"I'm very wary of large groups of people getting together and trying to believe the same thing. It never seems to end well, whether it's political or religious or whatever"
About this Quote
Krause isn’t attacking community so much as the seductive comfort of unanimity. The line lands because it’s framed as a personal reflex - “I’m very wary” - not a manifesto. That modesty is doing work: it invites you to recognize the pattern without feeling preached at. He’s naming a low-key American anxiety about crowds that start as support systems and end as pressure cookers.
The key phrase is “trying to believe the same thing.” It’s not belief itself that worries him; it’s the effort, the social labor required to sand down disagreement. “Trying” implies enforcement: the subtle sanctions, the loyalty tests, the unspoken rule that belonging depends on repeating the right sentences. By widening the scope - “political or religious or whatever” - he collapses the usual partisan defenses. No one gets to exempt their team as the enlightened exception. The “or whatever” is casually dismissive, a shrug that suggests how quickly any identity can become a machine for conformity.
As an actor, Krause’s context is a profession built on reading rooms: who’s performing agreement, who’s afraid to be the dissenter, who’s playing to the group’s mood. Coming out of the late-20th/early-21st-century churn - culture wars, post-9/11 unity rhetoric, social media pile-ons, wellness cults, fandom politics - his wariness sounds less like cynicism and more like pattern recognition. The subtext is simple and bleak: when belief becomes a membership requirement, empathy narrows, complexity dies, and the crowd starts calling that “clarity.”
The key phrase is “trying to believe the same thing.” It’s not belief itself that worries him; it’s the effort, the social labor required to sand down disagreement. “Trying” implies enforcement: the subtle sanctions, the loyalty tests, the unspoken rule that belonging depends on repeating the right sentences. By widening the scope - “political or religious or whatever” - he collapses the usual partisan defenses. No one gets to exempt their team as the enlightened exception. The “or whatever” is casually dismissive, a shrug that suggests how quickly any identity can become a machine for conformity.
As an actor, Krause’s context is a profession built on reading rooms: who’s performing agreement, who’s afraid to be the dissenter, who’s playing to the group’s mood. Coming out of the late-20th/early-21st-century churn - culture wars, post-9/11 unity rhetoric, social media pile-ons, wellness cults, fandom politics - his wariness sounds less like cynicism and more like pattern recognition. The subtext is simple and bleak: when belief becomes a membership requirement, empathy narrows, complexity dies, and the crowd starts calling that “clarity.”
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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