How Does Fear Fuel Hysteria and the Mob Mentality?

This concept of the "mob mentality" has been analyzed and observed in many novels over history as well as in the individual reader.

In terms of our summer reading, the concept is most directly introduced in Huck Finn, when Colonel Sherburn confronts the mob outside his house. He says that the mob mentality was only engendered by one fool who screamed to "lynch him! Lynch him!" This led others around him to begin fearing embarrassment and ridicule for not joining in. Thus began a domino effect, until everyone was peer pressured into conglomerating into a lynch mob. Colonel Sherburn asserts that no one really wants to lynch him, as they just want to follow the crowd. It is this fear of embarrassment and peer pressure, that forces them to his door.

We can also see the example of mob mentality when the duke and the king's ridiculous rip off performance convinces its initial audience to lie to the rest of the town. The first audience is quickly embarrassed and so agrees, as a whole, to lie to the rest of the town so that they are not the only ones fooled. This trickery and deception only occurs because of fear and embarrassment

In ninth grade English, we first learned about the mob mentality in To Kill a Mockingbird. It has its relations with racism against Tom Robinson. When the mob gathers outside, Atticus explains that one of the men there, Mr. Cunningham, is a good person but that he's allowed the mob mentality to pressure him into joining outside.

To be honest, when I first read that chapter in Huck Finn, I felt that Sherburn's whole speech was kind of unexpected and unnecessarily included. To a first time reader attempting to quickly finish her summer reading, the speech was confusing and out of place. I found myself asking, "Why did Twain include this speech?" However, after some contemplation, I found that the theme of mob mentality is consistent with the rest of the book. It's an example of an extreme form of peer pressure. It's a comment on Huck's experiences with racism, with religion, and with society overall.