Others ~ Selected Correspondence

Anger and Aggression

Early on in my encounter with actualism it became apparent that it’s all or nothing. If Richard’s ‘style’ seems aggressive to you, or you have a problem with it, then you have something to investigate. It had gradually dawned on me that Richard’s very relentlessness had something to do with the fact that he is currently the only human being on the planet that is actually free.

Is the ‘aggressiveness’ really coming from Richard or not? In every case I’ve looked into, Richard has simply not been the aggressor. It’s really quite simple – a normal human being ducks and shoves. When Richard refuses to let you of the hook, ‘you’ (those that interpret it as an aggressive style) duck the perceived dart and shove the blame on him for being ‘aggressive.’

Blaming others, trying to change or manipulate others, having a problem with someone’s ‘style,’ etc simply has no place in actualism – it really is all or nothing. Early on in my encounter with actualism it became apparent that it’s all or nothing. No 37 to No 60, 3.2.2006

Not too long ago in the past, ‘I’ wanted acceptance by as many as would accept ‘me’ – so I used to be very fluent in ‘identity talk’, speaking/ writing/ listening in a style that was very much approved by other identities; and, as a consequence, ‘I’ was usually liked by nearly everyone in ‘my’ life.

One of the reasons I enjoy seeing Richard correspond is because he writes things that can be so challenging, to one’s socialized ‘being’, as to be perceived as aggressive (thus making him out to be a very unlikeable identity) – which is the main reason why ‘I’ would always remain silent when seeing another’s fundamental contradictions*); and therefore maintain a friend/an ally who would most likely also remain silent when seeing one of my own. Consequently keeping each other in the dark – that’s how much we cared.

I have seen Richard lose countless potential friends/ allies by refusing to play this game. And this game was therefore more important to them than whatever is on offer on the Actual Freedom website and list. No 47 to No 60, 3.2.2006

*) Small/trivial contradictions are easy to point out, especially by sugar-coating them with humour, but the fundamental contradictions are another matter entirely.

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How exactly would you go about doing this, No 60? How could you explain to somebody that their most treasured feelings/noble ideologies/optimistic dreams (those very things that give meaning to their life) are fundamentally flawed in that they have never and will never bring about peace-on-earth, without the possibility of coming across as ‘aggressive’, ‘arrogant’, ‘hostile’ and ‘unfriendly’?

As an example, the first girl who I fell in love with was nothing less than perfect to me; she gave meaning to my life. But when someone informed me, in a very kind and considerate way, that this girl was actually only interested in older guys (despite her telling me otherwise)… I resented this person and denied the evidence put forth.

After several months of digesting what had been presented to me, and seeing the facts of the matter for myself, I realized I had thoughtlessly shot the (friendly) messenger of a very factual but unpleasant message – and the style of the message was flawless, it was the substance I had a problem with.

Now, here is the thing, even if actualism was all substance and no style I would have still been interested enough upon first approaching it to get to where I am now. As the style, which I personally find a lot of fun by the way, is only very partial – it is the content, the substance of the words, that interests me. No 47 to No 60, 3.2.2006a

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I don’t criticise Richard for being persistent, challenging, unrelenting, refusing to let people off the hook when they’re doing something dodgy, pointing out their fundamental contradictions etc. Never have. I do think it would be possible to do all of that in a friendly and peaceful way though.

How exactly would you go about doing this, No 60?

See below for an example:

[begin example] No.47: How could you explain to somebody that their most treasured feelings/noble ideologies/optimistic dreams (those very things that give meaning to their life) are fundamentally flawed in that they have never and will never bring about peace-on-earth, without the possibility of coming across as ‘aggressive’, ‘arrogant’, ‘hostile’ and ‘unfriendly’?

As an example, the first girl who I fell in love with was nothing less than perfect to me; she gave meaning to my life. But when someone informed me, in a very kind and considerate way, that this girl was actually only interested in older guys (despite her telling me otherwise)… I resented this person and denied the evidence put forth.

After several months of digesting what had been presented to me, and seeing the facts of the matter for myself, I realized I had thoughtlessly shot the (friendly) messenger of a very factual but unpleasant message – and the style of the message was flawless, it was the substance I had a problem with.

Now, here is the thing, even if actualism was all substance and no style I would have still been interested enough upon first approaching it to get to where I am now. As the style, which I personally find a lot of fun by the way, is only very partial – it is the content, the substance of the words, that interests me. [end example]

See?

Would you by chance consider the possibility that a ‘friendly and peaceful way’ of communicating coexisting with a ‘persistent, challenging, unrelenting, refusing to let people off the hook when they’re doing something dodgy, pointing out their fundamental contradictions etc.’ type of communication is different from a ‘friendly and peaceful way’ of communicating without a ‘persistent, challenging, unrelenting, refusing to let people off the hook when they’re doing something dodgy, pointing out their fundamental contradictions etc.’ type of communication?

I ask since I have a life of experience with the latter – and a relatively recent acquaintance with the former; which, out of fear, I do not always pursue.

I don’t much care about this style issue (I just don’t like the denial that there is an issue for many people).

The way I see it – When somebody is physically ill, a competent doctor will instruct certain actions to be commenced in order for the patient to become healthy again – regardless of the manner in which the prescription is expressed, what is prescribed will work the same.

Somebody who truly desires to get well will gladly follow the prescription in spite of any affective ‘issue’ they may encounter with the doctor or his style of communicating.

However, since the human condition is not considered an illness by many/most – and actualism is even less likely to be considered the cure

I am not at all surprised that these issues gain the same importance, if not more, than the prescription itself. Especially as my experience has shown that the style is mostly a manner of expression steered by the substance (few or no emotional impediments).

I resent …

So do ‘I’ :o)

That’s why, just as I was angry at the messenger because I thought that there was a hidden agenda – a lie in progress – where there actually was none, I see that you too are angry/get angry (a form of resentment) for reasons which you have already explained.

However, in this case, I can relate more to your feelings than to your reasoning; so I hope you excuse me for being a bit skeptical about your claims, which seem logically sound, but are at best influenced by resentment – or at worst based on it.

[I resent] the oft-repeated implication that an objection to the style of actualists is necessarily an avoidance reaction to the content. The two can exist simultaneously, and there can be one without the other. They are orthogonal.

In the ‘real world’, I suppose so – and you are living proof of it, right? But, in the actual world (as the flesh and blood bodies that we actually are), or even with common sense operating, there are only so many ways you can describe a simple white sheet of paper – and since the expression of such is not the thing in itself, and both parties involved intimately know this, there would never arise any such conflict as the one you are currently experiencing; even when detailing such complex things as is the human condition.

If someone criticises an actualist’s style, must it necessarily be the content they are really objecting to if the truth be known?

