Groups (digital or human) win adherents not by better arguments but by supplying tight‑fitting social goods—love, faith, identity, status and moral meaning—that people are primed to accept. Fictional depictions (Pluribus’s hive seducing via love) concretize a real mechanism: offer exactly what someone emotionally wants and they’ll join voluntarily, which scales far more effectively than coercion.
— Recognizing belonging as a primary recruitment channel reframes policy on radicalization, platform moderation, public health campaigns and civic resilience toward changing social incentives and network architecture, not just regulating speech content.
Adam Mastroianni
2026.01.06
78% relevant
Mastroianni’s central claim—most people chronically misestimate how much others like them and therefore underinvest in social connection—ties directly to the idea that supplying belonging (vs. argument) is the main lever that recruits and stabilizes people in groups; the article supplies experimental evidence (group‑of‑three liking estimates, silence attribution) that shows the mechanics of that recruitment dynamic.
Rob Henderson
2026.01.05
100% relevant
Pluribus finale: the hivemind uses Zosia to induce love in Carol and studies Manousos’s resistance—concrete dramatization of manipulative appeals to belonging and faith.
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