Isn’t barbarism (as used in this thread) defined as a society in which there are no societal constraints? So isn’t this just a tautology: any culture that has societal constraints removed will devolve into a society in which there are no societal constraints?
This doesn’t seem consistent with 20th century history.
In Iraq when an invading power removed leadership, disbanded its military and prevented the reconstitution of those entities there was a breakdown of societal constraints. But there’s no reason aside from the circular to assume that this was caused by the factors mentioned, as opposed to being due to pre-existing societal predilection for chaos.
If we look Germany/Austria in the closing stages of WWII or post WWII we also have an invading power removing leadership, disbanding its military and preventing the reconstitution of those entities. But no widespread skin wearing ensued in Germany. To that I could add the all the examples in the Pacific and Europe flowing the other way when they were conquered by Germany/Japan. Few notable incidents of skin wearing in Poland or Malaya when they were invaded and had their military and leadership structures removed and not replaced.
So I see no reason to believe that all or even most societies degenerate into barbarism as Iraq did. In fact I would argue that the reason why the allies were able to restore leadership and security so fast in Germany was precisely because it never did descend into barbarism. And that the reason that the US has been unable to restore leadership and security in Iraq is because it did descend so rapidly into social chaos.
IOW I think that you have confused cause and effect. Societies don’t become anarchic/barbaric following invasions because leadership and security structures aren’t rapidly reinstated. Rather, leadership and security structures can’t be rapidly reinstated in a minority of societies because those societies became anarchic following invasion.
I don’t believe that social chaos inevitably stems from a removal of leadership/security structures. I think that a very small number of societies are so inherently fractured along sectarian or ethnic lines that they are only held together by leadership/security structures, and unsurprisingly in these cases when the leadership/security structure disappears chaos ensues. But in the vast majority of cases societies are inherently stable and held together by shared culture, not by security forces. In those cases when the leadership/security structure disappears society continues to plug along quite well and leadership will inherently rise from within.
On your first point, the thread title is: “Do people really resort to barbarism once societies controls are removed?” so I don’t think it is fair to challenge me for keeping my comments within the parameters of the debate.
As has been noted elsewhere, there was a world of difference between the allies occupation of Germany and the US occupation of Iraq. In Germany and Japan, the allies put many more resources into rebuilding and controlling society. Societal restraints that were removed were quickly replaced at the end of WWII, partly in response to a perceived Soviet threat.
I think the behavior of some US troops in Iraq supports my contention that our culture is also capable of acts of barbarism: Haditha and Abu Ghraib are the most well known.
I think that if societal constraints were removed in the US you would eventually see red state/blue state violence on par with Sunni/Shii’a violence in Iraq, not as soon as in Iraq, but eventually. This week, Kansas saw the assassination of an abortion doctor who had been the frequent subject of a number of conservative talk show hosts on Fox News. We have seen the bombing of abortion clinics, the bombing of the Olympics, and the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City, all the result of domestic terrorists in the US and this is during a time when we have functioning societal contstaints. I think the US is likely to see more of these kinds of right-wing terrorists acts in the coming years of the Obama administration. If societal constaints were removed, I think you would see all out chaos on many American streets.
That still doesn’t make you position any less less tautological.
What precisely is your point if not the tautology that any culture that has societal constraints removed will devolve into a society in which there are no societal constraints?
When the OP said barbarism he refined that to a descent into a primitive, tribal state characterised by an orgy of insanity, violence and cannibalism. Are you seriously arguing that Iraq has devolved into such a state?
Did they? Can you give population adjusted figures for the amount spent on rebuilding Germany for the 24 months following invasion, vs the amount spent on Iraq? Not military or humanitarian expenditure, but actual expenditure on rebuilding and controlling society?
Because I don’t believe this is true. Per individual and adjusting for inflation I believe far more was spent on non-essential aid in Iraq than in Germany in that time period.
Once again, I contend that you have confused cause and effect. Societal restraints that were removed could be quickly replaced to deal with the Soviet threat because Germany remained socially stable.
In contrast, societal restraints that were removed could not be quickly replaced to deal with the terrorist/radical threat because Iraq rapidly descended into social turmoil.
Wouldn’t it be more valid to point out that the behaviour of the vast majority US troops in Iraq supports a contention that our culture is inclined towards acts of societal cohesion and respect for authority. Because I’m guessing you won’t dispute that the vast majority of troops are law abiding, upstanding members of society. Right?
If the behaviour of troops in Iraq has any bearing at all on how people act when isolated from normal civilisation then doesn’t it indicate that overwhelmingly people remain well disciplined, self-sacrificing and upstanding members of society
I don’t think anyone disputes that some individuals are capable of acts of barbarism. But that isn’t the issue under discussion here.
