Why we fight...

[Steve]

I'm reading a book right now called A Fighter's Heart, by Sam Sheridan. Good book reflecting on the nature of our fascination with violence. Why men and women train in violent arts and why many of us feel compelled to test ourselves against nature, against each other and against ourselves.

But that's not what I'm posting about.

In that book, Sam refers to another book: Barbara Ehrenreich’s Blood Rites. To be clear, I haven't read this book, although I might pick it up if I can. Sam refers to one of her theories and as I understand it, it boils down to something like this: we fight in order to defeat within ourselves millions of years of prey instinct. According to Sam, Barabara's theory is that humans (I assume back to austrilapithicus or further) were prey. We were weaker than other creatures, easily killed and eaten. We were like antelope. Our triumph over our predators was and is social. We band together, building tools and strategies that allow us to prevail.

Yet we are, at our core, still prey. The compulsion to fight is the compulsion to expunge our prey instinct and to assert ourselves as predators. And we watch fights because we vicariously celebrate our own status as predators through the victor. We admire athletes who win, who compete and triumph. He also refers to people who identify themselves to closely to their teams that they use the pronoun "we." For example, "We could have won that game, had our running back not been injured." Or, "Next year, we'll make it to the World Cup if we can find a better goal keeper."

I don't know about you guys, but I find the idea of this to be very... provocative. I've tried not to editorialize too much because I'd like to hear what you guys think of this. I think that it has a lot of interesting implications both in favor of and against competition and the nature of violent sport.

 

[Flying Crane]

It's an interesting idea, but I don't think there is any way to really prove it.

Humans were/are prey animals in many ways, but we are also predators and have been from day one. Until we began making tools and weapons with which to hunt and to defend ourselves from other larger, stronger, faster predators, we were just an unremarkable group of primates somewhere in the middle of the food chain. Not at the bottom, definitely not at the top.

We are at the top now only because of our ability to cooperate in sophisticated ways (altho we are not the only animals who do that) and because we have made the most sophisticated and effective and reliable weapons and tools with which to ensure our position. But on an individual or small group level, if you take those tools away, we are back in the lower level of the middle of the food chain. Probably even moreso now than before because socially and culturally we have largely separated ourselves from actively interacting within that food chain. Most of humanity is soft and unfit and inexperienced, and would not survive for long if left on the Serengetti without any weapons, or even with simple weapons like a knife or spear, and even in a small group (I am excluding tribal groups like the !kung who still live this way and know what they are doing in such a setting).

So really, our removal from being prey is very artificial, and perhaps may even prove to be short lived in the larger scope of natural history.

At any rate, has this crept into the collective psyche of our species, to be vented thru ritualized violence? Maybe, maybe not. I don't know how to prove or disprove it. It's certainly interesting speculation.

 

[Hyper_Shadow]

I always say I train to fight the strongest and become stronger in turn. I suppose that makes sense to me. Being so powerful that you don't have to be prey to anything anymore..... I think I'm gonna check out those books. Thanks for the interesting topic.

 

[Svart]

Hmm its an interesting topic to read on. But what about lions and other large, top end predators? Growing up they reguarly scuffle with each other, even as cubs they wrestle and fight. I guess you could say this is a natural way of them developing their killing skills.
Definitely something hard to pin point.

 

[kingkong89]

great post. we fight for all of us have a bug in us, this bug is our sense of danger, adventure, and violence. its the bug when we watch a movie like indiana jones, or enter the dragon, or even rush hour that makes us say i want to be that character. it is basic human instinct, how we use this instinct is up to the one who it controls or who controls it.

a fool fights for he wants to, to taste, to feel, to see, but a wise man fights only because he must to defend, himself, country, family, and honor.

 

[MA-Caver]

Had an interesting conversation with a man 20-30+ years my senior about this topic last week.
He said that in effect because we have no natural weapons... save one, our minds that have brought us from the bottom of the food chain to the top. Yes, there are those who still get eaten by sharks, lions, tigers and bears (oh-my!) and even by soldier ants but by and large we are the species which has crawled then fought our way to the top of the food chain. The IRONY is we got there because we were fighting each other.
We learned from battles with nature and with each other on how to achieve this position.
The (human) mind is and always has been the greatest weapon on the planet... Darwin Award winners and nominees not-with-standing they're the throwbacks of our species and like the site says do us a favor by weeding themselves out of our gene pool... just as nature intended, just as Darwin observed as survival of the fittest.
We are a "violent" species overall. Yes we are also capable of great acts of generosity, kindness, gentleness and all of that and also with other species... but we wouldn't have been able to show our "softer side" without first asserting our hard side first and dominating the planet like we do.
But yes, as it was said it is instinct borne of adversity and survival. But again we have something not very many animals have... reasoning. It has yet to be proven if higher mammals such as cetaceans and apes have reasoning capabilities, they do have intelligence yes but do they think things out like we do? That is still a mystery.
But we certainly have it, though not all of us always use it, but we got it. Yet we are also emotional creatures. We're born with our feelings and our feelings are who we are. We can learn control of said feelings and I think we do so via reasoning.
We do fight because of that animalistic nature within all of us, but we do so out of choice. Remember that there are literal pacifists out there who will stand by and do nothing while someone attempts to kill them or someone they love. While many will probably agree that it's a stupid choice... it's one made from reasoning.

 

[Steve]

I have a follow up question that occurred to me reading kingkong89 final sentence: "a fool fights for he wants to, to taste, to feel, to see, but a wise man fights only because he must to defend, himself, country, family, and honor."

Do you enjoy training? If so, what is it about your training that you enjoy? Do you think that there's a connection to this idea that we are validating our status as a predator, even if we only engage in violent acts as a matter of training?

 

[chinto]

hmmm don't think I quite buy the pray idea.... we have always fought to survive.. from larger predators way way back.. and from others who would take what we built up as well.
In short we have always fought to survive. the threat is not the defining thing, but that in order to survive from predators or other humans or what ever else it was fighting or running would mean that you survived. fighting preserved the things you had worked hard to gather or make or grow. That is why fighting an agricultural society in a war is always more deadly then when hunter gatherers fight each other! because the farmer has to get home and work the land to feed his family and himself. you threaten his land and crop and life, so to deal with it so he can go back and do what he needs to do he is there to kill and destroy the enemy who threatened his livelihood. a hunter gatherer society sees war almost as a sport and casultys are rather small and almost rare, and status and glory and to perhaps settle some smaller arguments. but the stakes were not the same. we fight when we are threatened and the level of threat tends to gernerate a more intense and even lethal responce in acordence with the threat.

 

[bowser666]

I think I am going to check out that A Fighter's Heart book. Maybe it will give me more insight as to why people feel the need to compete. It is a riddle I want to unlock. THanks for the heads up.

 

[YoungMan]

It's not lions and bears I fear, because I don't run into many. It's the guy next to me who wants to beat people up for kicks that helps motivate me. Training so that you won't be a victim is very natural.

 

[Brian S]

There are as many reasons we fight as there are people. People do it for different reasons and on different levels from wars to mma events.