[tomkat0789]

I think he highlights some fundamentally toxic aspects of human nature with this bit:

“The Socialist who finds his children playing with soldiers is usually upset, but he is never able to think of a substitute for the tin soldiers; tin pacifists somehow won’t do.”

The engineer in me wishes we could substitute the soldiers with construction workers or something, but I can’t deny enjoying war games growing up. These days “peace games” like Stardew Valley are more appealing to me, but maybe I’ma little odd.

[whoopdedo]

The answer to this is sports. War is competition through violence. When you remove the violence you get peaceful competition. It satisfies the tribal urge to fight things different than you, but also encourages healthy behaviors. Respect for your opponent. Accepting loss. Recognizing your weaknesses and working to improve them.

[pohl]

I'm with you in the abstract, but where I live there's toxic culture around sports that made it unpalatable for me as a kid. Back then what turned me off was belligerent parents on the sidelines yelling at the children, but the symptoms actually go way beyond that one little thing. (Conflating excellence with dominance is another example.)

[Retric]

I have noticed team sports tend to be vastly more toxic than solo sports.

Climbing for example has a wildly different atmosphere. Just listen to the crowd in this or read the YouTube comments, people are supportive when several women have disappointing results. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfhGW6Bwyks

People will complain about the route setting or camerawork not the athletes, that’s a shocking amount of empathy IMO.

[bobochan]

One of my favorite sports memories was going to my son's first big cross-country running meet. There were hundreds of kids lined up for the race and parents lined the course to cheer them on. The crowds clapped loudly for the leaders, it died down for the long stretch of mid-pack runners, and then grew to a roar for the kids working their hardest at the back of the pack. Everyone there seemed to understand how hard it is to get started in endurance sports, but also how transformative they can be to a kid's confidence, especially if they have not felt welcome or successful in team sports.

[hef19898]

Funny enough full cobtact sports are somewhat similar. Sure, you actively fight and beat each other in the ring or on tha mats, but outside ofbit things are surprisingly civil. Of ciurse over aggressive exceptions proof that rule.

[Dudeman112]

>toxic culture around sports

I was rather fond of practicing team sports as a kid, but I found the culture off putting for the same reasons

Some people just can't behave, adults weren't even much better than your regular kid

[the_only_law]

> adults weren't even much better than your regular kid

If life has taught me anything, it's that the notion of adults being emotional mature is a joke.

I've seen numerous grown people suddenly turn into a character from Mean Girls instantly after a petty slight.

[theptip]

This is a valid observation, however I wonder if the best frame is to consider if that toxic culture is preferable to a warmongering society.

It may be that some level of toxic behavior is inescapable when humans release their tribal competition instinct. And if team sports is construed as a war-replacement, perhaps it is a better (though not perfect) mechanism to absorb that toxicity.

Maybe there are better-still options to absorb tribal toxicity, bit I can’t think of any off the top of my head.

[frozencell]

The future might robot competitions: compete with zero-ego robot beings, the robot is always kind.

[coffeeboy27]

BattleBots

[HPsquared]

Indeed, many sports serve as a way of developing and competing on "war skills": throwing, running, strength, coordinated maneuvers as a group, etc. All of which are useful in fighting, and a way of establishing a male hierarchy without fighting.

[zppln]

I've always thought of Wall Street and what goes on there to be our substitute for war.

[scottyah]

Big Law too

[anigbrowl]

True for both, and these are actually unhealthy outlets because it means everyone essentially lives under sanctions and oppression while norms fray altogether.

[notch656a]

There may have been some genetic selection here. Societies without those who want to defend the tribe with violence, ultimately succumb to the violence of other societies that perpetuate that violence. Prisoner's dilemma means universal instinct of pacifism is a difficult steady-state to hold.

[maxwell]

"Pacifism is objectively pro-Fascist." -George Orwell

https://reason.com/2014/06/18/why-selectively-quoting-orwell...

[varjag]

Nope, usually you get the cult of war and cult of sports together as a bundle.

