Mind Your Own Scapegoats

In 2020, when J. D. Vance had no inkling of his future as vice president, he published an essay in which he describes how his worldview had been completely shaken up by the thinking of a French literary scholar, René Girard. Girard opened his eyes to the way people blame others in order to feel good about themselves.

Girard, who died in 2015, was the great expert on the scapegoating mechanism. According to him, it is the basis of human order. He found traces of this phenomenon in ancient texts from all over the world. Apparently, we humans need scapegoating: in order for a group to cohere, we need to place the evil that is in us outside the group, on the head of an outsider. We were, and still are, less rational than we think. “It captured so well the psychology of my generation, especially its most privileged inhabitants,” Vance writes. “Mired in the swamp of social media, we identified a scapegoat and digitally pounced, blind to our own problems.”

Biblical texts talk about group behavior and scapegoats too, but with a distinct difference: Jesus sided with the scapegoats and became one himself. Vance writes, “In Christ, we see our efforts to shift blame and our own inadequacies onto a victim for what they are: a moral failing, projected violently upon someone else. Christ is the scapegoat who reveals our imperfections, and forces us to look at our own flaws rather than blame our society’s chosen victims.”

The friend who put Vance on the trail of Girard was Peter Thiel, the man behind PayPal and Palantir, who also provided Facebook its first major financial injection of half a billion dollars. Thiel knew Girard personally and took his classes as a philosophy student at Stanford University. Thiel says the French thinker opened his eyes to the primal force that moves people: comparison and rivalry. This crucial insight helped Thiel understand the potency of Facebook, the great comparison machine. Without Girard, Facebook might never have taken off.

Photo by Svfotoroom / Adobe Stock.

The school of thought inspired by René Noël Girard is called mimetic theory. Scientists and thinkers from a range of disciplines have built on his ideas, and it is not unusual to hear people say that Girard was a revelation for them. Girard, who was born in Avignon, France, in 1923, started his career at Indiana University, teaching French literature. In old novels, he found deep insights into human nature that went completely against the prevailing idea that people should find their deepest, authentic self. That pure self, Girard said, is a romantic lie. People are deeply mimetic – that is, they always imitate someone. That is how we learn and grow, Girard writes. “We literally do not know what to desire and therefore, to find out, we look at the people we admire: we imitate their desires.” Our desire for a new car, a better job, or a sexy partner is mimetic and is fed by the people we admire. And their desire is strengthened by ours. Very quickly we become rivals, feeding each other’s desires. “These rivalries, unlike animal rivalries, can become so intense and contagious that they spread, mimetically, to entire communities.”

The tendency toward conflict is deeply ingrained in humans. The fact that violence results from this led Girard to a second discovery: when mimetic rivalry in a group increases, it will end in violence unless the growing pressure finds a release valve. Violence is most easily prevented by blaming someone else – an outsider or a stranger. This clears the air and brings peace. Girard calls it the mechanism of the scapegoat, after the practice described in Leviticus 16:10. It can explain the origin of religion and culture, he speculates in his 1972 book Violence and the Sacred, and it may be as old as humanity itself.

In myths and rituals from all over the world, and in interviews with people from remote tribes, Girard discovered stories of violence against people who were deformed or disabled or came from elsewhere. They always seemed to get the blame. What struck Girard was that in all the ancient religions he studied, this bloodshed was connected to peace and reconciliation. What if these myths are true, Girard wondered, if they are only told from the perspective of the powerful, who assume they are right?

All over the world we find foundation stories that follow a murder. Rome was founded by Romulus, the hero who killed Remus. The myths gloss over the arbitrariness of the violence. The victim was a danger, but Girard discovered a fascinating corollary: the scapegoat was also sacred! Scapegoats were sacred because their ritual sacrifice brought peace. This explains the sacrificial cults in religions all over the world. Even Athens, the birthplace of democracy, kept a supply of slaves at its disposal to throw off the cliff in case of impending disaster. These pharmakoi bore guilt and holiness at the same time. In one way or another, people have kept the memory of that sacred violence alive, with animal or even human sacrifices.

Political structures such as the monarchy also emerged from this scapegoat mechanism, Girard argues. It is not reason, or a social contract, that our social order is built on, and from which the power of the state flows. On the contrary, it is sacred violence. Violence that brings order and peace – peace and order based on a lie, the lie of the guilty victim.

For George Dunn, a scholar of philosophy and religion who has taught at various American and Chinese universities, reading Girard was an “aha” moment. “And for many of my students too. Suddenly you start to see it, and then you can never not see it.” There is rivalry everywhere, but if we can blame someone else, it dissolves. “The best way to unite people is a common enemy. Demagogues know that. Anger is a very contagious passion. If I am angry with my boss, it is very easy to transfer it to my wife, my child, or my dog. Not because I am necessarily right, but because anger is a powerful passion that gives me a feeling of power and self-righteousness.” This powerful mechanism is central to most mass movements. Having an enemy unites us, whether that enemy is the Jews, the capitalists, the communists, or the immigrants.

