Are we more violent today?
[Coronation Street's message: "Don't miss out, girls - you too can kick heads in."]
Tiberius has written an interesting piece:
James Hamilton has an interesting piece about early football violence up at his blog. It concerns a game between Bolton and Glossop in 1908 where the referee was threatened, the stands turned riotous and even the players were fighting on the pitch.
Plus ca change, you might think- and indeed scenes from the 1970s and 1980s wouldn’t be unfamiliar, by James’s account, to your average Edwardian spectator.
Furthermore like today, it was not the very poor who indulged in football violence- priced out of the game then and now- but the respectable, stockbrokers and others who went mad on the terraces.
We’re pretty convinced today that society is much more violent, the ASBO generation is upon us and we could be forgiven for thinking we’re a more violent society. Unfortunately we have only the historical record to help us and the historical record is flawed – it’s a collection of memories then as now.
Browsing round, we’re not greatly assisted but there are some points of note. A former infantry officer and psychologist came out with some reflections, not so much on violence but on killing:
After the Jonesboro killings, the head of the American Academy of Pediatrics Task Force on Juvenile Violence came to town and said that children don’t naturally kill. It is a learned skill. And they learn it from abuse and violence in the home and, most pervasively, from violence as entertainment in television, the movies, and interactive video games.
Killing requires training because there is a built-in aversion to killing one’s own kind.
Every species, with a few exceptions, has a hardwired resistance to killing its own kind in territorial and mating battles. When animals with antlers and horns fight one another, they head butt in a harmless fashion. But when they fight any other species, they go to the side to gut and gore. Piranhas will turn their fangs on anything, but they fight one another with flicks of the tail. Rattlesnakes will bite anything, but they wrestle one another. Almost every species has this hardwired resistance to killing its own kind.
If you think it through, “I’m going to kill you,” usually becomes, “I’m going to beat you up.” There are consequences to killing, unless it’s a manslaughter thing.
Throughout human history, when humans fight each other, there is a lot of posturing. Adversaries make loud noises and puff themselves up, trying to daunt the enemy. There is a lot of fleeing and submission. Ancient battles were nothing more than great shoving matches.
It was not until one side turned and ran that most of the killing happened, and most of that was stabbing people in the back. All of the ancient military historians report that the vast majority of killing happened in pursuit when one side was fleeing.
That is the reality of the battlefield. Only a small percentage of soldiers are able and willing to participate. Men are willing to die; they are willing to sacrifice themselves for their nation, but they are not willing to kill. It is a phenomenal insight into human nature, but when the military became aware of that, they systematically went about the process of trying to fix this “problem.”
From the military perspective, a 15 percent firing rate among riflemen is like a 15 percent literacy rate among librarians. And fix it the military did. By the Korean War, around 55 percent of the soldiers were willing to fire to kill. And by Vietnam, the rate rose to over 90 percent.
Armchair patriots might have this notion of the nobility of men standing side by side in adversity and killing the dreaded enemy to save their nation and their families but in the actual situation, it’s a different matter. It would seem, from tales of my father’s generation, that you fired to stop him killing you or because not to do so showed you to be a coward in your fellow soldiers’ eyes.
Vietnam was an “advance” in military terms in that the psychological job had been done on the men more thoroughly. You know of Manchurians and there’ve been posts on the psychological community and the evil within it. We all know about bromide in the food too when in the army and how it dulled the libido.
In rooms we were lectured on strategies for staying alive and maximizing your mates’ chances of staying alive too because in saving your mates, you were saving yourself. We learnt percentage strategies – those which would give the greatest result. We learnt everything except how to kill a man in cold blood.
We learnt that everyone was a potential enemy but that good community relations could keep the unit safe. When Calley took his orders at face value:
“I was ordered to go in there and destroy the enemy. That was my job that day. That was the mission I was given. I did not sit down and think in terms of men, women and children. They were all classified as the same, and that’s the classification that we dealt with over there, just as the enemy. I felt then and I still do that I acted as I was directed, and I carried out the order that I was given and I do not feel wrong in doing so.”
… there was a lot going on in the head. He had the power of life and death as long as the army gave it to him. Someone above had identified all villagers as either Vietcong or sympathizers and refuge givers. His job was just to do the job. I don’t believe Medina’s testimony for one moment.
This is Lynndie England and Abu Ghraib and the justification comes down from above. There’s an evil abroad in these situations and the easiest way out for your own callousness and imperviousness to the suffering of others is to project responsibility onto those higher up the chain.
