Physical aggression

originally posted by: ketsuko
The thing about anger is to understand what it is that makes you angry and why. If you go through life without that knowledge than you are a mass of switches just waiting to be flipped by anyone and everyone.

Not to mention anyone in sports can tell you that you actually do worse when you are angry. You need a high degree of focused concentration in order to excel at any sport. Using a sport in order to take out your anger and aggression doesn't make you a good competitor because you are not in control, your emotions are.

I kind of responded to this in the post I just wrote, but in referring to violence, I was not speaking of anger.
To me, anger is the product of repression- it is the physical impulsions of energy that have been repressed and fermented by the mind over time.

A common source of anger I have experienced and witnessed is when my body has a reaction of aggression (sudden chemical production which speeds up heart rate and blood pressure, sends blood to the muscles...) and out of my conditioned ideas against violence, I did not allow my body to act. Immediately afterwards, my mind formed ideas about who the emotion was "about" or whose fault it was- because I was judging it "bad" that I felt that way, so now there has to be a fault somewhere for this bad thing!

Holding those thoughts in mind, became a way of triggering a repeat of the physiological state, each time I thought about it.

Once long ago, I was on the metro in Paris, with my children. A couple of young guys were lifting up the skirt of a young girl, and when the father said to them to stop, they attacked him. A fight broke out, and the men fell on top of me and my two youngest children (ages three and five at the time). On one hand, I felt a surge of energy, and wanted to push and punch them off, but the part of me that believed I mustn't be violent, under any circumstances, kept from reacting and I quivered under the blows passively.
Other passengers stopped the train with the emergency pull, and they collectively threw the young men out of the door. I found myself standing up, filled with blood pounding in my ears and my fists clenched, and suddenly very embarrassed at my aggressive posture.

It took me only half a second to start a dialogue in my head about how they were bad, and violence is bad, and it was their fault I was succumbing to violent feelings ( I am no longer at fault for my sinful aggressive reaction, they are).
Not only that, I spun it further, to their racial background (algerian) and this memory served to make me angry every time I thought about it. It even laid down my first beginnings of racist thinking.

If I had just let my body react, punch and push them off violently, I probably would have let the whole thing go without thinking about it too much. If I just accepted my violent urge in the moment as normal and useful physical instincts.
I also would have walked away feeling less scared of people in general- I would have some sense of having some physical reactions that aid me in life and in case of threat. My ideas about violence as universally bad left me passive in dangerous situations- which made me fearful on a regular basis. Fear of potential threat around one creates more problems...

a reply to: Wang Tang

I am totally on the same wavelength as Nietzsche in regards to this. I do not personally think we can avoid or kill off our natural drives, and that trying to do so is only damaging. Learning to master and channel them is the best hope.

I saw this morning that someone put up an old interview with Ayn Rand, and her objectivism synched in my mind with this subject- her assertion that reason should be the only driving force behind anything we do. I used to believe that.

But as an adult, and perhaps because of being in a culture which, to the contrary of American protestant values, holds the body and it's drives high in value (seeing the mind as more a source of mistakes and sin), I came to perceive what they are getting at. I did not come altogether to their view, that thinking leads to folly and danger, but I see that there is a time and place for everything, and sometimes the body is better adapted to responding to the world then the mind.

It was primarily in working with horses that I learned the real value of my body and it's automatic impulses. Thinking first, reasoning, sometimes simply cannot be quick enough and makes the difference between injury and well being.
My biggest problem at first was that I would lose precious seconds observing what is happening, and choosing a response.
An instructor had to keep yelling at me, "Don't think! Act!" -Which was very scary proposal for someone who had been raised to believe that is dangerous!

With time I learned that I can rely on my body, it can carry out actions which inter-react with others around efficiently, without my mind even having to pay attention. My elbow shoots out as a horse whips their nose around to bite me, and he slams that nose into the hard nub, and doesn't try again. That happens even when the head is behind me! I didn't see it, except perhaps in peripheral vision that I am not aware of, and I didn't "tell" my elbow to do that, or calculate the exact position that nose was headed. This happens without my conscious reasoning mind getting involved.

