Spectacle, reality, resistance
Peter Coltman reviews a book that challenges the culture of militarism
Human beings do not naturally kill each other. In Britain, the chances of being murdered are slightly less than one in 100,000 – a product of natural revulsion against violence and of culture rather than a fear of the law. In the USA, which has substantially higher rates of homicide than the UK, fiercer laws are no deterrent: the murder rate in those states which carry the death penalty is higher than for those which do not. So, what keeps most of us, worldwide, from murdering each other is an innate horror of the process and its results.
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