And in that same 15 year period we also saw three changes of administration with absolutely no violence. We saw hundreds of thousands of people serve in the military, fire services and the police, putting their lives on the line to protect people they have never met. We saw tens of billions of dollars donated ot charities.
Once again, if the behaviour of people when we have functioning societal constraints has any bearing at all on how people act when isolated from normal civilisation then doesn’t it indicate that overwhelmingly people are well disciplined, self-sacrificing and upstanding members of society?
And I see absolutely no evidence to support that. You have cherry picked a few points that support your point of view while ignoring the 99.9999% of data points that seem to flatly contradict it.
Okay, using the definition of babarism as a tribal state, insanity and violence (I think inclusion of cannibalism is absurd, I’m not aware of widespread cannibalism existing in the real world outside of ritualistic consumption), I would point to two incidents in American history where sociatal constraints were removed and the populace resorted to violence and/or tribalism:
The Rodney King Riots, when the LAPD community pulled out of rioting neighborhoods, the violence and looting escalated. When a percentage of the the society felt there was little chance for punishment, they went on a rampage; and;
Katrina. Although the violence was not as bad as originally reported, there was, IMHO, a very significant event. During the worst of the disaster, the neighboring community of Gretna dispatched its police department to prevent New Orleaneans from exiting the city through the town. Gretna is a majority white city, during a time when societal controls were weak, it dispatched an armed militia to prevent a group consisting of a majority of black Americans from entering their community. This would seem to be the definition of tribalism. http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0916-01.htm
I don’t think per capita spending on re-building would be an accurate measure. Since we are talking about societal constraints, I think the number of troops to population is a better measurement. From here afresearch.org (PDF)
“Like Iraq, there would be considerable political pressure to bring the troops home as soon as possible but unlike Iraq, the initial troop levels were large enough to control the population. According to GlobalSecurity.org, the troop levels in Iraq as of November 2006 were 152,00022 in order to control a population of approximately 26.7 million.23 This compares with an initial U.S. troop level in Germany of 1.6 million, falling to around 200,000 by the end of 1946.24 These numbers included around 38,000 U.S. constabulary forces to control a population of around 17 million Germans.” An Inconvenient Comparison:
The Occupation of Germany and Iraq; William A. Hastings, Major, USAF.
But I am not arguing that the US has entered a phase of barbarism and chaos. I am arguing that in certain instances, when societal constraints have been lifted, the Americans have shown themselves as capable of entering barbaric and chaotic phases. It would seem that when I present you with an inconvient fact, you label it as cherry picking.
I would argue that even when a society is at its most barbaric and/or chaotic, many if not most of the citizenry do not engage in barbaric acts. It does not take a large percentage of the populace behaving in a violent, tribal way to have a profound impact on society. And as I have said, this behavior picks up momentum. As society falls apart, more and more people begin engaging in barbaric behavior, in part to ensure their survival and the survival of their tribe.
Aww, I like the part about the cannibals and the skin wearing.
Hang on, hang on.
The police pulled out because social order had irreparably broken down and the lives of the police (security forces) was at risk. IOW in this example the descent into barbarism occurred despite the existence of an intact leadership and security structure.
So this example once again supports my thesis that societal breakdown prevents the application/establishment of leadership and security programs, and it runs counter to your thesis that absence of leadership and security programs is what leads to social breakdown.
Not disputing that things got worse when the cops pulled out, but that is like claiming that serious fires start because of a lack of fire fighters. After all when the fire is so bad that the fire fighters withdraw for fear of their own safety the fire inevitably gets worse.
That may be the case, but it overlooks two crucial points.
Firstly that they started that rampage when the leadership and defence structures of the most powerful and stable nation in the world were fully intact and operational. This contradicts your argument that the rampage was caused by a removal of leadership and defence structures.
And secondly you overlook once again that the vast majority of people didn’t go on a rampage despite the fact that they had no more reason to feel they would be punished then the few who did. Out of hundreds of millions of Americans and tens of million of LAngelinos and tens of thousands of black LAngelinos a few thousand (tops) individuals went on a rampage.
So doesn;t this once again support my position? Even when there has been a total removal of security and leadership structure and there is minimal chance of being punished, the vast majority, certainly greater than 90% of individuals remain upright members of their society.
Once again I’d like to stress that nobody is arguing that some individuals won’t resort to barbarism when societal constraints are removed. Some individuals are barbaric when there are tribal constraints. But the evidence doesn’t suggest that most people will or that society as a whole will.
Out of interest, do you have any evidence that in the LA riots there were any more people resorting to tribalism and violence than did so before the riots? The sections of the community rioting already have extremely high rates of felony convictions (violence) and massive numbers of gang members (tribalism). Do you have any reason to believe that such people increased in number during the riots, as oppose dot becoming more over rather than overt? Did homicide and assault numbers for those communities increase during the riots?