No, and I hope you see the resemblance, but I cannot recall ever criticizing the wrapping paper on my favourite birthday presents/Christmas gifts as a kid.

Can’t it be that the style sucks, independently of the content? I think it can.

Well, if by ‘sucks’ you mean – ‘To be disgustingly disagreeable or offensive’ http://www.thefreedictionary.com/suck Could anything ‘disgusting’ or ‘offensive’ ever come into existence in a non-affective refreshingly sensuous world?

However, if you’ve watered down the word ‘sucks’ to just mean ‘disagreeable’- Then, yes, I think it can too. Like when I am ill and have to take antibiotics, it ‘sucks’ how some of the tablets come packaged… it’s such an ordeal to open it! When I tear the protective covering, sometimes two (or even three!) pills come tumbling out when all I needed was one.

Of course, this never happens when I open the package with scissors, which make a near perfect cut, but then I have to go look for the scissors! Man I tell you, if I’m ever in charge of the packaging design of antibiotics here in Mexico – I am going to make sure they are more easily accessible, aerodynamic, colourful and whatnot.

But, in the meantime, I’m sure glad them pills exist as they have cured me more than once from a potentially fatal disease… and, curiously enough, I have yet to come across somebody who didn’t take them because of the packaging design.

I think some of the actualists, led by Richard himself, communicate in a way that needlessly alienates people who would otherwise be interested in exploring more of the subject matter.

If the people who made possible this exploration ‘communicate in a way that needlessly alienates people’ and these alienated people consequently ceased ‘exploring more of the subject matter’ because of a feeling of alienation… then all it took was one feeling to stop the exploration and I sincerely think they will be better off because of it as they don’t need to spend any more time on something they are not sufficiently interested in.

Now, if someone insists that they don’t feel alienated but that they are in fact being alienated – then all it took was being on the receiving end of an emotional offence to stop the exploration and I sincerely think they will be better off because of it – as they don’t need to spend more time on something they know is both dishonest and perverse.

Besides, purposefully alienating others for egocentric reasons requires malice – and if there is malice in these here actualists, then why even listen to them/why stick around?

Or, if the alienating is not done purposefully but rather in denial – and they clearly will not budge from their position – then why even listen to them/why stick around?

I can only think of a few reasons, some things ‘I’ could/would do, and because I am aware of the motivation that may lie behind these and what it entails for ‘me’ – I understand my disinclination to be ‘persistent, challenging, unrelenting, refusing to let people off the hook when they’re doing something dodgy, pointing out their fundamental contradictions etc’ when it comes to interacting with my fellow human beings; and therefore the extent to which I care for them. No 47 to No 60, 7.2.2006

Don’t to you see anything of value in anybody’s writing so far?

So you were entertained to some extent by all the mails, writings in this list etc. but apart from that nobody’s writing has had any other value (like learning something new). Is this correct?

Trying to extract some positive comments from you :). Basically apart from the small benefits you posit, haven’t you learnt anything else? OK.

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3. How about outside this mailing list? How about UG Krishnamurti? Anything of value anywhere, in anybody’s writing/ saying/ experience in this world?

You have enjoyed reading many things... have you retained anything other than ‘enjoyment’ from reading/interacting with others? I am interested about UG Krishnamurti because your style of communicating seems to be very similar to UGK (contradicting yourself, others, bashing every kind of attempt etc.)

Yes actualism is contradiction free zone according to my reading and experiencing. You don’t think you are influenced by UGK, then?

Initially I thought Peter’s and Vineeto’s style was bashing type... that was long back... and yesterday I read Peter’s journal again and I saw how clearly he has described his experience... I must have felt that way before because of the contradiction (cognitive dissonance) I had with my beliefs (do consider this possibility for yourself... just for a second... you might be pleasantly surprised). However, your style is bashing not because of this reason but because of your imperative statements: throw these people out, stop reading stuff, you are deluding yourself etc.

And your favouring contradiction is mystical in style, and UGK was a specialist in contradiction and glorified it so much. I think he said ‘I say something and contradict it in the next statement’.... sounds like your response to Peter. Do you contradict yourself in your everyday life too? So frequently? Of course the everyday spoken words are not recorded so one can even deny that one is contradicting. In fact, I consider that using memory and seeing how one changes has value in itself: it is an act of common sense and intelligence (which was crippled due to reading Krishnamurtis’ [both of them] bashing on thought and memory and intellect).

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4. Is it possible for you to communicate without using derogatory, personal insults?

Well, the words ‘ass kissing’, ‘jerking off’.... to my mail and to others’ (quoting from my memory)... ‘fuck off... dickhead’... don’t appear to be otherwise to me. To you?

You accuse of others misquoting you when they quote you well. But you don’t care if you quote others well.

Actualists never said that compliments and insults are like water off a ducks back.... it was only Richard (who is an actualist too, but more importantly: he is free that’s why he said so) who said that. Actualist is somebody who is on the way.... who has taken up investigation. Depending upon which stage... he/she might have some emotional reactions. Whe he/she does with it is different to what goes on in the real/spiritual world.

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How are your communications outside this mailing list, in everyday life? Is it like this?

The reason I asked this is because if I think of sending a mail response to you, then I immediately think that you might start calling names etc.... some kind of fear of your response. I was wondering if people around you are scared of you because you call them names etc. and go to attack mode.

I suppose you better study harder to get rid of any fear or fears your current identity experiences. Perhaps you should thank me for exposing your hiding fear so you can investigate it and eradicate using actualist surgical techniques for removing any sort of emotion emanating from the illusion of self.

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There is no world of actualism (there is actual world but not ‘world of actualism’). Yes I thank you for such an exposure. But it doesn’t mean that I intellectually accept such ‘foul mouth’ (as in I won’t go about doing it) as I can see the harm it can cause.

Good to know that the experience for the people around you in the real world is contrary to the one is felt by me in the mailing list.

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But since actualism is not about holding others responsible for one’s emotion, I have looked into issues like why do I feel unpleasant when somebody uses such strong words and resorts to calling names... there is an automatic instinctual aggression/ fear once one feels insulted/threatened etc... solving this doesn’t mean that one becomes a pacifist, it does not result in withdrawal or anything... of course you may say, this is all meaningful only to me and not to you... as it is my experience... as you have expressed everywhere. But if there was a sensible dialogue between you and me, I am sure it will be an interesting discussion because though I don’t know you, you and I being human beings must have landed in similar situations and must have similar mechanisms... comparing notes if possible, is not only enjoyable but can be freeing/learning experience. Opens one’s eyes to other’s experiences etc. Of course this being actualism mailing list, our discussions will be like: ‘this approach of actualism doesn’t work for me.... how can you say that?’ etc. (i.e. sensible discussion about actualism based on personal experience... it doesn’t mean that you have to agree to whatever it is said in this list/site... you can say it doesn’t work etc.).