It’s no surprise that Girardians can be found on the left side of the political spectrum, since Girard offers a critique of the structural violence hidden in various form of groupthink. An example is Nidesh Lawtoo, a philosopher in the Netherlands who wrote the book (New) Fascism: Contagion, Community, Myth. He describes the contagiousness of fascist ideas. We think we can withstand group pressure and demonization by rational thinking, but that is naive, he says, and fails to acknowledge how mimetic we are.

And Girard provides ammunition for conservatives too, says Dunn, who moderates a Facebook group on mimetic theory with contributors from across the political spectrum. “Progressives often latch onto the victims’ perspective. But Girard also shows well that rivalry and violence can increase when the social and religious hierarchy which keeps rivalry in check breaks down. Conservatives are often much more concerned about that.” Girard’s theory undermines an idea that is still common on the left: that the world becomes a more peaceful place if you break down existing power structures and make everyone equal. On the contrary, Girard found, the closer we get to each other – in language, education, income, or gender equality – the more we compare ourselves. The more equal we become, the more we become rivals. This applies not just to individuals, but to nations as well. “In a globalized world, you can set fire to the whole thing with a single match,” Girard said.

It’s not just money, status, or power we’re competing for these days. There is a new source of rivalry – the struggle over who is the most wronged. Everyone wants to be seen as the victim. This emphasis on victimhood is relatively new and it might not have occurred without Christianity.

The role of Jewish and Christian texts is the third piece of the puzzle in Girard’s theory, after mimetic desire and the scapegoating mechanism. At first, Girard found the biblical texts very similar to other ancient myths and religions. But he discovered one crucial reversal. The Hebrew Bible and the Christian gospels are different in that they are written not from the perspective of the victors but from that of the victims. No, Cain and Abel aren’t just like Romulus and Remus, says Girard, because the text finds Abel innocent. This reversal continues throughout the Bible, from Joseph, Jeremiah, and Job to Jesus, the Lamb of God sacrificed by the angry mob.

That is unprecedented, says Girard. Elsewhere sacred peace is based on collective violence that is not discerned. But the gospel writers reveal step by step the unjust machinations that led to Jesus’ death. Just as in the myths, the victim dies for the people – yet this time not because he is guilty but because he is innocent. Girard writes, “The Bible is a radical break with mythology: it undermines the supremacy of the crowd, which goes back to the roots of humanity.”

Girard’s research into scapegoat theory led him to convert to Christianity. According to him, the gospel is a revelation, the unveiling of an ancient lie. But it is a very dangerous revelation, he says, because it threatens to explode the order humanity has devised to contain violence. How can we place evil outside the community if we can no longer blame others for it? How can we reject anyone if Jesus came for all humankind?

It turns out that the violence does not come from the gods but from us. This terrible insight had always been disguised, says Girard, and that is why our rivalry had an outlet. Christianity robbed us of all sacred pretext.

Naturally, we are constantly trying to restore it. Christians, too, have been eager to do so, with enemy images and stories about a violent God. But the unmasking can no longer be undone, says Girard. We see in history an undermining of faith in sacred myths, and also of faith in institutions based on these myths, such as kingship or the state. Increasingly, people identify with, and advocate for, the victims. The consequences are paradoxical, writes Girard: “Since the Middle Ages, our historical world has been moving in the direction of less and less violence. Our world saves more victims than any previous world. But our world also kills more victims than any previous world. The twentieth century has a history of death camps, genocides, and nuclear weapons.” People are still looking for scapegoats, but the mechanism no longer works. Often we resolve this peacefully, says Girard, but he is not optimistic: “We must not deceive ourselves. Though we live in a society that no longer stones adulterous women, a lot of people haven’t really changed. For many people the real reason for nonviolence isn’t renunciation of violence, but mimetic desire.” How quickly our peaceful group behavior can turn into the opposite!

We in the West have been shaped by Christianity, writes historian Tom Holland in his book Dominion. Our values are imbued with the Christian perspective of the victim, which the Romans and Germanic tribes wanted nothing to do with. Even progressive criticism of the church is based on this. But if we take only that piece of the gospel message, Girard warned, it easily turns into the opposite, resulting in coercion or persecution. “We are living through a caricatural ‘ultra-Christianity’ that tries to escape from the Judeo-Christian orbit by ‘radicalizing’ the concern for victims in an anti-Christian manner.”

It is at precisely this point that conservatives such as Vance and Thiel step in. They abhor this victim stuff. The solidarity Vance felt from the left as a young person in poverty, he writes, was condescending. They often were more compassionate, he admits, but “a compassion that assumes a person is disadvantaged to the point of hopelessness is like sympathy for a zoo animal, and I had no use for it.”

Thiel goes much further. He approvingly quotes texts by Girard that warn of apocalyptic violence in the world, and then claims that revolutionary technological breakthroughs can help humanity avoid this. He seems to dilute half of Girard – humans are not as peaceful as you think – with a good dose of Ayn Rand – the heroic capitalist who keeps everything together. Thiel believes religion and economic growth can keep the chaos in the world in check, which is remarkable, considering that the forces Thiel has been betting on – social media, faster growth, better rockets, and more populism – are more disruptive than conservative.