If not then I’m not even inclined to see this as society becoming more barbaric. The rioters were likely already already tribalistic and violent gangbangers who siezed an opportunity, and nothing more.
Do you have any evidence whatsoever that this was done on the basis of ethnicity rather than, as the officials have always maintained, because of alack of capability to deal with the refugees?
If not then it is not an example of tribalism at all.
I do, because you said the allies put more resource sinto rebuilding society, and the best measure of resources is money.
But since you lack those figures we’ll have a look at what you do have.
According to your figures
Iraq 152,000 troops per 26700000 citizens, or ~175 troops per citizen
Germany 200,000 troops per 17000000 or ~85 troops per citizen
There were far fewer troops controlling the German population. How does this support your contention that Germany never descended into chaos because there were more resources expended to retain/restore control there?
According to your own sources Germany never descended into barbarism despite having approximately half the troop density found in Iraq. To quote “insurgency fears in Germany never materialized”. How does this do anything but undermine your argument that Germany never became barbaric because the control structure was more rigidly maintained/rebuilt? Using troop number, a metric that you deemed to be accurate, far fewer resources were utilised.
But you have presented no evidence whatsoever for such a claim. Instead you’ve given us:
An example of where an administration made a justifiable decision not to fatally overburden itself with refugees.
2)An example of where a handful of US soldiers operating under normal security and leadership engaged in torture
An example of where people rioted when leadership and security structures were as functional as at any time in human history. And even here there is no evidence that the people involved were any more barbaric than they were at any other time. More visible sure, but no evidence so far that they were more violent, more antisocial or more tribal.
At this stage I’m not actually seeing any argument. You repeatedly assert that Americans are capable of barbarism when leadership and security structures are removed, but I have yet to see any evidence to support such a claim. The only (arguable) examples of barbarism occurred when leadership and security structures were functioning perfectly.
Err, no. When you present me with one fact while ignoring thousands of contrary facts within the same time period/social structure/geographic region I label that cherrypicking.
Because that’s what cherry picking is.
Look, if you want to invoke a single instance of social breakdown following invasion then you can’t ignore the dozens of examples of social cohesion following comparable breakdown or you are cherry picking. IOW if you invoke Iraq and ignore Germany that’s cherry picking.
If you want to invoke a handful of cases of people engaged in anarchic acts over a 15 year period while ignoring the hundreds of millions who weren’t, that’s cherry picking.
I’m not sure I agree with that, but that’s another debate. This is not what we are discussing here.
Here we are discussing whether a human population will turn to barbarism when social controls are removed. We are not discussing what happens in circumstances when humans do revert to barbarism.
The fact is that there is little to no evidence that humans are more prone to tuning to barbarism when societal constraints are removed. So far in this thread we have the following examples of barbarism: LA riots Social control perfectly functional when barbarism took over. Removed as a result of barbarism. IOW effect followed putative cause.
Gretna shutdown. No evidence whatsoever that this was barbarism.
’77 New York blackout. Social control perfectly functional when barbarism took over. Also contradicted by 75 and 03 blackouts where no barbarism occured.
Abu Ghraib torture. Societal control perfectly functional when barbarism took over. In fact barbarism was mandated by the leadership and security structure.
Iraq Social control removed. But contradicted by Germany, Poland, Malaya, The Phillipines and so forth where there was a comparable or greater removal of social control and no barbarism resulted
So based on the evidence so far 4 out of ever 5 times that humans revert to barbarism it has nothing whatsoever to do with removal of social constraints. And in numerous instances of comparable or worse social conditions no barbarism resulted.
Basically I’m seeing no evidence at all that people are more prone to barbarism when social constraints are removed than at any other time. I might almost be able to make a case that they are less likely to do so under those circumstances.
Wait a mo’. You’ve got that “troops per citizen” ratio the wrong way round - it should be “citizens per troop”, giving the German troops half as many citizens each to oversee.
Hang on there. You can not justify using the number of troops that invaded the continent as indicator of the amount of resources put into rebuilding social structure. That is in no way valid. Even your source acknowledges that those troops were there because we couldn’t bring them home any further. Maybe they had an effect on keeping peace, maybe they didn’t. Your source says they didn’t because no insurgency ever formed.
There’s no way I’m accepting that number.
And as for the number of personell being utilised to rebuild Iraq: 152,000 per our source and 190, 00 contractors. For a grand total of 4400, 000 personell, or 60 citizens per “troop”.
It’s going to be difficult to do a direct comparison between Germany and Iraq on personell grounds for all sorts of reasons, which is why expenditure per capita is a much fairer measure of the resources spent. But even based on personell I’m not seeing a hug difference between Germany and Iraq