[warent]

Do people regularly mass murder each other over sports? Because that's the stakes we're talking about here in context.

Brawling and screaming over a sport is much preferred to bombing and poisoning.

[widdershins]

No (though it does happen, see Constantinople's chariot teams). But expansionist and militaristic societies are often obsessed with sport, for example imperial Britain, Germany at the 1936 Olympics, and arguably the modern US.

[rhizome31]

Not to mention Ancient Greece. Sport as a substitute for war is a joke.

[anigbrowl]

Both sports and war leverage the same dynamics, just as individual athleticism improves one's chances in a fight. Neither are ends in themselves.

[Xeronate]

Sports are better, but I think encouraging competition and tribal urges are a waste of time in general. Better to encourage collaboration and self expression.

[afarrell]

You need some amount of brotherly conflict and competition in order to have healthy collaboration. Otherwise, you just get the pretense of agreement and a slow slouch into frustration and resentment.

[Xeronate]

Disagree that sports are a form of brotherly conflict. Maybe within the same team but definitely not considering the win/loss dynamic between teams. You can approach disagreements with the idea that both people are working together to make the best product and are are disagreeing with the same goal in kind; a different type of argument than the one opposing teams are engaged in.

[Xeronate]

Sorry I wrote this on my phone at the gym and should have proofread better.

[Ansil849]

> The answer to this is sports. War is competition through violence.

Absolutely not. Sports is competition through violence, as well. Watch a game of American football, or ice hockey, or basketball for that matter and be able to say otherwise with a straight face.

The answer is cooperative, not competitive, activities.

[anigbrowl]

There's no 'answer', violent competition is always going to exist because at some point the aggregate costs are lower than other forms of competition. A world completely dominated by war is bad, but so is a world completely dominated by productivity, which just creates and infantilized society.

[alar44]

Calling football or hockey "violence" dilutes the meaning of the word. May as well call a high five violence.

[hirvi74]

I think intentions should be considered when describing something as violence in a sport.

I assume you are unfamiliar with "head hunting?" If so, it's where a team or player intentionally tries to injury the better player(s) on the opposing team in order to secure a competitive advantage.

Here are some examples of what I would consider "violence" in hockey, some of which, could be argued to be head hunting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PHPktgmbdbA

[Ansil849]

Comparing American football and hockey and other brutal sports to a high five is what dilutes the meaning of the word. These are sports where men aggressively assault each other. They are institutionalized violence.

[spywaregorilla]

I've seen plenty of people rejoice at the injuries of another team's players

[hirvi74]

I assume the OP is completely unaware of "head hunting" in professional sports. An awful practice still subtly used today.

Story Time:

I play beer league/pick-up hockey as an adult, and we once had a suspected thief that was stealing from others in the locker rooms during pick-up games. It was believed said thief would get dressed with everyone, and would then "accidentally forget something" before his shift was up, and he would then return to the locker rooms when the rooms were unattended and proceed to shift through people's belongings.

After some time and some mob mentality, people managed to figure out who the thief was. I heard numerous instances of all the various plots and methods other players were working on to ensure this guy would never be able to play again due to an unfortunate accident (i.e. premeditated and intentional permanent or long-term injuries).

Thankfully, the police got ahold of the thief before any of the psychopaths managed to ruin the life of the thief and their own lives. I am also thankful that I was a goalie, so that I was never encouraged to participate in such barbarianism. I value the safety of another person more than a wallet full of replaceable items.

Still, there have been instances where police have been called due to unruly players and/or unruly parents of children players, refs being assaulted by players/parents, etc..

[failTide]

I've never seen that although I'm sure it happens. What I have seen a lot is the entire crowd cheering when a visiting player is able to walk off after being knocked down with a possible injury.

[BurningFrog]

Team sports are the best cooperative activities around, AFAIK.

Primarily within your team.

But also, by both teams playing within the rules, cooperating with the other team in creating a meaningful game.

I know team sports isn't for everyone, but it's a great thing for those suited to it.