“We were only following orders,” said the Auschwitz killers and the Belsen guards. Yet in the middle of the killing, with all constraints removed and everyone around you also killing, it would only be a morally and mentally strong person or one with a death wish who refused to do it, particularly if you’d allowed yourself to be convinced that they were subhuman.
In Rugby, we were often told by coaches that we had to go out and kill. One coach said to us before a game, “There’s not enough hate.” That’s the truth – he did say that. For myself, I never hated but there was another factor – if you didn’t hit the opposition player hard and bring him to the ground, you were creating problems for yourself later.
There was one more thing – if you tackled him in the right place, head below his butt, shoulder on his thigh and arms in as vice-like a grip as possible, plus he had to end up on the ground, then they’d think twice about your approach the next time. As a smaller man, I was once dragged about twenty metres by a prop forward who just wouldn’t go down but he lost his footing eventually and did go down. Meanwhile, the play had moved on.
So there are many reasons for “maximum prejudice”.
In the case of Clyde Barrow and the power in the barrel of a gun, it was a self esteem thing – a loser and mentally small man had become a big hero. Once having killed, it became so much easier. As Bond said, in Casino Royale, “Considerably.”
Violence today
It does seem worse, not in the degree of the violence itself but in the numbers willing to resort to it. This blog has already mentioned the feminist disservice to women and how they are less respected than before – there’s very little doubt about that.
But it’s something more and maybe the army man’s comment about:
“And they learn it from abuse and violence in the home and, most pervasively, from violence as entertainment in television, the movies, and interactive video games.”
I believe this to be so and the ordure which kids lap up and have been doing so virtually from birth, unchecked by parents who in some cases are themselves victims of this stuff and can’t see anything wrong with it, leaves them extremely vulnerable to the values imparted by it.
Porn is another deeply corrosive thing which is almost impossible for a male to shut out although I give it a real try shutting it out – it can only twist ideas on females which, combined with the feminist misandry, can have but one outcome.
I believe that this is one major factor in why the society is so broadly violent now.
Another is the paucity of interesting and wholesome pursuits. For a start, there’s little money about to pursue, say, sailing or cars, there’s less time and an economic and social malaise. People stay at home or hang around the Palaces of Glitz, the new shrines, the shopping centres and their values are shallow. The internet consumes many with a bit of money to spare.
Was it ever any better in Britain?
There’ve always been the rough neighbourhoods, usually inner city, with a brooding boredom and a chip on the shoulder. All it took was a victim class such as the Pakis or whatever and there was both the outlet and the justification.
What has changed these days
The scope of it, I think, the way it has spread, via entertainment in television, the movies, and interactive video games plus the lyrics of music [compare these to those of the 60s].
The moral constraints on a shrinking middle class have loosened and though the older generation disapproves, via the media, the slack legal system which rewards the criminal and the fear the older generations have for the young empowers the young to act with impunity.
Add to that add the very shaky registration of moral values on their mindset anyway – the young are more likely to tolerate the intolerable much more readily – and there is the recipe for disaster.
Annoyance and frustration
The above was about the young, about soldiers and about criminals. What about the average 30-50 year old, possibly a daily commuter?
There was the story some time back by a journo who came out of a train station and a bowle-hatted city man was coming the other way. The journo moved one way, as did the city gent, then the other, in a comedy of errors.
“Oh for f–k’s sake,” swore the city gent and pushed past.
Is that any different today to yesteryear? How can we know? Historians didn’t concern themselves with encounters on a footpath but with the big events and their causes.
It’s all very well for a government to present a paper on anger management, without addressing the root causes of it but it doesn’t alter the situation, treating only the symptoms.
There are too many people vying for the same space, being frustrated by the inability to move forward and that is the root cause – it’s systemic. How can you tell a city gent not to work in central London? That’s where the work is and he is a worker bee at the hive.
If he goes north to the less populated, more idyllic world of forest and field, it’s fine until he starves to death or goes on the dole. There’s no way around this, except for government incentives to decentralize and that gets into political positions.
There are some ways around it – minimize contact with others, commute as little as possible, drive to gardens or countryside and walk about, live near the river and so on. In Australia, when I lived down by the water, everyday after work was the beach.
There are ways. It’s not a satisfactory and final solution though.
Is violence worse today? I’d say so; it seems that way.
