Cass R. Sunstein, Columnist

We Need a Word for Destructive Group Outrage

Life in the age of lapidation, which ruins reputations but achieves very little.

May 23, 2019 at 4:00 PM UTC

Cass R. Sunstein is a former Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is the author of “The Cost-Benefit Revolution” and a co-author of “Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness.”

Group polarization may make lapidation acceptable. — Group polarization may make lapidation acceptable.
Photographer: Fadal Senna/AFP/Getty Images

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The English language needs a word for what happens when a group of people, outraged by some real or imagined transgression, responds in a way that is disproportionate to the occasion, thus ruining the transgressor’s day, month, year or life.

We might repurpose an old word: lapidation.