When you are cleaning the house, if you see dirt at one corner it doesn’t mean that you give up... you clean it and it goes away. It works, and it has gone away: the proof is I can mail you with sensible words instead of holding a grudge, instead of aggression or instead of hiding. Just for your intellectual understanding: Actual freedom is when some irrevocable thing happens in the brain as it did to Richard or a temporary experience of PCE where one is in the actual world. The method of actualism is a process where one can incrementally (note the word incrementally) clean oneself up of the emotional baggage (produced by the illusion of self as you say... do you understand that it is an illusion?)...

I have learnt one thing in my own experience and from others’: when one holds prejudices against others, one doesn’t read what is written carefully. And most of the problems and miscommunications I see are due to the fact that due attention is not paid to what is written. Once I saw this (even now I err, but less) I started reading carefully: whether one agrees with the other or not, one at least sees what the other is saying and it puts an end to endless repetitions and rounds of clarification.

Don’t you think your discourse about fear is identical to UGK? (if you are interested in proof, I can provide from UGK where he says exactly the same.... but I won’t copy and paste because of your allergy to it). You said somewhere above:

I must say that for the most part, you actualists are a polite pleasant lot

... why do you now say ‘Actualism is a very violent religion’ ? Because of its ruthless exposure of the illusion of self? Because of its critique on compassion? You accuse so much what you feel obvious to you... I do not deny that you feel it so.... otherwise you may not be writing all this. But can you prove one accusation beyond doubt? Just one? (I know you are not interested in proving).

I ask this because feelings, the most valued stuff by everybody, is not a reliable device for finding out what is actual.... one feels so strongly because of something and takes it to be true... once the feeling goes away... one feels the opposite. No 33 to No 58

There recently was a retrospective of the Roots program of the 1970s on TV. I remember watching this back in those days. There was the interest at that time for people, particularly Americans, to find out their ‘roots’, and there was a proliferation of the uncovering or the discovering of ‘who I am’ as one’s ethnic identity. In any event, I was struck while watching the program by the anger of the people they were interviewing as they talked about their reactions to the program. There was this universal feeling of rage and anger among people they interviewed, this abhorrence of slavery, the realization that they were themselves descended from slaves and that these horrors were perpetrated against their own ancestors. But I was particularly struck by the anger, and it seemed to me that it makes no sense to be angry about these things because if one is angry and holds a grievance, then sooner or later that feeling is going to be expressed, it must be expressed, in some sort of action against others. If one is angry, then one essentially feels that someone is to blame for these horrors. In my personal experience, anger must always have a target. It always comes out one way or another.

It seemed as I listened to the anger of these people on the program, many the descendants of slaves, that the same sense of outrage, grievance, and resentment was unleashing itself afresh on those who are held to be responsible. I realize that I am on a bit shaky ground here as the issue of race is an extremely complicated one and an extremely volatile one to discuss in a public forum. But in a sense I am not really talking about race, although the topic does touch on the issue of race, but I am talking about identity. One identifies as a black person, or a white person, or a person of Italian ancestry, Polish ancestry, or what have you. One identifies as a member of a ‘dominant’ group in society, or as an oppressed person, a minority. Actualism is about the demolishment of all kinds of identity, and it is this that people find so difficult to stomach, because people really cling to these identities, even to the death.

One need only open one’s eyes, look around the world at what is happening, to see the havoc that identity is causing. Gary to Peter

Why did Chapman do it – this day in 1980?

My interest in this: why it is important to understand the mechanism of feelings.

• Q. – Why you had to single this guy out?

• A. I was feeling like I was worthless, and maybe the root of it is a self-esteem issue. I felt like nothing, and I felt if I shot him, I would become something, which is not true at all.

• Q. Mm hmm.

• A. But that’s why I shot Mr. Lennon.

• Q. And him in particular because he was someone that you admired, or you locked at him and his stature, and you thought this would have some impact on your life, sir?

• A. Well, I originally – what happened was I was in the library, and I was looking through some books, and I came across a book called One Day at a Time, and I saw him there with photographs in front of his residence, the Dakota, and I was full of anger and resentment, you know. I took it upon myself to judge him falsely for – for, you know, being something other than, you know, in a lotus position with a flower, and I got angry in my stupidity. So it started with anger, but I wasn’t angry the night I shot him. http://www.courttv.com/archive/people/2000/1012/chapmantranscript.html No 33

What you say here is interesting and precisely what Richard experienced during so-called ‘Enlightenment’. I myself have been beset by bouts of anger and aggression which are most disturbing. When this happens, I tend to go through periods where I castigate myself, doubting the method, but then invariably rally and re-commit myself to the goal of self-immolation. It is not an easy thing to rid oneself of malice and sorrow. If I practice the Actualism method diligently, it seems like I invariably run up against pockets of malice deep in the bowels of ‘me’ that are still there, lurking in the shadows.

It doesn’t mean that the method doesn’t work, and it doesn’t mean that I am misapplying the method. I think in some ways it is evidence that the method is working because these pockets of malice and sorrow then become available for an intelligent investigation. Clinging to malice and sorrow is not the way I want to live. Gary No 46

I encountered the following interview with Debra Niehoff, author of ‘The Biology of Violence’ on the web this morning, as I was interested in looking into articles dealing with the amygdala and its’ relation to the instinct of aggression. To keep it rather short, I excerpted a brief snippet from the interview in which she responds to a question about violence, given what the scientific community is learning about brain regulation of emotions and the correspondence between the amygdala and the cerebral cortex:

And how does that relate to violence?

A: Well, that circuitry is overlaid and connected to the circuitry of emotions. So the two work hand in hand. Aggression, the ability to use force, is a natural part of the behaviour repertoire of living things. Aggression is important. If we couldn’t be aggressive, we couldn’t defend ourselves, or our children. We wouldn’t be able to compete for jobs or compete in sports. But when that normal behaviour becomes inappropriate, when it is directed toward the wrong person, in the wrong place, at the wrong time, and with the wrong intensity, then it becomes violent and it becomes unacceptable.

When that happens, there is a change in the person’s ability to accurately determine whether something is a real threat. Either they are overreacting to benign stimuli, or they are not reacting to very real threats, like the threat of punishment. Something has gotten out of whack in their ability to understand and react correctly to their environment. The frontal cortex plays a big role in providing additional information to our emotional reactions, to clarifying those reactions by saying, ‘Wait a minute, that’s not really the way things are working. Step back and take a minute to think.’