And we go about our relationship as if nothing happened. There are no hard feelings on my part- the horse has it's right to feel irritated or whatever, and I have my right to defend my limits, and it is in the past now.

In such cases, my mind can be a obstacle, and a source of problems. The body is made of this physical world, and is perfectly adapted to it. My mind flies in realms of subjective associations of conceptual forms, not subject to time and space.

a reply to: Bluesma

Keep in mind that gender roles vary from culture to culture in many ways- little if any of that has anything to do with biology or nature- its just a cultural habit.

There is nothing inherently feminine about communication. In fact wouldn't it be unmanly if someone couldn't look you in the eye and say excuse me please step aside, and instead felt they had to squeeze or push past you? Insecure people take a purely physical option that shortens their interaction with others- they'd rather have you pissed off while they're walking away and gamble that you won't chase them, instead of have you size them up and decide whether or not to cooperate.

And there is nothing inherently masculine about violence. Men tend to shoot each other. They like reducing violence to a click of their finger. When a woman does get violent, she's more likely than a man to use something cruel and personal like a knife.

People need to to be active, they need to physically struggle against problems and succeed, and they need to resolve all of their problems, but they need not struggle violently against their human problems. There's no reason one can't solve problems involving others peacefully and struggle for dominance over other challenges. I like to use grunt labor jobs as my violent outlet. A construction site is my mammoth hunt- I'm gonna carry more material per trip, i'm gonna make the most trips, i'm gonna slam and jam things together, and I'm gonna be watching to see if anyone is able to stay ahead of me. I'm gonna put out as much force as i can, I'm gonna make things bigger than me do what i want them to do, and everyone's gonna notice that earning dinner for their families is easier when I'm around.
Compared to lashing out in the moment, by having the discipline to carry that energy peacefully and channel it in a productive direction at the right time, I get more benefit in every way. I get more respect, more influence, more stress relief, more exercise, and instead of getting enemies and injuries i get money for it. I think the feeling of being unburdened and suddenly at rest mentally and physically that you get after a fight is mild and shortlived compared to coming down from a good days work.

originally posted by: The Vagabond

There is nothing inherently feminine about communication. In fact wouldn't it be unmanly if someone couldn't look you in the eye and say excuse me please step aside, and instead felt they had to squeeze or push past you? Insecure people take a purely physical option that shortens their interaction with others- they'd rather have you pissed off while they're walking away and gamble that you won't chase them, instead of have you size them up and decide whether or not to cooperate.

And there is nothing inherently masculine about violence. Men tend to shoot each other. They like reducing violence to a click of their finger. When a woman does get violent, she's more likely than a man to use something cruel and personal like a knife.

Out of concern for cutting down the length of my posts, I have somewhat left out the bases of my thinking and terminology, probably because I have written them out many times before and forget there are readers who aren't already familiar with where I am coming from.

I refer to masculine or feminine qualities as one both genders have- the YIn and Yang in all of us. In this context, the social collective drives, and the individualist drives; the drives towards synthesis and those for contrast; relation and object.

There may or may not be naturally higher or prominent sides in each gender biologically (studies indicate there might be- hormonal influences do exist...) but I am sure that depending upon environment, either gender can be conditioned to develop either side.


Being able to think out and reason before putting such drives into action is made possible by organized society, in which fighting to survive, to have food, or mating rights, is not necessary. It is replaced by a collective force which is much larger than the individual.

You make the point well- in some sorts of physical labor, we can spend that energy; in some sports and hobbies, we can use it. That is pretty much what I mean.
Look at the state of society today- the amount of physical labor needed is waning, partly because of technology, partly because of out-sourcing. American kids don't plan on construction jobs- they are expected to get jobs where they use their minds more than their bodies. So... that leaves a lack of outlets for aggressive drives.
Now, we've been taught to channel those primarily physical drives into mental ones, through this repression-fermentation process- to use it as fuel for getting ahead financially, for example.

The problem remains that we lose confidence in our physical abilities to defend ourselves against any potential threat!
This is where guns and knives then become necessary. This is where the mind begins to worry- what if I was threatened by someone? What would I do? OMG! I better make sure I have a weapon, I better be on the watch for bad guys, I better be vigilant and ready!!

