Tribes

[trufflesniffer]

Assuming that my time is worthless, I'm continuing to get infinite value from the BBC (by having no television, and thus no legal requirement to pay a television license, but at the same time listening to BBC radio and watching programmes on the iPlayer). Recently, I've been taken by a couple of programmes based around the contrivance of Developed

Comments

[spider88]

It makes sense though...if your life depends on what you pull off of trees and eat off of animals, and no one owns the animals or trees, what is there to fight over?

Can you imagine what would happen to society if we all used the technology we most certainly already have to use un-ownable energy sources?

[spider88]

Don't the infamous Yanomamo dispute all this, though? They are hunter-gatherers and violent and polygamous. They war over women, not food/possessions. Though I've read more than once, to the confusion of the anthropologists, that the women are pretty happy there.

[trufflesniffer]

One of the interesting scenes with the second tribe involved a declaration by a number of the tribal wives: "We're never faithful to our husbands. When they leave we sleep with other men." Then they added, "Then the husbands find out and they fight with the lovers". At the thought of which they started smiling.
Male-on-male violence over females could be seen as quite gratifying from a female perspective, I suppose. It tends to be males, rather than females, who suffer the bulk of the excess mortality as and when tribes get violent. (Arguably one of the main causes of domestic abuse in modern societies is low-status males displacing their anger about being subjugated on their female spouses because the full force of the law and the state protects the higher-status male from being physically attacked. Without such displacement male-on-female violence could be lower where male-on-male violence is 'permitted').

[spider88]

I've been reading about the psychology of domestic violence (including mother on child violence and adult children on elder parents) and according to one theory, it distills down to punishing those around you who reflect back to you a negative image of yourself. This could be pure projection ("I hate myself so I believe my spouse does as well") or due to actual criticism. At any rate, the feeling of loss of status/respect/competence is so painful they punish their spouse for "reminding" them of the feeling. Apparently domestic violence initiates or escalates when a man loses his job. And it's more common for single mothers to abuse children than married mothers.

It seems your sociological theory merges pretty well with this psychological one. If the man is just plain trapped in his situation, then being reminded of his low status would trigger violence.

Though it's worth noting that upper class men abuse their wives as well. In that case it's likely more projection/perception than frustration of one's actual status.

[natnot]

The octopus is very sticky! The ball sticks in my hand!

[trufflesniffer]

OK.