Internet games – teaching kids good values
Filed under: Society & human issues
You talk a lot about misandry and the feminists but where are your denouncements of misogyny? In fact you support such bloggers and even have one who posts as a guest poster here , I note.
It is not lost that you can bleat on about misandry but anyone calls foul when it comes to racism ,you split hairs, and when it comes to the topic of misogyny the objecter is ‘abusing buzz words’ as .if.it.doesn’t.exist.
If you look, I equally condemn misogyny and have written posts on it, Uber.
You’re always polite in your responses to all people who comment here regardless of their differing opinions. It’s a shame that not all men are the same when women have differing opinions.
I am surprised though that you would have as a co author of this blog soemone who is notoriously misoygnistic to women on his own blog,which can’t go unnoticed by you. So, in a sense, you DO support misogyny by giving it authorship on your blog.
I think the picture sums up a lot of why young people are violent these days. I have seen what youngsters can get like after playing a violent computer game. It completely changes their personality for a while.
Whilst I was at the hairdressers yesterday I read an article on womens violence to men. The article was mainly about how one woman abused her partner and he was the one that got the blame for what was going on. Quite appalling to read.
Uber – right.
Cherie – it’s probably possible but I imagine women would use more verbal means and I know one did it by taking the role of making his breakfast and putting his cup just out of reach, the egg just a bit too hard and so on.
As for physical abuse, that one is a bit hard for me to conceptualize. The idea of a woman abusing a man is … well … I don’t know what to say. Although it was true my gf kicked my shins and clawed at my face but that was just par for the course. I’d just hold her in a bear hug and when I released her she’d take a swing and then that was that.
Usually if I agreed with her, that would stop it. I’m not sure men should worry too much about women’s abuse of them. Perhaps I’m wrong.
“Porn is another deeply corrosive thing which is almost impossible for a male to shut out although I give it a real try shutting it out – it can only twist ideas on females which, combined with the feminist misandry, can have but one outcome”
And what of mysoginy which is pervasive in glamourised rap culture, itself very much a key player in porn culture and so much youth violence. That has had more of an influence on youth than lesbian misandry James.
I find you very one sided in your approaches to all this.
Well mental abuse/damage has long reaching effects.
In the article the woman was abusing the man in the way you describe, but also self harming herself. Then she made a complaint about the man. The logical conclusion was that the man had attacked her physically. So he got the blame and charged and has a criminal record.
Apparently this sort of thing is not uncommon…
Well you would, Alison but that doesn’t mean I am. It just means that it’s very much more on your mind. I decry both misandry and misogyny as equally pernicious.
I shouldnt though James. I should find you equal in how you approach cultural issues but I dont which is why I set up that other blog, to challenge you on it.
You beat me to it – I was coming in to modify my last comment which I thought was a bit rough. I know where you’re coming form and your former experiences and thus you would feel that I was one way.
You’d probably think this woman was biased one way too but her opinions were formed from her experiences.
There are many people who feel this way, not just men. The mysogyny is not disputed – it is so and I’ve written posts referring to it but as the whole discussion was skewed that way, I wrote some things the other way as well to balance it up.
I know you won’t agree but that doesn’t mean I think any the less of you. And besides, this post was not about misandry and misogyny – it was about violence and killing, so how did we get on to the other topic again?
Ah, Cherie – I think our comments crossed.
They did James, so following on I am appalled at how either a woman or a man would resort to such depths to destroy another person…
Or are they really destroying themselves…
The fact is. Much of the violent behaviours you are speaking of is actually not normal for many people. It is a distortion.
Personally I think it is wrong to initiate physical violence… But you need to know how to defend yourself to avoid being a victim of it. And more usefully how to run or just not be there ^_^
I think it is generally wrong to be mean to others also. Basically all the people I know, male or female hold the same.
I think often it is better not to rise to provocation as often it is more a misunderstanding than intended, often better to explain in a non aggressive sort of way to defuse a problem.
A problem is some people take any gentle comment as a personal attack and come back like a rabid dog. I am not sure where they learn that behaviour but to me it seems dysfunctional behaviour.
One other problem. If you are offered violence is figuring (sounds strange) at what point it becomes real violence and how serious it is.
I think it is more a problem for women or I guess smaller guys. Because women are generally less powerful than guys they have less options in defense, Lots of the less harmful responses are not any use. Only the stuff you are naturally reluctant to ramp things up to.
Some food for thought:
The Birmingham Post
The Express
The BBC
I looked at these, Cherie and while it’s nice to see both sides, from a personal point of view though, I’d like to see a woman try anything physical on me.
