Alternative Dispute Resolution
Jan. 4, 2014
The narcissism of small distinctions
Sometimes, they have about as much importance as the number of angels that could be doing the cha-cha-cha on the head of the proverbial pin.
In 1917, Sigmund Freud coined the term "the narcissism of small distinctions." In his seminal work, Civilization and Its Discontents, published 13 years later, Freud explained this idea by discussing the ways that people who are very much alike use very small differences to separate themselves and cause conflicts with others. This phenomenon is seen everywhere in society---in religion for example, the seemingly small differences between different branches of Protestantism are extremely i...
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