Most people are not even aware of their need to conform. They live under the illusion that they follow their own ideas and inclinations, that they are individualists, that they have arrived at their opinions as the result of their own thinking — and that it just happens that their ideas are the same as those of the majority. The consensus of all serves as a proof for the correctness of “their” ideas.

Erich Fromm (1900-1980) American psychoanalyst and social philosopher

The Art of Loving, ch. 2 (1956)
    (Source)