WingNews logo WingNews
top | item 33206066

(no title)

annowiki | 3 years ago

I can strongly recommend Fussel's (the author of this essay) book "The Boys' Crusade", which provides a very eye opening account to WWII. It is most likely a longer version of this essay (I haven't read this essay).

I can also recommend his book Poetic Meter & Poetic Form, but for different reasons.

Other books in the same vein:

- The Warriors: Reflections on Men in Battle by J Glenn Gray (Gray was a philosophy PhD and a 2nd Lieutenant in the war)

- War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning by Chris Hedges (Hedges was a war correspondent during the balkans and numerous other conflicts, this is much more interested in the psychological build up to war in common society, and its effects on society)

These books make me very pessimistic about human nature, but Nicholas Wade's Before the Dawn: Recovering the Lost History of Our Ancestors provides a nice antidote: the total number of people killed by warfare in the 20th Century, if we followed similar patterns to our prehistoric ancestors, would have dwarfed what actually happened. We are becoming less warlike, even if its not cured.

discuss

order

siavosh|3 years ago

I read the Chris Hedges book when it came out and it's left a lasting impression on me. I think it got rid of any academic notions of war I may have had. One part that I'll always remember was him saying the war criminals were the pundits on TV leading up to and during the Bulkan war, they held much guilt in leading the masses to the terrible outcomes. The other counter intuitive insight it gives is how wars have this strange effect on some people where they can relinquish their day-to-day worries/anxiety/failings and instead can find some kind of strange peace or even thrive in a more black/white just-survive reset of society. I should probably read it again.

branko_d|3 years ago

> the war criminals were the pundits on TV

Mila Štula comes to mind.

I still remember watching the hysteria on Radio-Television Belgrade in disbelief that people would actually believe it. But they did. And the rest is history, as they say. Ugly, murderous, and utterly unnecessary history.

I see some signs of this in the contemporary US media landscape, and I worry the consequences might be similar.

agumonkey|3 years ago

I've read an article long ago about war veteran that wanted to go back. They found life in society more dreadful than war. War brought them unrivaled intensity of bonds (life or death is unquestionable) and order. In society everything is muddy and mediocre.

Even without going to the extent of war, I find "primitive life" is probably still healthiest for us existentially. Maybe using proxies like sports as symbolic wars.

rospaya|3 years ago

The Hague is full of poets, playwrites, psychiatrists and lawyers and the media was heavily used to incite hatred. Not in the way that directed violence in Rwanda for example, but it was propaganda.

yamtaddle|3 years ago

Not about war, but the same author's Class: A Guide Through the American Status System, published in 1983, is insightful and very entertaining.

Incidentally, if anyone knows of a worthy successor, I'd love to read it. His observations remain remarkably accurate in most cases (his completely-off take on "Class X" notwithstanding) but there must be more to say on the topic since then.

bwanab|3 years ago

"Class" seems to have held up very well. I remember back when it was published trying to shoehorn myself into his "Class X". I had to squint really hard.

buescher|3 years ago

Bobos in Paradise by David Brooks is "what happened when the upper middle class became class X". You could argue whether it's worthy or not, but it's what we've got.