If someone has gotten into a few fights, or practiced an impact sport, they are more likely to shrug and say, "well, I guess I'd deal with it. " -and not become further obsessed.

a reply to: Bluesma

There is no obligation to be a sedentary button pusher in our culture. That's a choice people make, and there are plenty of outs from that without obsessing over one's readiness for yesterday's challenges. One could be insecure about his inability to joust on horseback just as easily- but if he wastes his life covering that base he's gonna come out with much greater insecurities when he realizes just how small and unimportant the hill he chose to become king of really is.

I get that the world dwarfs us all and makes us entertain ideas about what it might take to give us ultimate security but there is no such thing. Our lives are not what they are because of some cultural wrong turn- that is just a matter of flavor. Suppose we had a culture that embraces violent affirmations of our abilities- it wouldn't level the playing field. The guys who would lose any fight they got into in todays world and know it would not be in any better standing in a world where both they and the next guy up the hierarchy are more practiced at it.

We talked about cops earlier- Cops are some of the most prepared for violence people on our streets. It doesn't give them cool confidence- it makes them panic fire until they are out of ammo at unarmed men. They might be tough but they've entered a melee that's much bigger than any one man and it leaves them scared and insecure and vicious.

originally posted by: The Vagabond
a reply to: Bluesma

There is no obligation to be a sedentary button pusher in our culture. That's a choice people make,

I think that is waving off the strong influence of cultural pressure though. It took me many years and a separation from my culture, to accept that I am a physical personality, and like doing physical types of work, manual labor. My family, however, is ashamed. I am sure I never would have come to this point if I was still amongst them.

and there are plenty of outs from that without obsessing over one's readiness for yesterday's challenges. One could be insecure about his inability to joust on horseback just as easily- but if he wastes his life covering that base he's gonna come out with much greater insecurities when he realizes just how small and unimportant the hill he chose to become king of really is.

Agreed. I don't mean to support an exaggeration on the other side- dedicating ones life to mastering physical aptitude- I only meant to support consideration of it as not judged as a universal and static evil to be avoided at all costs.

I get that the world dwarfs us all and makes us entertain ideas about what it might take to give us ultimate security but there is no such thing. Our lives are not what they are because of some cultural wrong turn- that is just a matter of flavor. Suppose we had a culture that embraces violent affirmations of our abilities- it wouldn't level the playing field.

I don't relate to this- perhaps I need to let it roll around in my head- I don't relate to idealistic thinking about a "level playing field" in any society- I don't see that as possible, and never really considered whether it is desirable.

We talked about cops earlier- Cops are some of the most prepared for violence people on our streets. It doesn't give them cool confidence- it makes them panic fire until they are out of ammo at unarmed men. They might be tough but they've entered a melee that's much bigger than any one man and it leaves them scared and insecure and vicious.

I don't think they have cool confidence at all, because of the whole situation- under the taboo against violence, they are under pressure to use violence, while also facing judgments that it is bad to do so; they have to respond to the slightest sign of violence, because it is considered something that if released at all, will come out in completely unrestrained and exaggerated fury. Generally, it seems americans consider violence/aggression/ anger/unbridled fury as synonymous.
A bit of one automatically entails the rest.

There are so many videos available, of real life situations, in which we can see the police forces overeacting and losing it when they must use violence. I think that is the result of the taboo. They may be trained physically, but they are also ingrained psychologically to expect all other aggression to be out of control and intense.

Another poster brought up the concept that once there exists a build up of "violent feelings", then there is no clear way to "get rid" of that through action- it will simply come out explosively. I agree. I think the ideas we learn very early in life pretty much stay with us for ever.

That is why I tend to refer to childrearing. We might not be able to change ourselves, but we can influence small changes in a certain direction through generations. We can, for example, work on not encouraging our children to form a similar build up of repressed energy.

Not to some "ideal" perfectly balanced society- we'd probably come out with new and different challenges! We can, as individuals, only look at this time period we are in and consider what we'd maybe want to change. Then our offspring will do the same in their time period.