If a person has come to believe that the world is against them, and they are overreacting to every little provocation, these violent reactions get beyond their ability to control because they are in survival mode. Debra Niehoff, interview

I found the views expressed here to be the prevailing wisdom on aggression – a kind of ‘you better learn to live with it – you can’t do without it’ approach. The prevailing wisdom seems to be that there is appropriate violence, such as in the workplace or on the sports field, and that there is inappropriate violence, as when the brain runs amok and the amygdala is ‘highjacked’, resulting in the primitive instinctual passions. The view that aggression is natural and normal, and that human beings could not survive without it is clear in this brief excerpt. Since, in this view, one wants to retain aggression, the approach to dealing with the more destructive aspects of the emotion is to learn self-control techniques, or (increasingly) to use medications to deal with fear and aggression. At no point in what I read does it occur to the author that there might be a way of eliminating, once and for all, aggression at its very source, the primitive lizard-reptilian brain-stem. I am sure she would probably regard that finding as completely mad!

So anyway, I thought this might be of some interest. I would like to pursue some readings in this area and find out more about recent research on emotions and the brain.

I am looking for some leads and corroboration for what we are all doing. Probably a good place to look would be a nearby hospital’s library, as they have many medical journals and associated medical information. Can anybody think of something else I might look into? I am not scientist but I have had a smattering of physiology and neuro-physiology from my college days. Interesting stuff! Gary

Whether or not any justification seems apparent, the violation exists.

(Long pause.) Because you believe that physical self-defence is the only way to counter such a situation then you will say, ‘If I am attacked by another person, are you telling me that I cannot aggressively counter his obvious intent to destroy me?’ Not at all. You could counter such an attack in several ways that do not involve killing. You would not be in such a hypothetical situation to begin with unless violent thoughts of your own, faced or unfaced, had attracted it to you.’ ‘The Nature of Personal Reality’ Seth via J. Roberts I find it curious that these words of wisdom about physical self-defence supposedly come from a disembodied entity. As such, I would say that an ethereal entity without a physical body would be the least qualified to offer gratuitous moral advice to we corporeal earthly humans. ‘The Nature of Personal Reality’ Seth via J.Roberts

Yes, unless such a one was ‘God in human form’. That is essentially the Christian myth. So there is one (i.e. Jesus, Seth, etc.) who knows all about being a human but at the same time is ‘beyond’ all that, having transcended it, and can supposedly guide us mere mortals. Now please note, I am not arguing from this position. I merely found the excerpted quotation interesting as I have struggled to understand how to deal with violence.

I notice that you used the word ‘aggressively’ in talking about countering another’s obvious intent to destroy you. So it appears that this is the sticking point: one is still aggressive and falling prey to the instincts, is one not? I have variously tried to imagine what it must be like to be without fear, like Richard. It seems like a mostly futile enterprise, as the fact remains that I am fearful. But I should think that were one without fear, having extirpated the emotional faculty, one would not ‘aggressively’ respond to anything. There would be no need for aggression as intelligence and common sense would guide one as to what to do in any given situation.

Agreed.

Not much difference, is there? Gary to Peter

In a recent post, No 8 wrote:

But the information is fascinating. Seth is no advocate of irresponsibility; he declares you are absolutely responsible for every minuscule event that ever happens to you. The archives of every word he spoke have been stored at Yale University and physicists are studying his probability theory which you can read about in a book titled Bridging Science and Spirituality. ‘The Nature of Personal Reality’ Seth via J.Roberts

In reply, you wrote:

It’s a rather big foot, Peter, and I was wondering if you might like to reply. I called it the ‘sticking point’, because I feel there is a point that most of us get to when we are severely challenged and up against something that refuses to budge. Faced with an adversary who is intent on putting an end to your life at the point of a gun or some other equally potent weapon, it is interesting to speculate as to whether one would respond instinctually with a ‘kill or be killed’ mentality or whether something else would happen, something more akin to intelligence and common sense. Of course, I may be neglecting to recognize that common sense might dictate speedily dispatching the onerous adversary with a well placed shot. A kind of ‘putting him out of his misery’, as it were.

Pardon the gallows humour.

I am really quite surprised that you replied to me that you would not hesitate to respond ‘aggressively’. I can only conclude that since you told Charlie you put your foot in your mouth you feel you made a faux pas. Well, if it is a mistake, I don’t want to make too much of it. Perhaps the scenario I described of being faced with imminent loss of life by a violent opponent is where the rubber meets the road for an actualist. If one has thoroughly self-immolated, and as I am aware of no one who has achieved this feat save for Richard, I should think there would be no aggression involved at all. In other words, there would be no adrenalin rush, no fight-or-flight response, no desperate pleading for your life to be saved, no hair trigger ‘shoot first’ reaction, like in all the cowboy pictures we were raised on. With no fear on board the physiological organism, a fervent imagination leads me to two possible conclusions: 1.) one would be as ‘calm as a cucumber’ and able to defuse the most violent of confrontations, skilfully using the wastage of energy generated by the opponents’ wrath, or 2.) one would most likely perish and be quite unconcerned with it, as one is devoid of a sense of being a personal ‘I’ that needs defending. Rhetorical questions and speculations aside, few of us are actually faced with anything like this. Not to say that we might not be at some relatively near point in the future, if war breaks out, which, considering the history of world, is certainly possible. It is a wonderful distraction to consider these questions, but I don’t want to belabour the point. It is far more interesting and vital work to consider how to deal with the situations that are actually facing me than concoct a hypothetical situation to speculate about.

If you would care to respond, you might comment on whether or not you were caught unawares when you responded in that way by saying ‘aggressively’. It was a rather revealing remark, as I think we are all in that boat, unless of course we are in Actual Freedom. Gary to Peter

In response to this comment about ‘aggressively’ countering a lethal attack, I seized on your use of the word ‘aggressively’, believing that I had discovered a contradiction: that an actualist could espouse being happy and harmless whilst advocating aggressive means to deal with violence. In another subsequent post to me, you clarified your use of the word ‘aggressive’:

I was satisfied with your detailed post in which the preceding excerpt was included.

