly from the connection.

I don't root for the US teams at the Olympics or the Steelers/Pirates here. (Bad example, I know, because I don't follow football or baseball anyway, but if I did, I wouldn't necessarily favor those teams. I would favor the teams that showed the best balance of skill and sportsmanship, whoever they are.) I don't vote for politicians just because they're from my neighborhood/county/state, or women, or Jewish, or Carnegie-Mellon alums, or (speaking theoretically) SCA members or coworkers.

Now there are some areas where having something in common can affect a decision. In an election for city council, the guy who actually lives here and participates in the community has an edge over the guy with a local post-office box who's never seen on the streets. Or, if all other factors are equal (which they rarely are), I'd probably vote for the candidate who shares my religious views, because those views can affect how one governs (or judges, since we elect judges here). But that's not at all the same thing as favoring the secular Jew just because he's named Rosenblum.

I've seen a lot of campaigns that amounted to "vote to put a woman in office" or "vote for the home-town candidate". (And, of course, the "vote party line" appeals.) That sort of thing is actually less likely to get my vote, because they should have been talking about issues instead of appealing to my presumed "nationalism" ("statism"? "townism"?).

Now voting is important and sports are not, but I suspect that a lot of people base loyalties on the same kinds of factors in both. But I just don't feel that connection -- that someone went to the same school or lives in the same town is casually interesting, in a small-talk sort of way, but not really relevant.

Comments

[dvarin.livejournal.com]

Association-based loyalty makes a little bit more sense in the case of associations where all (or most) members are there voluntarily--that is, you must have at some point before joining made a general judgement about the group, its practices, and such, and decided that you wanted to be a part of that. Since everyone else is doing the same thing, this gives you some (presumably favorable) character information that is probably true for each person in the group--that they have decided that the ideals or whatever of the group are worth following.
Religion is something that I wish applied like this all the time, but often doesn't. So, I won't look at you funny if you decide to favor someone you don't know because they are an unmarried Jewish convert--I think that's the one case where the group-ideals thing usually does apply. :)

[cellio]

I agree that it makes more sense for self-selected groups, though I still think there has to be some relevant shared quality. Some groups are fairly homogonous that way; others are very diverse.

(I just realized, in writing this, that I probably have a more diverse social circle than the US average. That may be part of why I don't assume that a social tie means similarity. Some of my best friends are people with whom I disagree vehemently on most political issues, for example.)

So, I won't look at you funny if you decide to favor someone you don't know because they are an unmarried Jewish convert

You do know that I'm married, right? :-)

Circle of friends

[patsmor.livejournal.com]

(I just realized, in writing this, that I probably have a more diverse social circle than the US average. That may be part of why I don't assume that a social tie means similarity. Some of my best friends are people with whom I disagree vehemently on most political issues, for example.)

Yes, that's true of several of us. One of my dear friends and I have deep divides in our politics, and a couple of my sisters and I do, as well.

Howsomever, I do happen to know that the president of the Northern California Christian Coalition lives a couple of blocks over from me. And if I were to see one of the people whom I know from being in the neighborhood is on their leadership council, I would probably make instantaneous judgements on whether I'd vote for that person in local elections....

[dvarin.livejournal.com]

You do know that I'm married, right?

Yeah, I specified "unmarried" only to eliminate what seemed like the largest reason for people to convert without actually believing in the religion they're converting to.

[cellio]

Ah, got it. Unmarried at the time, as opposed to unmarried as current state. :-)