This Interview thing sure brought out our Inner-Jingo

[OnyxCollie]

3. Yeah! We should assassinate Kim Jong Un on principle alone!

And take over their Internet, too!

U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A!

The cultural attenuation associated with the mass manifests itself in a peculiar relation of the individual to major cultural symbols. On the one hand, he is only weakly affected by them; he does not reflect their pervasive influence in his habitual conduct. At the same time, however, he may develop a compulsive attachment to the symbols as such -not to their meaning- and to their institutional embodiments, especially if these attachments offer leverage for aggression. Thus it would be characteristic of the mass man to be only poorly influenced by the complex meaning of democracy, unable to make the necessary discriminations, with little conception of how to fulfil the value in his daily life; and yet he may be easily susceptible to manipulation by wielders of this symbol, will swear allegiance to it, and will be prepared to use any means (including those ordinarily interdicted by democratic principles) against its purported enemies. Similarly, mass elements in a church may have little understanding of basic religious principles and reflect nothing of them in their own conduct, yet they will characteristically respond with special fervor to the symbols of the church and be its most aggressive defenders. This ambiguous participation, both in symbolic and in institutional behavior, is fundamental to the mass.

Selznick, P. (1951, January). Institutional vulnerability in mass society. American Journal of Sociology, 56(4), p. 328.