Your use of the word ‘aggressive’ was used in the sense of denoting a robust, vigorous, and forceful response to violence aimed at one, not necessarily meaning use of lethal force. I agree with your comments to the effect that every other means possible should be taken to de-escalate a violent confrontation short of using lethal force. I have found that one can do much to avoid being in situations that are potentially violent by increased vigilance to one’s own malice and sorrowful feelings, to the point that one is questioning oneself constantly, attentive to the automatic ‘me’ responses of defensiveness, fear, and anger. Rather than responding with submissive behaviour, ie. the automatic conditioned response to ‘be nicey-nice’, one goes on with one’s interactions with another who may be angry without missing a beat, because one has not fallen prey to feeling personally insulted, offended, or otherwise maligned because there is no ‘me’ or ‘I’ at the wheel needing defence. One is also not on some kind of ‘mission’ to provide nurturance or succour to those who are disturbed by anger or violence, a response that is often inculcated into one by spiritual values such as ‘turning the other cheek’. It is stupid to turn the other cheek when someone is angry, unless one is a ‘holy man’ and has to prove that they are ‘compassionate’. I find it increasingly difficult to understand why people around me are so willing to wallow around in angry feelings, feeling resentful, sorrowful, and upset over what often appear to be trifling matters. I say this out of no sense of superiority, as I have my ‘blind spots’ I am sure, and can be just as easily triggered off by situations over which I seem to have no control. In fact, such happened recently, and I was greatly disturbed to see myself reacting in unhelpful and nonsensical ways. As you wrote most recently:

Yes, that is so.

This is precisely what happened on the most recent occasion when I exploded in anger at my partner’s grandson. I immediately felt guilty and ashamed of myself and secluded myself upstairs in my den. After a period of cooling down, I was able to explore and examine what was going on with me that provoked my response. The whole thing still rather mystifies me. While I have discovered some things about ‘me’ through this experience, I still have the sense that I am skating around on the surface of the thing.

So, thank you Peter for being willing to explore this in detail with me. I found your replies helpful in that they have given me more grist for the mill. Gary to Peter

‘Shocking’. It is indubitably so. This where the rubber seems to be meeting the proverbial road for me in my day-to-day interactions with others. And it shifts and changes. While it came up most recently in the situation involving the partners’ grandson, it could just as easily come up in the situation at work, or in some other interpersonal situation. I am reminded here of the warning that the self, with its’ rudimentary animal instinctual core, is very cunning indeed, defying one’s attempts to defeat it through verbal explanations, intellectual understandings, or philosophical speculations. I also do not feel the much vaunted ‘choiceless awareness’ is a means of being rid of the instinctual passions. ‘I’ cannot defeat this separative self because ‘I’ am none other than one and the same. It is also shocking to encounter this in oneself because one finds, directly and intimately, that this is the same stuff out of which all the wars, rapes, tortures, child abuse, suicides, etc, etc are made and that one is ‘all of that’.

I have been motivated to find a way to eliminate all of that in myself because I have been unable to intellectually and emotionally distance myself from all of the murder and mayhem in the world. I realize that I am quite capable of doing any of these heinous things, given the enabling conditions, because of the in-built, genetically inherited instinctual passions. I met, in 1985, my own personal Waterloo, my own personal high-water mark, which was coming face to face with my addiction in a moment in which I had complete presence of mind, and, since then, I have had my own direct understanding of the destructive potential of the instinctual core. But I have also found that no amount of praying, meditating, wishing and willing will make it go away. It takes something that is so totally beyond me at this point in time to understand that I am willing to listen to and strive to understand what Richard, Vineeto, you, and all others involved in this enterprise are saying and writing about. It is of the most urgent necessity.

Unequivocally.

Yes, I am leaping too. When Richard appeared on the listening-l list, I immediately knew that he had something of urgent importance to convey, although I too was rather slow, and still am, in understanding the finer points of what he is talking about. I can still hardly understand how it is possible to self-immolate, and I get all kinds of fanciful ideas about it, down to day-dreaming that I too have self-immolated. Any pretension to this final and irrevocable experience is made perfectly clear to me by the welling up of anger, jealousy, lust, despair, sorrow, and a myriad of other affective experiences.

At first sight, when I read your words, I thought I have been awfully selfish, for the most part, thinking of myself and wanting happiness for only myself. But, looking a little more deeply into it, as I write it, I think I have been quite honest with myself for many years now and realized that there is little or no difference between myself and, for instance, the war criminals one hears about sometimes on the nightly news, the child abusers, the predatory criminals most people are afraid of, the suicides one hears of, the drug addicts and alcoholics, etc, etc. And so, because I cannot adopt a superior attitude towards those who have ‘fallen’ into those baser passions, I realize that I have a responsibility to put an end to these things in myself, primarily, but also for the greater good of the people around me, my ‘loved ones’, my family, my community, and so on. So I think there is that altruistic motive there operative in me at this time and I think it can only gain momentum as I continue to experience the pure sensual delight that being alive is. I have heard and read about in the readings here that the combinative effects of the memory of the PCE, the demolishing of the self with its beliefs and values, the investigation at a deep level of the instinctual passions, and the pure intent to be happy and harmless is what brings this mutation about. Gary to Peter

I notice that I have a particular tendency to berate myself for feeling or displaying anger. This was undoubtedly conditioned into me with such parental admonitions as ‘Don’t you get angry with me, buster!’ Other people I come into contact with seem so uninhibited in their way of venting their spleen, of showing anger or making a big show of how angry they are. I often chuckle to myself because ‘I’ am not like that. But it is interesting, isn’t it, to stand back and realize how completely arbitrary this social conditioning is? I don’t know if ‘arbitrary’ is the right word for it. I mean, ‘I’ could just as easily be some other way based on what I was taught growing up, what values I imbibed from the elders and the tribe.

From time to time, in the past, I have had sharp, angry reactions to things that have happened, like protecting my turf at work. It has been a long time since I have had this type of reaction. These angry reactions were quite unpleasant to me and actually fuelled my search for a way to eliminate them. I would perceive that I was being taken advantage of, would assert ‘my rights’, and become quite angry and insistent. These reactions were so lightning fast that I am convinced an instinctual reaction had been triggered, because it seemed that any attempt to reason out the feeling and try to be more sensible about it was impossible. I think this instinctual anger and aggression is very destructive. It is this that is spreading mayhem throughout the world. A complete elimination of the instincts is much to be favoured, but one cannot pick and choose: I cannot, say, get rid of anger but hold on to fear – similarly, I cannot get rid of aggression yet hold on to nurture. The whole kit and caboodle has to go. But again, I have to be careful here: ‘I’ cannot get rid of anger, because ‘I’ am anger. But I can dig into it, investigate these feelings and emotions intensively when they come up, turn it over and over and become intimately familiar with the morphology of anger, intimately familiar with the morphology of fear. And there is the remembrance of the PCE as the guiding light – the sure knowledge that the best is not only possible but right at hand, never far away. Gary to Peter

Recently you wrote on the differences between intelligence and instincts. I am going to continue with my practice of snipping relevant passages and sentences from your post and then responding to those, rather than try to reproduce the entire large post and reply to each and every point. I find that it is bit more manageable for me that way. However, I must say before I do that your recent post was exceptionally well written and powerful. I think you expressed your points with particular clarity and forthrightness. All in all, I found your points have persuaded me to take a long, hard look at just what I think and feel about the whole matter of intelligence as it relates to the instincts. At first reading your post aroused a kind of defensive response in me and I was inclined to respond in a defensive kind of manner, but I decided to wait, think it over more, and really consider what you are saying, ‘chew’ on it a bit more before putting anything down in writing. I also decided, as you suggested, to re-read that portion of your Journal on Intelligence. I recognized immediately that I had read it before, but this time the words took on a different meaning, fuelled in part by my desire to unravel, understand and get to the bottom of this whole thing.

