Remembrance Day is a time to honour those who have sacrificed themselves through military service to make the world safe for others. If you look at the current state of the world, it is clear we need to do more than remember. War is still with us. There are at present four major conflicts each resulting in more than 10,000 deaths in a year, and forty-six more conflicts with lower body counts.
So I wonder, why all the fighting? Don't we know better? Can we blame it on action movies or bloody video games or contact sports? Is there something essentially bellicose about human nature? Just asking.
In lieu of wearing a poppy this year, I invested an hour reading what others have written about this, and now I am slightly better informed. Here is what I found. If you read the following articles, prepare to be surprised.
I read your offered articles with interest. You're right: lots of questions.
ReplyDeleteThe one with all the lessons learned from being a fighter brought to mind our family's experience with judo. With four kids and shift work, we early decided we would Not be doing team/league sports. But realizing that children do need activity and skills building of some sort we opted for judo. The advantage of fixed class times, all levels and genders working out together were big pluses for us. Not all our kids were as delighted with our choice, but all participated and succeeded to the extent they could.
As time went on, all the other, not-so-obvious learnings from this ancient Japanese practice became more evident.
I recall one time when our gang were set upon by bullies at the bus stop. They reported to us that there had been some loss or minor damage to school books, etc. but mostly it had blown over.
Asked if they'd not used their judo techniques to defend themselves, the response was "I didn't want to hurt them..."
I can't say with any certainty whether or not violence or non-violence is inherent or learned. Probably like many things, it's a mixture.