Good article. I think there should be more efforts like yours to tackle broad topics and fewer efforts to pick policy nits here on OpEdNews.

o It seems that being an "American" (so called, though USer works better for me) becomes more embarrassing by the day. I abhor the way violence adheres to our national character.

o In the list of violent sports baseball and basketball should rightly be added.

o Where did your reference to "manageable violence" come from? I'm wondering if there's something I've missed that should be aware of.

While I certainly agree that violence needs to be managed, that it is inherently dangerous, and as you say, it resist management, I hasten to add that we manage it all the time and have no choice but to manage it. It's not about to go away. Violence is not unnatural. It's behavior hard-wired into our reptilian brain. Men are obviously more familiar with it than women since they produce a lot more testosterone. Because of that ability (testosterone is invaluable in fight or flight situations) the subject of violence necessarily has a sex-linked attribute. You should have mentioned that. Due to the biological foundations of violence, its management is largely a thing for men to practice and a thing for women to understand. When violence management is discussed seriously it is not, first and foremost, a matter of opinion or moralistic philosophy. It's a matter of hard science. Violence is a hard fact of nature, of which we know quite a bit. We also know a lot (but not nearly enough) about managing it. Any successful attempt to deal with violence has to be founded on objective facts. Given a firm foundation, we can then begin to philosophize about it.

Your conclusion is exact. We must be "willing to commit to the levels of personal and societal nonviolence that will permeate to the core of our cultural establishments." It is a collective problem, not just a collection of personal problems.

So, were will the motivation to do anything about it come from? I haven't a clue.

o Our natural aversion to violence, seem to be more conscious when it involves dogs. When violence is directed toward brown-skinned people, U.S. Americans are not so concerned.

There is a relevant, dramatic video clip on YouTube. Robert Byrd gave a rather long rant about animal cruelty on the floor of the Senate with a focus of the Michael Vick case. I want to draw attention to his deep emotional reaction. In the link below, fast-forward to 5:00. Watch him yell repeatedly, "Barbaric! Barbaric! Barbaric! ..." (nb: Senator Byrd will be 90 this November)

Part 2 of 3: SENATOR Robert Byrd -- Dog Fighting

by Max Ward (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 43 comments) on Sunday, Jul 22, 2007 at 6:20:04 PM

Apologies for the delay in getting back to you. Thanks for your comment.

Your question about the source of the term “manageable violence” led me to research the term a bit online. I had not intended to reference “manageable violence” as an official or professional term. For the purposes of this article, I effectively invented (or thought I had invented) the term and placed it in ‘dummy quotes’ to demonstrate my skepticism of the concept. As it turns out, however, there is, in the professional realm, some related terminology.

“Violence management” is a concept that is referenced in literature related to institutional psychiatry and institutional corrections (and other additional areas, no doubt - these are just the ones that I found). There are also recurring references, in other contexts, to a quote by an author named Samuel Huntington from his book titled The Soldier and the State: The Theory and Politics of Civil-Military Relations (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1957). Huntington suggested that the essential function of military officers was to act as “managers of violence.”

I also found a bizarre reference to the concept of ‘manageable violence’ that demonstrates the potential power of twisted rhetoric to contort clear reasoning.

Re: Your comment on the relationship between biology and violence:

Please know that I believe it is always significant when male persons are willing to acknowledge and accept responsibility for male violence in our culture. The people who are most able to influence male behavior are other males. When there is consensus in the male community that it is cool to be nurturing and supportive of others, there will be a considerable decrease in the levels of male violence.

However, one of the things I am grateful to be reminded of by feminist theory is that an essentialist perspective will rarely provide us with complete clarification. I include this link to the National Criminal Justice Reference Service (NCJRS) that provides statistics on the dramatic increase in crimes - including violent crimes - committed by female offenders. According to NCJRS:

“Many risk factors can contribute to women's criminal behavior, including substance abuse, mental illness, and spousal abuse. One of the most significant risk factors is prior victimization …”.

What I mean to suggest is that even though violence has historically been a problem associated with maleness, there are other causal factors to consider as well. Although I don’t have a ready reference, I am aware that some feminist writers have suggested that violence has historically been associated with male privilege and that when women act out violently, they may be acting ‘as’ males - i.e., they may be acting from the perspective that they are ‘choosing privilege.’

Also - although I feel that this is not what you mean to say - I am including a link to demonstrate that other perspectives may be associated with essentialist rhetoric around the issue of violence.

Thanks again for your comment.

 

 

by Ginger Carter (1 articles, 6 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 16 comments) on Thursday, Jul 26, 2007 at 3:01:28 AM