[recyclelater]

Then how do you satisfy the real need for an outlet for aggression? I personally did this with motorcycle racing, which is competitive but mostly non violent. Cooperative activities are great and I really enjoy them, but don’t scratch the same itch.

[ClumsyPilot]

> Absolutely not. Sports is competition through violence, as well. Watch a game of American football, or ice hockey

And golf, the worst one of them all!

Also horse riding, Javalin throwing, etc. Mixed bag

[chriscappuccio]

For people wired for competition, that's no answer.

[germinalphrase]

Aldous Huxley’s perspective was that competition is driven by the desire to dominate. We can play games - like wrestling or war - that cause us to dominate other people. Or, we can play games - like rock climbing - that cause us to dominate ourselves.

[Latty]

You see a lot of children playing Minecraft, or when older, Factorio on pacifist modes where they can focus on "the good bit" of building something. Historically war management was what was available, I remember enjoying building a city in Age of Empires more than the battles, and I think with the options available, while combat will always be popular and engaging, it does have alternatives some people enjoy more.

[the_only_law]

I'm waiting to see how Vic 3 turns out. Given the devs claim to focus on diplomacy and politics moreso than map painting warfare (much to the distaste of the paradox community)

Ofc war is still an option, albeit the mechanics are rather high level and less micro involved than past games.

If the mechanics are well designed in general I think I may find it really engaging.

[philistine]

Looking at Paradox's past promises and what was delivered, I expect the game to be just as focused on warfare as Europa Universalis IV.

[shostack]

I love the survival crafting genre but am so dismayed that the best games have gone heavy into combat or thriller directions. And I've played most of them. There may be a way to set a peaceful mode but it is rarely if ever a fully fleshed out experience.

[the_only_law]

That genre seems to be in the midst of a rush, with every publisher Indy or large trying to pump out games in that genre.

I generally like it, but my steam queue are now filled to the brim with crappy, rushed survival games trying to copy everything else all because I played Ark and Valheim a few times.

[zozbot234]

Kids just don't know any better. I would imagine that those who actually spent some of their childhood in a war zone would have a very different perspective. What's toxic is when grownups end up glorifying war or thinking of it as a solution to hard problems.

[schroeding]

(Second-hand) Anecdata: My Grandpa was born in '39, was 6 when the war ended and lived very close to a big city / region that was bombed regularly by the Allies from '42-'45. He was old enough to remember this and the (light) fighting when the Americans arrived.

After the war, he and the local kids played with live guns that the German soldiers just threw away. They used a Flak (anti aircraft cannon) as a carousel, played with the shells of it and used the local bunkers to play "soldier", with some playing the Germans and some playing the Americans.

So I'm not sure whether or not spending the childhood in a war zone actually changes the perspective of children (to the better). It sure can later, when they become adults, though.

[bombcar]

Adults are often more traumatized by it than children are; for them it's just the new normal, and something to play with.

[zweifuss]

As a small child in Essen, my mother lived through the bombing nights of 44/45 and the also harsh post-war period. The trauma that people close to her can suddenly disappear (e.g. suicide, abandonment, sometimes result of canibalism) still shapes her behavior today.

[Pamar]

Did you know anything about role preferences (if any)?

I mean: would children prefer to be Allies (because they won) or Germans (because, well, they were Germans)...

[schroeding]

My grandpa prefered the Americans, because the local soldiers gave him (and the other kids) sometimes sweets or stuff like an orange (which he thought was a ball at first, being disappointed that it didn't bounce :D) and were generally very nice to them.

Some older kids only wanted to play as the Germans or Hungarians (at the end of the war, apparently some Hungarian troops were stationed in the local bunkers to fight off the Americans).

I don't know what the other kids in his age group prefered, though.

[WesolyKubeczek]

> I would imagine that those who actually spent some of their childhood in a war zone would have a very different perspective.

They very much play war games, even incorporating the realities around them into the games, like checkpoints, airstrike alarms, and such.

