“No matter how idealistic the aim sounds, this new century must become the Century of Humanity, when we as human beings rise above race, creed, colour, religion and national self-interest and put the good of humanity above the good of our own tribe. For the sake of the children and our future. Peux ce que veux. Allons-y.”
Lt. General Roméo Dallaire, Force Commanding Officer of the UN Assistance Mission To Rwanda, 1993-1994.
This article is really a comment I had been posting in response to Claus Jacobsen’s excellent and thought provoking piece The temptations of national security. Like the best writing it hit a certain nerve, pulling together so many ideas that a simple comment ballooned immediately out of control in all sorts of directions. Instead, here it is, with my thanks to Claus.
He writes:
When animals refrain from butchering each other over the right to procreate or hold a certain territory, we must view it as an evolutionary mechanism. The individual will fight for his own successful procreation, but be blocked by the collective interest in the survival of the specie. Should rivals eliminate each other, the collective probability of survival would be greatly reduced on a long term basis.
Individuals will take care not to kill close relatives, down to say cousins, because this would mean destroying a survival pathway for the genes they have in common with that relative (for example my brother and I share 50% of our genes if we have the same mother and father) – evolution has created a psychology which closely matches these percentages. Actions outside those considerations are sometimes extraordinarily brutal: I saw a nature documentary the other day describing the way brown bear males would kill the cubs of a female so as to bring her on to heat that season and allow them to mate with her. What is the distinction between this and two males fighting (which is much more “civilized” – the weaker male usually backs down early, and is not pursued by the winner)? The difference is that the weak male might sometimes be lucky enough to wound the stronger, even while losing the fight. The stronger has to fight a number of battles in a season; if they were to the death he would never make it through. So I mean “civilized” behaviour exists only when it has a logical underpinning, in animals.
If you see human tribal behaviour, battles between tribes are usually a matter of bluff and intimidation, with only a few casualties or woundings on each side. This is for much the same reason male bears rarely fight to the death; the chance of a Phyrric victory is too great. What’s more, the solidarity of the tribe is of absolute importance to the survival of its members, so there are strongly built social and behavioural tabus against murder – meaning killing another member of one’s tribe. I’ve never had the hebrew to verify this but I was told that the Commandment was originally “thou shalt not murder” rather than “thou shalt not kill”; the difference being that murder was within the tribe, whereas killing outsiders was a matter of pragmatism rather than ethics.
How do genocides happen? They’re rarer than battles but not unknown throughout history, from Saul to Magdeburg to the several in the last century. Usually they are preceeded by a period of propaganda designed to dehumanize the enemy. A group practice which builds a frenzy of resentment against the cockroaches and dogs who have always plotted against us and must therefore be exterminated. The language appears over and over again, the same each time. It is a mechanism for overcoming the necessary tabus which hold the internal structure of a tribe safe. [Claus is entirely right in saying that the removal of these mechanisms makes us less than human.]
There are implications in all this of the most serious nature for the present. First, we have in the most extreme cases the ability to conduct genocide without the buildup of propaganda: our leaders can press a button and destroy millions. This means we must build a clear understanding with leadership before the event that such action is not acceptable. And why is it not acceptable? In purely pragmatic terms is it not better to have an opponent who cannot rise again? Not in this world… we are all connected, and the only strategy against an opponent who would countenance such a knockout punch is to get him first. In this case we descend to the situation of too many rats in a too small cage, tearing one another apart.
I believe the solution is to become more than human. We must consider all humanity as part of our family, using our genetic predisposition to help our relatives to our advantage. Build bridges, tolerate differences, become so close to one another in communication that no one can succeed in the propaganda of genocide.