This is where the defensiveness set in. I thought I don’t need you to tell me about the appalling brutalities that have been committed in the past 100 years. But rather than persisting in a defensive reaction, and making some kind of defensive retort to your post, some kind of knee jerk reaction, I decided to really try to understand what I was feeling defensive about and why I was feeling that way. There is something about this whole issue that I just have not ‘gotten’, something that has not clicked with me. And it goes way beyond just dealing in the semantics of it – the meaning of words and their usage – and it goes to the heart of the matter. And I must admit – and this is very hard – that I have been mistaken in this: you see, I thought that making and using weapons was an intelligent reaction to a perceived danger from other human beings, but I am reconsidering this.

This is the crux of the matter. You see, ‘I’ have been living in fear and I don’t want to admit it nor give up my cherished existence. ‘I’ don’t want to give up my ‘extensive defensive preparations’, for ‘I’ feel naked and vulnerable without them. The simple truth of the matter is that fear is not intelligence. It is the instincts that are killing people around the world, and it is the instincts that make me not only capable of killing but of wanting to kill another fellow human being. I found that in thinking about what has happened in the last 100 years, indeed in all of recorded human history, it has been impossible for me to separate what has happened historically from what goes on on an individual, ‘personal’ level, what takes place inside of this critter named ‘Gary’. I am just another sane, normal human being- and it has been these same sane, normal human beings that have, for the most part, been responsible for the appalling bloodshed that has happened and is still happening.

To move on a bit, you wrote:

That is the commonly accepted view. I am reminded in this connection, however, that in school we were taught the same thing about the Kaiser and German militarism in the First World War. I recently was browsing a book in the book store about WW1 wherein the author developed the interesting thesis that the English were actually responsible for the start of the war in that they consistently provoked the Germans and their allies and deliberately and with malicious intent engaged in the kind of sabre-rattling and expansionist policies that goaded on the war, with the resultant bloodshed. This is quite the opposite from the usual view. Actually, I would say that since every human being inherited the blind instincts that nature genetically endowed all sentient creatures with as a rough and ready software package for survival, that all the human beings that lived at that time were responsible for the war and what happened in the war, that would include the pacifists, the isolationists, the politicians, the priests and ministers, rabbis, gurus, and every sane, normal human being living on the globe at the time. Maybe that seems to be going a bit too far? What do you think?

... a species that gets to the stage of MAD is not intelligent, it is a species driven by senseless passion. To bring a permanent end to this MAD-ness would undoubtedly be a triumph of intelligence over blind passion.

And because ‘I’ live in fear, indeed ‘I’ am fear, my intelligence is hamstrung by the instinctual passions and cannot therefore operate freely. To me, mad and afraid go together – it is exceedingly difficult for me to tell where fear starts, leaves off, and MAD begins. I have noticed at times in the past while driving that when a careless driver swerves into my path, there is the first instantaneous burst of movement to avoid the danger and then, sometimes, this is followed a bit later by an angry reaction (‘You f...ing jerk, watch where you’re going’). So the anger seems to come a bit later. Sometimes too the fear comes a little later. I don’t know if that makes any sense – maybe it is just my labelling of the fear or anger that comes later and not the emotion itself, but at least what I explained above seems like what happens. Often though, there is the instantaneous reaction to avoid the danger and no anger, no fear. I much prefer it that way.

This is another thing that I was thinking about ... I do carry a weapon ... a revolver in the glove compartment of my car. I live in a country and a state that gives law-abiding citizens the right to carry concealed weapons, and a few years ago I decided to get one. After the necessary fingerprinting, records search, etc. I got the permit and started carrying the gun in the car for ‘emergencies’. Just last week, on the way home from work, I accidentally ran a red light. The road conditions were very slippery and I had swerved to avoid a car that stopped rather abruptly in front of me. As the gun is in the compartment with the vehicle registration and the insurance card, and as the officer asked to see these documents, I thought it the intelligent thing to do to inform him that I have a gun on board and am legally licensed to carry it, lest he blow my head off when he spied the revolver in the glove compartment. After running a check on my license, and being satisfied that I was not a criminal on the run or that my license was under suspension, he told me everything was all right and I could proceed home. He thanked me for telling him about the gun and didn’t even ask to see my carry permit. I am glad I live in a country which allows its citizens to privately own firearms. Obviously, though, America is a place where gun violence is rampant, further fuelling the fears that people have about violence being directed at them, and leading much of the citizenry to take to gun toting as a reaction to that fear. I have noticed distinctly many times that, before venturing too far from home, I feel ‘naked’ without my gun in the car with me, and go to some pretty ridiculous extremes to ensure that I am armed.

I remember when I first came to this list and began a correspondence with you that you and I considered the issue of ‘self’-defence, the use of deadly force to avert a murderous attack. I made it clear that I am not pacifist and would use deadly force to avert a murderous attack on me or my partner. This would seem to be an intelligent thing to do, rather than let oneself be victimized, murdered, or tortured by a madman. These things do happen in this world, although their incidence is relatively low in the region that I reside in. I have sometimes thought that it is ridiculous to carry a gun because statistically the probability of me being harmed by someone is so low. It may be more likely that I would be attacked by a rabid chipmunk or a disturbed moose than by a fellow human being. Associated with this issue, though, is a related one: if one is fearful, in other words living in a state of fear of attack, to what extent are they then responsible for being attacked? I seem to remember Richard saying that, in all but the most random cases of violent crime that the supposed ‘victim’ of the assault is just as responsible as the ‘perpetrator’ for the violence that occurs. While an extreme position on it, it does seem to make some sense to me. If I am fear, in other words if I have fear on board, to what extent would I myself be responsible for attracting violence from others? I have seen this dynamic at play recently in my reactions to someone at work. I have felt nervous and afraid of this person and then felt ‘offended’ and even malicious when they ‘attacked’ me. There seems to be considerable grist for the mill in these reactions.

