Blocking the Transmission of Violence

Well, let's jump right in, shall we?

Reading this recent article in the NYTimes didn't provoke much of a response in me. I've never lived in an area where street violence was prevalent, and I don't feel qualified to judge any efforts to curb that problem. (The analogy of street violence to infectious disease did provoke some thought, as I have a background in microbiology.) What prompted me to write was not the article itself, but some rather 'pollyanna-ish' commentary on the article.

Here's a rather brash statement... You cannot rid the world of violence - be it war, street crime, or domestic violence - until you understand and acknowledge those same forces that drive lethal acts of violence within yourself. I would never do that, you say. The problem is them. They could just decide not to do it. Perhaps... So why does it persist?

One can choose to study the problem at several levels...

Why does the individual make the decision to kill, and how can his behavior be changed? What behavior could replace killing, and how would that behavior deal with the threat (or perceived threat) that drove him to choose lethal action in the first place? Is merely substituting one behavior for another at the individual level an adequate solution for the problem of violence? Or will a permanent solution to the problem of violence require something more?

Why do larger groups sanction lethal action against other groups? How does this sanction contribute to the actual committing of lethal acts by an individual? Does such sanction result in the absolving of personal responsibility for individual acts of lethality, or is that an arbitrary judgment whose validity rests solely in the 'authority' of various social structures?

Intrinsic to the problem of lethal violence is the issue of survival. Most acts of lethal violence are perpetrated in response to a perceived threat. Assuming for a moment that killing is simply the most morally wrong response to a perceived threat, we can shift our focus to the issues that underly most of the acts of lethal violence that are committed by individuals and/or sanctioned by group/societies - survival, and threat assessment.

Perhaps we can eliminate lethal violence by ensuring that everyone has plenty of food/clothing/necessary resources, you say. No one's physical survival would be in danger, so there would be no need to kill others. But what you fail to recognize is that what is necessary for survival in the moment is rarely deemed sufficient by those who would kill to have more. 'I may be okay today, but what about tomorrow?' Maslow points out that when the basic physiological needs are met, the next need to be addressed are needs concerning long-term safety - "These needs have to do with man's yearning for a predictable, orderly world in which injustice and inconsistency are under control, the familiar frequent, and the unfamiliar rare." One could argue that it is these needs that drive the majority of the acts of the lethal violence we see in our world today.

So perhaps the problem lies in the manner in which these types of threats are assessed...