Reminds me of a book I read -- I think it was The Global Brain by Howard Bloom. He described a town dominated by a holier-than-thou matriarch that everybody secretly hated. Because of their individual fear of her, they were outwardly pleasant to her and echoed her proclamations about morality. Behind closed doors most of the townspeople had little cliques where they engaged in all of the sinful behavior they outwardly condemned -- cards, alcohol, that kind of stuff.

Because they felt isolated in their "sinfulness" they were ashamed and kept their activities secret. Had everyone known what everybody else truly thought, folks could've been a lot more relaxed about their card playing and whatnot. And, they could've been out from under the thumb of the tyrannical old biddy since they would've known that everyone else hated her too.

Nice piece. It'd be neat to have more of this kind of thing.