I’m sorry but what’s a man doing accepting that? What sort of a pass have we come to?
What worries me more is why would a woman behave like that in the first place?
But quite equally why would a woman accept that type of behaviour in reverse?
So why do either behave like that?
Violence such as Cherry pie highlighted is just wrong and appalling no matter who inflicts it on who. M on F or F on M. There is to my mind something wrong with anyone who inflicts it. It is soul destroying.
I can easily understand why people don’t know what to do about it or are reluctant to do anything.
The abused party can’t or won’t use violence back.
They have everything they have worked towards tied up in the relationship, including children often. Their finances and their (maybe misplaced) love. I bet they get promises that it will not happen again and sometimes things can be ok for a bit. Plus for men there is the worry of looking wimpy or not being believed.
To do anything is in their mind to risk loosing everything. The situation often has to be appalling before they are willing to take the chance.
James, your “I’d like to see a woman try anything physical on me.” is silly. Hopefully you are a sort who would never let it get to a situation of domestic bullying, but on the simple level of physical violence a female who knew what she was doing could possibly do you, or most guys, really serious damage, if pushed to it.
That was what my comment was touching on.
Women in self defense situations have the easy options, apart from running (and guys are fast) taken away. Only the relatively “extreme prejudice” stuff is left to them. The crippling or potentially fatal strike.
For someone who is reluctant to do harm at all it makes for possibly fatal delay in reacting in deciding what to do.
A guy once told me in extreme situations. “Worry about the law after. Better to end up in court alive and healthy than on life support, or dead in a ditch”.
In this, I think, we’re all agreed.
“James, your “I’d like to see a woman try anything physical on me.” is silly. Hopefully you are a sort who would never let it get to a situation of domestic bullying …
Well, that’s true. The number of violent incidents I can remember are few and far between and the violence was hers against me.
I did do something three times. With my second wife, she provoked over such a long period, trying to wind me up and see how far she could push me that I picked her up by the arms and threw her on the bed. She then raped me.
One time in Russia I bumped my gf over in the snow as we were walking, once I found a soft patch because she was refusing to stop nagging about one particular thing I’d already explained. That shocked her.
Once I lifted her bodily off the stool and plonked her on the floor because I’d asked her countless times not to take her coffee near the keyboard – she was light as a feather. I got a smack in the mouth for that.
Many was the time she’d attack me physically though and I’d have to bearhug her until she calmed down. This though was just an extension of the whole relationship, which was very physical – Russians tend to be. They’re more reassured by physicality than words because they think you can read everything in the nature of the touch.
Overall though, she and I were fine together and are still close, even today.
… but on the simple level of physical violence a female who knew what she was doing could possibly do you, or most guys, really serious damage, if pushed to it.”
Not the females I’ve known. The only real danger is that you can’t block her as you would a man because of our upbringing that you don’t touch a woman that way. I was brought up that you never hit a woman to solve your problems, you never touch her face or hair even in soft situations without her tacit acceptance of what you’re about to do but that sometimes a hug is all it needs to solve a problem. That’s what I was taught.
So, if a woman comes at me with murder in her eyes, I have to make general moves like bearhugging her or if that doesn’t work, a full nelson, which is a weird thing to do to a girl but it works. Trouble is she then looks out for an opportunity later when you’re not concentrating. But you’d either learn to be ready for that or else you’d leave her.
So yes, if she knew what she was doing and was going for vulnerable points, that hesitation because of upbringing could be critical. With a man, it’s a different situation. You’d go for the kill immediately, even before he struck. That’s why I never fight men because it’s stupid doing less than going the whole hog to cripple him.
I avoid fights with males because I only know one way to fight and neither would come out of it in good condition. With females though, it’s usually just skirmishing and lets her get it out of her system.
But all this talk of fighting is only in extreme situations. I think almost everything can be talked out or if it can’t, I tend to walk out. If she just won’t listen, then I’m gone. The problem then is if she blocks the door and says, “Oh no you don’t.” Then there are two choices – physical or just stand there until she gets bored. i don’t like manhandling a woman except in love so I usually just stand there and try to outlast her. Then I’d usually ask which of us was going to put the coffee on.
If she did say, “Go then,” then she’s made a decision about my usefulness in her life and I’d go and not return. Often that would end up in phone calls and rapprochement but sometimes it didn’t and I don’t regret those, even now.