Anomie in societies or individuals, is a condition of instability resulting from a breakdown of standards and values or from a lack of purpose or ideals. — Émile Durkheim.
Professors back from secret missionsResume their proper eruditions, Though some regret it;They liked their dictaphones a lot,They met some big wheels, and do not
Let you forget it. — W. H. Auden
Some Germans were perhaps attracted to the Nazi movement because it gave them a sense of belonging. Membership gave them new importance and the ability to smash social norms.
Seyward Darby claims in “Sisters in Hate,” that “Hate can be understood as a social bond, a complex phenomenon that occurs among people as a means of mattering and belonging.”
Americans may have joined the Trump movement because it gave them a feeling of importance, a chance to smash norms, and a feeling of belonging. These feelings must be strong enough so what the movement professed didn’t much matter, or more likely resonated with preexisting, perhaps shadowy, beliefs.
