“War, what is it good for?!” Maybe nothing, but maybe it’s a link to our past as a society. What if our aggression and attraction to violence is a direct result of our instinctual habits? Look at monkeys that will pick up a rock or stick to hit things with. Whether it’s out of anger or playfulness, it feels compelled to act out that violent action. Look at the monkey in the beginning of 2001 Space Odyssey, who felt compelled to smash the skull with a blunt object. It had no motive to do that, and the skull certainly wasn’t presenting any threat. Yet, he decided to destroy it anyway. Are you going to say we are different because of our growth in society and technology? Allow yourself to give into the possibility of our rumored evolution, from monkeys to man, and you can see similar behavior in our children.

Images of Neanderthals are usually equipped with a club of some sort. As we have evolved, so did our weapons; from the club came spears, from spears came swords, from swords came guns and everything in between. As explained in the book Blood Rites, by Barbara Ehrenreich, these weapons were created to compensate for our lack of natural weapons, like fangs. They were initially used for defense against predators in the night. However, all animals, including man, have not only used violent acts against enemies, but on each other as well.

Aggression is defined as “hostile or destructive behavior or actions.” The stimulus that sparks aggression, in animals and humans, can, and will, vary depending on personality and circumstance. Aggression works with the Fight-or-Flight Response, explained by Walter Cannon in 1915. The stimulus that causes either a reaction to become angry, or become afraid and run is due to an “abundance of catecholamines at a neuroceptor site that facilitates reliance on spontaneous behavior often related to combat or escape.” To put it simply, depending on who you are will determine whether a said stimulus will cause either aggression or fear.

Is it so hard to believe that after millions of years, we have become so used to the primal habits of our ancestors, that we have eventually made them a part of our everyday lives and even grew to love them? No, I am not going to use violent sports as an example of this…I have already done that. However, I will back my point by using the wedding ceremony as an example. There are some modern traditions in a wedding ceremony that stem from savage origins, such as the best man, honeymoon, ring, and carrying the bride through the threshold. There are varying stories of how these traditions began, but in one version they all revolve around a single aggressive act. The best man tradition is said to have started in Northern Europe around 200AD. When there were not enough women in one community to marry all the men, a man would choose his best or strongest friend to accompany him in invading a neighboring community to kidnap a “bride”. Carrying a new bride through the threshold mimics the action of forcing the kidnapped woman into your home. The ring symbolizes the shackles put on the kidnapped to prevent escape. Last but not least, after the kidnap, the couple would disappear into hiding until her family found them, by which time she would already be pregnant. This time away is more commonly known as the honeymoon today.

Is it our natural response to be aggressive and violent? Is this response due to our weakness as animals? If you think about it, we are very much like animals in our habits. Whether it’s because of a threat, or merely to have the pride of being the Alpha-Male, we still fight same as animals do. I understand that we have evolved mentally beyond any other animal, however, does our ability to “know better” outweigh millions of years of instinct?