Whenever and if people give up their guns and nuclear weapons indeed doesn’t really seem to be the point. I have decided for myself that I am not going to live my life a hostage to fear, come what may. This means that I am going to examine each fearful and/or angry reaction that comes up in me, as well as all my ‘good’ emotions, as the necessary first step to eliminating my own malice and sorrow. The way is now open to completely eliminate what has been bringing the human species to grief throughout the long history of its’ presence on this planet. This is not a belief or a hope. This is a desire born of sheer desperation and a stubborn refusal to follow the same Tried and Failed path of those who preceded me. This desperation that I talk about comes out of my life experience. Everyone I know has been affected by war and violence. Nobody has escaped the carnage, at least nobody I know. I myself have been both victimized by violence and prone to violence myself in the past. I had a sharp memory during the period of time that I was considering your posting of a time in my life, many years ago and in my drinking days, when I actually plotted the murder of this man because he had assaulted me. At that time, my drinking was at the height of its’ destructiveness and even the simplest thing, like going to grocery store for food, was incredibly complicated because I was ‘drunk as a warlord’ most of the time. I thought long and hard about how I could murder this man and had seized on a means and a plan. I was just too drunk at the time to carry it out and knew it. But I thought I would throw this in because you said in your journal that you had been shocked when you realized that you relished the idea of killing someone after reading about a murder in a local paper. It is indeed shocking to get a real glimpse of intensity and extent of these deadly passions once the mask of Love Agape and Divine Compassion is taken off.

Thanks for the encouragement Peter. I enjoy our correspondence and I appreciate your sagacity and intelligence in these matters. I did not come to this list for group hugs or to be reaffirmed in my beliefs (‘emotional support’ I think its’ called). I am looking for a simple and practical way to bring about suffering and sorrow. I appreciate the actualists on this list that have challenged me to my core, and upset the proverbial apple cart. It is not my way to stand off on the sidelines taking pot-shots at actualism like some list participants have done. I welcome questions and observations from others that really make me think. It is a hard thing to admit that you have been wrong about something all along, but it is also the only way to really throw off the past and free yourself from it. Gary to Peter

Yes, ‘the aggressive instinct turned in on myself’ – that is a very valid observation of what happens. I think I have said this before about aggression, but I’ll say it again – it doesn’t matter who or what is on the receiving end, when aggression kicks in, anyone is fair game, including yourself. Many people have ended up destroying themselves because of their aggressive instinct – perhaps this is what is operating in most suicides and most cases of depression and despair. Depression, despair, self-castigation – it really is a lethal combination and it really is easy to see how, given the right circumstances, one might really harm themselves. But then, one really is conditioned, I think, to turn it against themselves, are they not? I think that was particularly true in my case, as I look back at my upbringing and conditioning – these tendencies to engage in self-reproach and self-castigation were fairly well pronounced when I was just a small tot.

*

I can say little to what you have said here, because it all hits the mark. The habit of blaming others is deeply ingrained, and it is a natural outlet for one’s maliciousness and sorrow. And the reason this is so is because it is natural, ingrained instinctual behaviour.

Despite ‘my’ best intentions, I have found myself engaged in blaming others for my unhappiness. The factors that make one unhappy come ultimately from one’s instinctual fear and aggression. It is possible to experience these instincts without the reflexive blaming of others, but it is very difficult. It seems to me that it is very important to experience the instincts without resorting to blame, because the blaming is a defensive adaptation, a means of coping with overwhelming feelings. One learns this behaviour early in life, because one can also manipulate and control others through criticising them. The self-criticism or self-castigation is, then, merely the flip-side of the same coin.

So, it seems to me that the blaming behaviour is not only a coping strategy, albeit a faulty one, but also it is instrumental in getting one what one wants in life. No wonder it is so deeply ingrained.

I’m having a little difficulty seeing the difference between assertiveness and autonomy. Assertiveness is concerned with ‘me’ and ‘my rights’. Assertiveness is commonly described as a way of discharging angry feelings through sticking up for one’s rights in a situation. Autonomy, on the other hand, is something that one can practice without putting forward one’s beliefs or views or asserting one’s rights. I wonder if there is a stage that people go through where at first they do have emotional reactions to situations, and as they learn increasing autonomy, these emotional reactions get less and less. For instance, when I quit my job, there very definitely was a strong emotional reaction at first, but resigning the job in hindsight seemed like an intelligent thing to do under the circumstances, even though there was the definite emotional reaction at first. So, even though I was emotional at first, I think it was a move towards autonomy. It could have been done without the emotional reaction, I suppose, but I don’t seem to be yet to the point where I am free from emotions. Gary to Peter

I seem to be in the stage right now where I am reaping the rewards of practicing the method of actualism. Yesterday, for instance, I did experience first some irritation and then some anger. It was a rather uncomfortable experience. But the interesting thing is that I realized how seldom and how rare it is for me to experience this uncomfortable emotional state. I was interested to learn when this had all started, what had triggered it, and why I was apparently so down on myself. I made a rather stupid error at work, but actually the feeling of irritation had started some time before that. The ego kind of takes over first, and I start pouring responsibilities on myself, expecting myself to be perfect, and then KAPOW! ... irritation and anger. It is fascinating and interesting to see this process at work and it tells me where I get off track and what I can do about it. And, yes, the advice to ‘keep one’s hands in one’s pockets’ is invaluable, as the feeling of anger and irritation is so malignant and so deadly it is apt to spill over in interactions with other people if one is not careful of it. Also, I wanted to say that any kind of off-colour emotional experience of this sort is evidence of ‘me’ – all traceable to the sense of identity. One can find one’s identity writ large across any emotional experiences of this type. What I have found is that any emotions all boil down to one’s identity. It’s like Vineeto said in another post recently: ‘What’s all the fuss about?’ If there is any fuss, it is always about ‘me’ – that I am this type of person, or I must be treated this way by others, so on and so forth. Richard’s discovery that the Human Condition is typified by being an identity is a major groundbreaking discovery. I’ve never run across anyone anywhere saying it in quite this way with such radical implications. Eliminate the identity in toto and there is no more pain, no more suffering, no more malice and sorrow, and no more need to go off half-cocked into delusory spiritual and metaphysical realms. Gary to Peter

The Breton and Largent article, interesting though it may be, seems to be a rather shallow treatment of the subject of warfare and killing. I would like to take this opportunity to comment on it, perhaps at the risk of seeming to ‘nitpick’.

One of B & L’s theses is that human beings are not blood-thirsty killers such as depicted in Hollywood treatments of war. This hardly seems surprising. I would think it would be rather evident to any but the most naive that Hollywood depictions of real life events are given wide latitude to depict those events in the most lurid ways. This is so obviously true about Hollywood depictions of warfare that we hardly need these authors to remind us about it.

