Violence: The Starting Point Of Civilization

“I don’t like violence, Tom.  I’m a businessman.” – The Godfather

I tried to be an architect, but they didn’t like my library design.  It only had one story.

Violence is something that society has been built to avoid.  Historically, violence has been much higher – I recently wrote about the Yanomami people and how half of their men died in combat up until recently.  This is an ugly fact.

One of the myths that has been force-fed to us is that native peoples are nice and peaceful and reverent.  I had heard that people like the Blackfoot tribe “used ever part” of the animals they killed.  But that same tribe would kill them by making a herd stampede over a cliff, mashing themselves as they fell – it’s what’s called a “buffalo jump”.  Yes, I imagine they used a lot of the buffalo, but I’m fairly certain that practice resulted in a lot of waste just by the sheer nature gravity and the rocks below.

Likewise, the Aztecs were worse:  they sacrificed 4,000 actual humans for one party in 1487.

I know the Aztec priests worked hard, since the high priest said, “I’ve made a lot of sacrifices to get where I am today.”

Yet, now the world is much safer, though places like the United States are getting less safe by the day.

Why?

Not enough violence.  At least, not enough violence in the right places.

While Western Civilization certainly didn’t start the idea of laws, they’ve been embraced wholeheartedly since laws work.  Although the number of laws in our current system far exceeds the number we need for a functioning society, laws are still important.

But laws are just words.  Ultimately, enforcement of the law means that someone has to be willing to employ violence to follow up on the law, up to and including killing the violator.  That’s where the sheer number of laws gets silly.  Should we really face imprisonment for a broken taillight?

Yes, I know that’s not the penalty, but try not paying the fine and see what happens.  Eventually, people with guns will come and put you in jail and if you resist, they will shoot you.  The reason I think we should consider very carefully what laws we as a society have is that ultimately the threat of violence is what underpins them all.  The Feds ended up putting dozens of people to death at Waco over novelty paperweights.

That is, of course, a ludicrous overuse of force, done by bureaucrats so that they could justify their funding at the congressional level.

I think we can agree, though, that laws are necessary.  And laws gain power through their enforcement.  If a law isn’t enforced, it loses all of its power.  If the penalty is too small, then the law will be ignored.  As I read once, “If a law is only punishable by a fine, that means it’s legal for a price.”

If you stop a Catholic service with a squirt gun, does that make it a Weapon of Mass Destruction?

Likewise, if attempted murder is punishable by six months in the slammer (I recently read about a murderer who was out after that length of time for attempted murder), the penalty is less severe than the fifteen years that a man received in Iowa for burning a pride flag.

If there is no penalty for crossing the American border and then taking over apartment buildings in Aurora, Colorado, why, people will do exactly that.  And why stop at one apartment building?  Martha Raddatz of ABC® seems to think that five is a perfectly acceptable number of apartment complexes to be taken over by criminal Venezuelan gangs.

This is the outcome of the propaganda that “violence is never the solution”.  Violence, or the threat of violence is often the only solution to many problems.  An example is if a thief is attempting to break into my house and do Heaven knows what.  My answer isn’t to politely state that what the thief is trying to do violates the laws.

I bought a substitute thesaurus, and it’s really bad.  Really bad.  Just, bad.

Nope.  In order to protect my house and family, I may have to use violence at that point.  Certainly, it will be a reluctant use, but the reason why homes don’t experience much burglary around here is because people have guns and burglars know that, and also know that juries around here are made of people just like me.

The law doesn’t keep houses in Modern Mayberry safe, the threat of violence keeps people safe.

But all the world isn’t Modern Mayberry.  Places like Chicago or Baltimore have ongoing violence levels that are at multi-decadal highs.  Why?

The criminals have gotten the message that they can do whatever they want, whenever they want.  And if someone tries to step in and protect citizens?  Well, like the Marine Corps veteran Daniel Penny, who restrained a potentially dangerous man in a way he thought would keep everyone safe, they’ll be put on trial.

Yes, and the trial is expected to take six weeks.  At $1,000 an hour for lawyers, that’s $40,000 a week.  Or $240,000 for all six.  Maybe he’s got a coupon?

Is a lawyer required to name his daughter Sue?

Regardless of if Penny is found guilty or not, his trial sends the same message as New York has always sent to its citizens:  you’re not allowed to protect yourselves.  Criminals threatening violence have the upper hand.  Just ask Bernie Goetz, who decided he refused to be a mugging victim again.

We’re at the point where the criminals will start using violence – not because they have any political objective, but just because no one is stopping them, and those who would attempt to stop them are punished very visibly.

The way forward is obvious.  At some point, decent people will have no other place to flee, and will have to stand and fight.  When I review history, the pattern is pretty clear that civilization does return, though it does take the reestablishment of violence to get us there, and probably a few more buffalo jumps.

I had a bison steak the other night, and asked the waiter for the buffalo bill.

And it’s been 200 years since the last organized buffalo jump, I here.  I guess that makes it a bison-tennial.  And maybe Penny can get an Aztec lawyer – they get right to the heart of the problem.