It often starts almost imperceptibly. An invisible line in the room. A meeting at a company. Someone leans back in their chair and says: “The problem is that management doesn’t understand reality.” Someone else nods immediately. A few minutes later, the room has been divided into two invisible camps. Us who understand. Those who don’t. Or in politics. “Ordinary people versus the elite.” Or in social debate. “Those people don’t care about others.” Or in a creative group. “We who want to think new versus the conservatives.”
The strange thing is that people often feel safer at the same time that the world is divided in “us and them”. The complexity disappears. Reality becomes easier to navigate. A sense of direction, belonging, and meaning arises. But that is precisely why “us and them” is also one of the most powerful social tools there is. And one of the most destructive in creative processes.
Why people are drawn to the concept of “us and them”
Humans are extremely sensitive to group affiliation. Evolutionarily, it has been crucial for survival. Belonging to the right group could literally be the difference between life and death. That is why the brain reacts quickly to signals about who is with us and who is outside.
The problem is that the same mechanism still governs modern organizations, societies and creative environments. As soon as people create a “we”, a “them” almost automatically also arises. It does not even have to be stated. Small signals, language use or hints are enough. “We who understand.” “We who build.” “We who are grounded in reality.” Suddenly, identity is formed through contrast. That is why “we and them” is so effective as a form of power.
Whoever manages to define who “we” are also gains the power to define who is outside the community. And whoever defines the outside often also controls the inside. Historically, this is an almost constant recurrence.
History is full of created enemies
Many political movements throughout history have built their strength by creating an external enemy. Sometimes it has been about nations. Sometimes about religions, social classes or minorities. The mechanism is almost always the same. When people feel anxiety, uncertainty or loss of control, a need for simplification arises. If the problems can be linked to “the others”, the world becomes easier to understand. This does not mean that conflicts or injustices are made up. It means that people often organize complex reality through stories about groups.
During industrialization, clear stories were created about workers and those in power. During the Cold War, the world was organized around East and West. Similar mechanisms are still used in modern politics, even if the language has changed. Populism is often based on this. The idea of a “real people” who are threatened by some other group.
The interesting thing is that these stories are almost always emotionally stronger than analytically correct. Because reality is rarely so pure. People carry contradictions. Values change over time. What one generation sees as obvious may be seen as unreasonable by the next generation. History is full of examples of norms that were once passionately defended and later perceived as absurd. Therefore, there is rarely an absolute “us” and “them”. There are people with different experiences, perspectives and values that are constantly changing in relation to the world around them.
The problem with fixed identities
When people get stuck in “us and them”, identity begins to become more important than understanding. And that is where something dangerous happens to creativity. Creativity requires that people can hold multiple perspectives at the same time. That they can be curious about ideas they disagree with. That they can move between different points of view without feeling that their own identity is threatened.
“Us and them” works the opposite way. It simplifies the world by sorting people into right and wrong, inside and outside, friend and opponent. It creates a strong group feeling but also mental rigidity. Once people identify someone as “them”, they often stop listening to understand and instead start listening to defend their position.
This is why creative processes can quickly collapse when groupthink takes over. A group can be intelligent on an individual level but become creatively weak collectively if people start protecting their group identity instead of exploring ideas.
Creativity is built on trust, not unity
It’s easy to think that creative groups work best when people think alike. But it’s often the other way around. The most creative environments are usually not the most homogeneous but the most tolerant of difference. Where people dare to think out loud without risking social punishment. Where half-baked ideas are allowed to exist long enough to develop.
It requires trust. And trust works differently than group loyalty. Group loyalty is often based on people showing that they belong on the same side. Trust is based on people feeling that they can be different without losing their value in the group. It’s a crucial difference.
In a creative process, people need to be able to say things that sound strange, contradictory or unfinished. If the group then starts to divide people into “those who get it” and “those who don’t get it”, self-censorship quickly arises. People start to adapt ideas according to social acceptance instead of creative potential. And that’s where innovation often disappears.
The inclusive perspective
The most interesting thing about truly creative environments is that they are not only inclusive internally but also externally. Many organizations miss this. They build a strong internal culture but at the same time create a negative image of the outside world. “We are the innovators.” “The industry doesn’t understand.” “Customers don’t keep up.” “Management is slowing us down.” The problem is that creativity then gradually becomes isolated from reality.
Really good idea development instead requires contact with people outside the creative group. With users, skeptics, other perspectives and other experiences. Creativity needs friction from reality to develop. Otherwise, creative echo chambers easily arise where groups start to confirm each other’s ideas rather than challenge them. That is why facilitation is so important in creative processes.
Creative leadership is about keeping complexity alive
A skilled facilitator rarely tries to create total unity right away. Instead, the facilitator tries to keep multiple perspectives alive at the same time without the group splitting. It is a much more advanced leadership than many people think. Because people often want to quickly reduce uncertainty. They want to know which idea is best, who is right and which direction applies. But creativity often requires that contradictions be allowed to exist for a while.
Creative leadership is therefore less about steering people towards an answer and more about creating a space where several possible answers can coexist long enough for something new to emerge. This is where “both and” becomes more important than “either or”.
A creative leader can, for example, keep both a business perspective and idealism alive at the same time. Both structure and experimentation. Both experience and a beginner’s perspective. Not by compromising the differences but by using the tension between them as creative energy. It is almost like directing a conversation rather than controlling it.
When “us and them” can actually work
That doesn’t mean that competition is always negative. In the implementation phases, a certain amount of competition can create energy. When ideas are to be transformed into prototypes, products or solutions, people can be driven by the ambition to be first, the smartest or the most innovative. But then competition works differently.
It’s not about the opponent being bad or less worthy. It’s more about inspiration through contrast. “Can we solve this even more elegantly?” “Can we think even more freely?” “Can we build something even more useful?” That’s an important difference. As soon as the competition starts to be about the value of people instead of the development of ideas, creativity becomes defensive. Defensive creativity is almost always worse than exploratory creativity.
Once you hear it, you can’t stop hearing it
The strange thing about “us and them” is that once you become aware of the mechanism, you start to notice it everywhere. In meetings. On social media. In organizations. In debates. In friendship groups. In leadership.
Sometimes it’s used aggressively and deliberately. But it often happens subconsciously. People build togetherness by marking distance from others. It may sound innocent.
“We who really care.”
“Those people.”
“People like us.”
“Ordinary people.”
“We who make great things.”
And suddenly the world has been divided again.
The interesting thing is that even people who claim to fight against injustice sometimes use exactly the same mechanism. They create a “we” that stands for the good and a “them” that represents the problem. That doesn’t mean that injustice doesn’t exist. But it does mean that the method often simplifies people into symbols instead of understanding complex systems, driving forces and behaviors. And that’s where you often lose the opportunity for real change.
From identity to understanding
Creativity requires something much more difficult than group loyalty. It requires the ability to see people as changeable rather than fixed. To understand that ideas, values and behaviors are shaped by context. That people can carry contradictory perspectives at the same time. That’s why truly creative environments almost always feel more open than ideological environments. They are driven more by curiosity than by positioning.
And perhaps that’s where the most important difference lies.
“Us and them” tries to make the world clearer by dividing people. Creativity instead tries to make the world bigger by connecting people, perspectives, and possibilities that were previously kept apart. One reduces complexity. The other uses complexity as raw material.
And perhaps that’s why true creativity almost always begins with the same question:
What if the opposite also contains something important?
