Belief is a powerful force.
So powerful in fact that it can both guide and define the lives of those who hold its edicts close to their very being.
Belief is what spurns many on to greater things in their lives.
Whether it’s the belief in an upcoming job promotion, belief in one’s capability to achieve some great feat, or simply the belief that life tomorrow will go on as usual.
But the power of belief is also its greatest detriment, an all-consuming force that when held above everything else in life, can cloud judgement and impair decision making completely.
And all too often recently, belief has been at odds with scientific fact and expert opinion.
Whether it’s the belief that one doesn’t need to protect themselves during a global health crisis or even the belief that individual actions don’t have widespread consequences for others. The potential that belief has to cause harm is very real.
The natural state of humans, from the day they gained the ability to reason, has always been to minimise potential threats and maximise safety.
If the historical actions of humans are any indicator, this has always primarily been done by establishing a group mentality.
So why then do those with detrimental beliefs still hold them even when confronted with overwhelming evidence pointing to what has been deemed correct?
Sometimes the truth is the hardest thing to hear when it runs contrary to what a person has always held as being ‘right’.
While for many, simply learning the truth causes a swift realignment of their ethos to better fit what majority opinion or expert advice has deemed to be right, for a small subset of every community, the future holds resistance, defiance and indifference.
Think about those rejecting the need to stay inside during a crisis or ignoring the pleas of experts to follow certain protocols to ensure the safety of themselves and others. Both of these situations stand as current examples of out-group belief and its potential to endanger lives and livelihoods.
This concept isn’t anything new to humans, however, the digital age has created a means for deviant thought and belief to flourish as it never has before.
Communities whose sole causal link is their disbelief and distrust of prevailing opinion or evidential fact have proliferated across the internet since its inception.
Where once a small group of like-minded (if misguided) individuals gathered in person and formed a tiny subset of a larger community, the internet has allowed groups to expand their influence across the globe.
And the current trend of dismissing and demeaning those with harmful out-beliefs has proven to be ineffective in turning the tide towards accepting fact.
In the face of being told that their beliefs are wrong, many out-group members simply switch off or condemn the information in front of them as insufficient or loaded with ulterior motives.
Remember that staying a course against adversity is one of the defining characteristics of many great people throughout history, and it’s very much ingrained in the human psyche. Out-groups usually see themselves as the oppressed or martyrs and those individuals who stand against a common consensus are defined more often than not by their unshakable views and opinions.
That’s why the process of bringing those on the outer into the fold begins not with condemnation but understanding.
Outright dismissal no matter how wrong a person may seem must be put aside in order to allow common ground to be established.
Many deviant strains of belief are kept alive in their overreliance on the realm of the theoretical. In theory, anything is possible, which allows views that would normally not be within the realms of probability to maintain some small amount of credibility.
The first step must, therefore, be to ground every interaction in reality. Ways such as finding some facet of a belief that both parties can point to as being irrefutable, or showing out-group members that the actions caused by their beliefs have the potential to harm others. The point is that theoretical infinity must be left behind quickly for progress to be made.
Then, with the foundation established, a bridge must be built between both parties.
Changing minds is no simple process, it takes dedication, care and time to reintegrate those with harmful beliefs and make them feel comfortable with a new way of thinking.
However, this must be done in order to combat the spread of misinformation and potentially dangerous actions, as the digital age is all too often guilty of fostering views that stand only to harm wider society rather than help it thrive.