In a recent interview, Peter Robinson suggested to Thiel that Girard advised something quite different. In a world full of violence and rivalry, with a sacred order that is increasingly undermined, there is, according to Girard, only one solution: “Adopt the behavior recommended by Christ.” Thiel clearly felt a bit uncomfortable with that humble, powerless path. “I want to always try some of both,” he hedged, “both the personal and the political. I think Mother Teresa was a greater saint than Constantine. But there’s still a part of me that has a preference for the Christianity of Constantine.”

Of course, progressives also scapegoat: whether it’s the rich elite, conservative speakers on college campuses, or members of their own tribe with wrong opinions that have to be canceled. Liberal strategists advise attacking Elon Musk because that attracts voters, and progressive magazines put Trump on the cover because it sells.

“Trump is the scapegoater-in-chief,” Dunn admits. “But at the same time, he is also the chief scapegoat! People on the left always interpret him in the most unflattering light, even when he sometimes has a point. He has become an emblem of wickedness. That is what unites people, in a sense of self-righteousness."

“As Girard always reminds us, we can’t combat scapegoating with scapegoating, calumny with calumny, intolerance with intolerance. Of course, no one sees their own scapegoating, only the other side’s. Our scapegoating always looks to us like justice. And that brings me to the other important reason for dialogue: we can’t discern our own scapegoating. We need the other for that. If we only stay inside our own ideological bubble, and only blame the others, then we will never learn something about our own blind spots. I need the other in order to know myself.”

Cynthia Haven, an American author based at Stanford University, agrees wholeheartedly. When asked if mimetic theory can help us understand the emergence of right-wing nationalism, she reacts sharply: “Why do you want to talk about the scapegoating of the other side? That shows that you have an ‘other’ you want to explain. Don’t you have a need to explain the appeal of your own group? Or do you see that as a given? Why is your point of view normal and that of the other an anomaly that has to be analyzed and judged? I see demonization on both sides. And if you think this is not so bad, that’s because you belong to one of them.”

Haven was friends with Girard and is the author of a biography about him, as well as a selection of writings by Girard titled All Desire Is a Desire for Being. Girard himself did not believe in party politics, she says. Groups held together by “collective passions,” as Simone Weil called them, for him spelled the end of independent thinking. “Politically, I am above all anti-crowd,” he once said.

Of course there are political leaders who can become our enemies, says Haven. “Some are dangerous. I’m not naive. But our mimetic obsession with a handful of political figures distorts our politics and our thinking. It sucks all the oxygen out of the room. Our obsession gives power to these figures. If we keep on saying that the other is going to take over our country and we have to prevent that, then we increase the fear of our opponents.”

“Group thinking is in us all,” Haven adds. “As soon as we get obsessed with an enemy, we get entangled in it. The more we want to beat the other, to get what the other one has, the more we get caught up in a rivalry and start to fight with the same means, reciprocally. In other words: we start to look like the other.” This happens not only in politics, but also in wars, and in personal relationship. In the words of Bono in a U2 song, “Choose your enemies carefully, ‘cause they will define you.”

Haven speaks thoughtfully. She does not feel comfortable talking about politics. “What can I say about that? Yes, Thiel has a rather esoteric explanation of Girard. But I prefer to talk about something else: How should we live? What does all this animosity do to our country? How should we forgive each other? There are families who no longer want to eat together, because one voted for Trump and the other did not. What does real reconciliation look like? Forgiveness was a central thing for René. He talked a lot about Joseph [in Genesis]. It’s the first real story of forgiveness in all human history, he said. I tried to prove him wrong – I even studied the Bhagavad Gita – but he was right.” She quotes the last sentences from one of Girard’s books: “The time has come for us to forgive one another. If we wait any longer there will not be time enough.”

This is what excites Haven: “How can I make peace while I still can? And not with Trump, but with that family member? René would say: the only way to peace is to stop imitating each other. Refuse to follow the group. Give your rival space. We are imitating creatures, we cannot do otherwise. So imitate Christ instead, because he imitates no one except his Father, whom we can’t picture. What does that mean, in practice? Sharing your food, caring for the poor.… This, according to Girard, is the only safe way out of the mimetic tangle.”

These are statements of faith that Girard uttered at all the universities where he received honorary doctorates. Not everyone found that easy to digest, especially in his own France. He truly believed that violence will not go back in the box unless we humbly renounce rivalry in imitation of Christ. Yet in the end they could not ignore him. In 2005 he was inducted into the prestigious Académie Francaise. The well-known philosopher Michel Serres called him “the most nonviolent thinker I know,” and also “the new Darwin of the human sciences.” For Girard, the mind and the heart were inextricably linked.

After a lecture by Girard at Stanford, an audience member asked critically, “Given that we can’t entirely trust the veracity of ancient writings, how would you measure the success of your theory?” His answer was succinct: “You will see the success of my theories when you recognize yourself as a persecutor.”