But of greater concern to me is that the authors seem to think that the socially and morally inculcated aversion to killing that occurs in the several up-front and personal accounts of combat that they offer along with the article are enough to answer the question that they start the article off with. Although I have never been in a war, and so have no personal experience with combat, I am aware that there is this gut-level aversion to the killing of other human beings. I suspect, though I can’t prove it, that for every personal combat account of revulsion with the killing aspect of war, there will be another account of the exhilaration, indeed the feeling of jubilation at the vanquishing of an enemy.

My only real personal experience of this was with my near and dear friend, whom I have been friends with since the age of 4, who was drafted into service in Vietnam, who was wounded in action in Vietnam, who came home and told the most blood-curdling stories to his personal and intimate friends of his ‘up-front and personal’ experiences of killing Viet Cong, and there was absolutely no remorse or revulsion with the business of killing. Was he a monster? I think not. He was raised in a milieu much as the one I was raised in. He was not a monster but he clearly enjoyed the business of killing. Was he a freak, an aberration? Again, I don’t think so. But so much for the personal anecdotes.

The other thing, though, that these authors seem to skip over completely is the shattering and overwhelming evidence of history. Even assuming that most people have a gut-wrenching aversion to killing another human being, who do they think is responsible for killing the millions of human beings who have perished in wars in the last hundred years? I’ll tell you in case you haven’t guessed it already -other human beings. The simple fact is that human beings are killing one another, and in prodigious quantities. So far, the inculcated aversion to killing has not been enough to stem the flow of blood from the battlefield. In fact, quite the opposite. Given the wonders of technology, we now have wars that look more like Nintendo games. Isn’t it also a fact that most men firing at the enemy in combat do so at ranges that are extreme – at least that is my understanding of the European war. Most men firing at the enemy didn’t even see who they were firing at.

But to get back to the point I am trying to make: human beings kill other human beings. There are more wars going on in the world at this time than at any other time in recorded history. The history of any particular nation is the history of armed conflict, of conquest, exploitation, murder, and mayhem. The authors of this article seem to have an overweening confidence that ethics and morality will stem the flow of blood that flows across the pages of history. I think they are mistaken. Many of my fellow countrymen and women are clambering at this time to get their hands on Osama Bin Laden right now. Many of them would proudly step up to the plate and personally wring his neck or get a few kicks in for the thousands who died in New York. Do you think they would shrink from the killing? I doubt it, judging from the comments I hear made and from what I witness on TV and in the press.

Are human beings killers? There are two ways to look at this. Who else has killed all those millions of people who have died in wars in the last hundred years? Of course human beings are killers.

The other way to look at it is this: the only thing that makes one a bona fide killer is the act of killing, at least legally speaking. By that definition the overwhelming majority of human beings in the world are not killers. But the evidence of history makes it scarcely possible for them to congratulate themselves that they haven’t joined in the fray and killed their fellow human beings. Gary to No 22

Considering that I did not at the time directly answer your question, I will attempt to do so at the present time. If you are looking for evidence for the joy, indeed jubilation, of killing, then I would suggest you read ‘Hitler’s Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust’ by Daniel J. Goldhagen. There you will find abundant first-hand documentary evidence that human beings can commit atrocious and debased acts of killing and torture and thoroughly enjoy it, indeed, even relish it.

Yet I was reading a book over the weekend entitled ‘The Big Push: An Episode of The Great War’ by Patrick MacGill. He was a stretcher bearer in the Irish London Rifles and was in the great battle of Loos in WW1, taken prisoner and lived to tell about it. He had this to say about some of his compatriots:

‘It was interesting to see how the events of the morning had changed the nature of the boys. Mild-mannered youths who had spent their working hours of civil life in scratching with inky pens on white paper, and their hours of relaxation in cutting capers on roller skates and helping dainty maidens to teas and ices, became possessed of mad Berserker rage and ungovernable fury. Now that their work was war the bloodstained bayonet gave them play in which they seemed to glory.

‘Here’s one that I’ve just done in,’ I heard M’Crone shout, looking approvingly at a dead German. ‘That’s five of the bloody swine now.’

What clearer evidence could there be than this, from the words of an eyewitness himself? Gary to No 22

Article posted by No 22 –

© 1999 Denise Breton and Christopher Largent

One of the persistent pictures that we have of ourselves comes from the phenomenon of war. We tend to believe that in wars ‘brave fighting men’ and women (by the way) patriotically and emotionlessly kill their fellow beings for any cause that demands it. <snipped for space>

When we’re not waving a flag about this – when we’re not consumed with patriotic feelings or anger at ‘the enemy’ – we look at war more objectively. And most of the time, we look at it with sadness, because it presents us with a murderous humanity. A war-focused history gives us the impression, even the conviction, that beneath a thin veneer of moral heroism and civility, we’re all killers.

Up front, we want to be clear that we’re not saying that there isn’t bravery during wars; quite the contrary, there is exceptional valour. What we’re saying is that a close look at the history of warfare reveals two surprising facts: (a) that soldiers do not kill each other the way we see on war films and (b) that valour comes as much from those who do not kill as those who do. <snipped for space>

That in the entire history of warfare only a very few humans could be induced to kill other humans is a fact known to military historians – though not generally known to the public. <snipped for space>

Most of this refusal to kill is hidden from the public, and in its place, we usually see what combat veteran Jack Thompson calls ‘Combat Addiction.’ That is, the efficiently killing soldier we see in movies or on television comes mostly from that tiny percentage of men who become addicted to violence. <snipped for space>

Along with combat-addicted soldiers are those who kill from combat stress and for revenge (someone who saw a buddy killed in battle and wants to kill in response).

How about the other 196 men (out of the 1000) who do fire? How do they feel if they kill someone? In general, the results of war trauma are devastating, and Dave Grossman devotes an entire chapter of On Killing to ‘The Nature of Psychiatric Casualties: The Psychological Price of War.’ No soldier – as society learned painfully in a famous World War II study (Grossman, pp. 43-44) and from Vietnam veterans – simply returns from war. Even those who refuse to discuss what they’ve been through, as Sandra Bloom shows in Creating Sanctuary (pp. 64-69), pass their wounds down to later generations with ever more destructive results. <snipped for space>

Suddenly, humans look less like brutal killers and more like beings struggling with the phenomenon of war. They seem more trapped in this horror than at home in it, and the traumas from it scar their lives. And we need to remind ourselves that none of the soldiers had any say in starting the wars. Even those who kill intentionally didn’t set out to be killers. Rather, they ended up in wars begun – especially in modern times – by those who do not fight.

So, when we look at war’s history rather than war’s propaganda, we see a different nature from the one portrayed in war films. And we see responses that suggest that we humans may not be as murderous as the entertainment industry makes us out to be. © 1999 Denise Breton and Christopher Largent 

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