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Violence Culture

Like much of the connected world, this month became an extended media binge for me. The packaging of violence as entertainment is something, once drawn to my attention years ago, I’ve tried to be more conscious of, especially the last few weeks. Fictional violence is escapist and thrilling, inevitable and commonplace, and something I increasingly have mixed feelings about.


Violence is in our DNA, central to our myth: this country was forged in the crucible of conflict, and the Second Amendment enshrines the right to bear arms in a way that few other nations do. It bathes our history with wars won, numerous and major, just and improper, that place us in world preeminence and shape a sense of destiny, but also smaller wars, individual and domestic, chronicled and private, that fracture cohesion and make us more fragile. We fetishize violence by worshiping its tools and trivializing it in culture, depicting it indiscriminately across our screens for entertainment, where nonsensical body counts minimize death and render it inconsequential and irrelevant, demeaning actual tragedy and suffering. While violence in nature is wielded in primal, small scale struggle for survival, whether hunting for prey, defending the group, or competing for a mate, today’s firearms embrace an unnatural, rapacious capacity for destruction and effortless carnage that the founding fathers could never have foreseen. 

And yet, violence between humans has been decreasing; deaths due to armed conflict have been replaced by deaths in civilian hospital beds, with the military death rate falling tenfold in the last fifty years. We’ve decided we want less of its destabilizing and traumatic effects, and more education, economic growth, and higher living standards instead; the intentional homicide rate in the US almost halved in the last twenty years alone, while around the world, literacy rates quadrupled last century. We might feel differently about our virtual reality, but we desire less violence IRL, not more. Yes, humans are designed to survive in the natural world, and aggression is part of our physical and mental make-up, but putative proxies such as sports do exist in modern times (with even the idea of sportsmanship to accommodate civility in competition). Much has been written about these trends and why we should be optimistic about the future, and it seems safe to say much of the world is on a general trajectory towards greater peace, with a bias to broadening justice by lessening inequity and unnecessary suffering: witness the recognition of gender, racial, and LGBTQ equality over the last century, and the growing awareness of animal rights – the untold collateral suffering that our tidy supermarket packaging obscures – within the rise of the plant-based food movement. We’ll see if this continues, but the direction of recent history is difficult to dispute: less is more when it comes to violence.

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film notes

Inside Job (2011), Charles Ferguson

The two defining world events of the last decade have been 9-11 and the ensuing Iraqi occupation, and the global financial crisis of 2008 – for which the last word has still to be written. Filmmaker Charles Ferguson may have created the definitive documentary film accounts for both – in 2008, No End in Sight provided a damning analysis of the US-Iraqi occupation and subsequent insurgency, and his latest film, Inside Job, takes on the failure of the US financial industry.

As he did with No End in Sight, Ferguson provides a well paced and strikingly clear account of the causes and events leading up to 2008, and parades before us a gallery of villains and players (some of whom he interviews, rendering quite uncomfortable under his grilling in the process), most of whom still remain in key decision making positions. You’ll come away with an understanding of how all this happened; anger that while catastrophe has been averted for now, things really haven’t changed; and an insight into the scale of the problem.

The key messages:

  • the financial industry is too powerful, and wields disproportionate influence on government (lobbyists in general, wield too much power);
  • this allows them to heavily influence legislation of their industry, including the financial deregulation which laid the groundwork for the events of 2008;
  • deregulation leads to an industry where conflict of interest is legalised, and where the capitalist ethos, self-interest and short term gains thrive and are encouraged.

One solution appears to be greater regulation to prevent conflicts of interest, but given the power the financial industry currently wields, the chances of this happening any time soon are low.

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film notes

No End in Sight (2008), Charles Ferguson

Also on Netflix Instant.

The most surprising thing about this film for me – in Charles Ferguson’s narrative, how seemingly clear and direct the causes were for the current tragedy that is Iraq – egregious, depressingly mundane, and avoidable. The initial post-invasion goodwill was rapidly, almost systematically dismantled and destroyed, creating an environment for insurgency.

The mistakes made provide learnings which can also be applied to any undertaking where a number of people are involved, and planning is needed.

  1. Insufficient (and bad) planning. An example: martial law was not immediately established, with no good reason for this other than senior leadership thinking it wasn’t necessary. This left a void for law, order and security, which was quickly filled by religious extremist groups.
  2. Advice of experts and people on the ground was ignored. During the planning stage, General Shinseki’s recommended number of troops for the occupation was questioned and dismissed, even though he had direct and recent experience with post-war occupation – and he was later proven right.
  3. People were not treated with dignity. The Iraqi army was dismissed, as well as the incumbent government, completely disregarding people’s basic needs – an opportunity to make a living with respect and dignity. The Green Zone post-invasion immediately created a clear “us and them” environment.
  4. Insufficient communication, both within senior leadership and through the entire organization, and among the key leaders, a general lack of critical thinking and thoughtfulness.
  5. No desire to seek out differing opinions, or speak with others to build consensus and buy-in. Not toeing the company line meant being removed from your position, eventually resulting in an organization of yes men – nepotism in government.