[roywiggins]

Speaking of:

https://news.sky.com/story/amp/ukraine-war-children-with-toy...

[indymike]

> Kids just don't know any better.

Either that, or they are dealing with a scary, unknowable, potential direction their life might take and working through it by playing. This is normal, and how kids try to understand situations they might find themselves in. A kind in a war zone knows war and does not have to play to understand it.

[aqsalose]

>I would imagine that those who actually spent some of their childhood in a war zone would have a very different perspective.

Not sure if it would imply less war. Around the Napoleonic wars, many officers started their careers as teenagers or pre-teens. Nelson joined the navy as about 12-year old, which wasn't unexceptional age during the Napoleonic times. Napoleon was 10 when he was enrolled in a military academy. He was admitted to Ecole Militaire around 15 years old, graduated in one year, and got a commission as 2nd lieutenant.

[notch656a]

I spent some time in Northern Syria and there were quite a few "child" soldiers there (mostly teenagers), as well as people who grew up as children in war. I'm sure it was partially a coping mechanism, but I found many of them embraced and enjoyed their existence fighting the enemy that claimed the lives of their family members. The military also provides a sort of place for brotherhood and oddly stability (food / depending on where youre stationed shelter) at least until things really go sidewise.

[watwut]

The people who started and promoted and wanted WWI experienced WWI - either as soldiers or as kids. The young ones glorified army and wanted to prove themselves.

Wars don't make people peaceful. Instead, they normalize violence, hate and desperation.

[alex_sf]

I don't think this counts as Godwin's law given the context, but:

What exactly is your solution to the sort of naked aggression by Hitler in WW2? Is war not a solution to that problem?

[likeclockwork]

Lets translate your question.

What exactly is your solution to the sort of [war] by Hitler in [war]. Is war not a solution to [war]?

[alex_sf]

Yep. I know what you meant to do here, and I still agree.

You do not get to choose whether someone else is violent or not. If you aren't prepared for violence, you can only be a victim of it.

[likeclockwork]

I guess you appreciate any opportunity to restate your beliefs.

I was just suggesting that offering war as a solution to the problem of already being at war is pretty circular.

[alex_sf]

I appreciate an opportunity to provide clarity when it seems like a point was missed.

Whether it's circular or not isn't a meaningful property when bombs are dropping.

In that spirit of providing clarity: what is your answer to the un-translated question I asked?

> What exactly is your solution to the sort of naked aggression by Hitler in WW2? Is war not a solution to that problem?

[anigbrowl]

No, those things are not synonymous.

[sillysaurusx]

Eh, war is simply fun. It’s appealing to males in particular, and our testosterone tends to lock in the intoxication. There’s a reason that Battlefield is one of the most successful gaming franchises of all time, and that it’s very hard to find any videogame that doesn’t involve some kind of warfare. (There are dozens of wonderful counter examples: Minecraft, celeste, undertale, sim city, stardew valley. But for every one of those, there are dozens of Halo wannabes, and even Quake and Doom were one-man wars against demons.)

[landryraccoon]

> Eh, war is simply fun.

Well an idealized version of war that’s designed to glorify it could be fun.

Is actual war fun? Is the Ukraine war fun? I doubt it’s fun for any of the participants. It’s not fun for Ukrainian soldiers, it’s not fun for Russian soldiers, and it’s not fun for Russian or Ukrainian civilians.

Maybe it’s fun for some onlookers that like to cheer and spectate, but I would argue that speaks more to the nature of the spectators than to the nature of war.

[scarier]

Experiences in war vary greatly, and feelings about them are complicated and conflicted. I've met many people who genuinely seemed to enjoy it. This article nails it: https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a28718/why-men-lo...

[notch656a]

"There is no hunting like the hunting of man, and those who have hunted armed men long enough and liked it, never care for anything else thereafter." --Hemingway

[landryraccoon]

That doesn't sound like fun to me. That sounds more like a nightmarish psychosis.

[ClumsyPilot]

Strong or weak, in the long run all of them break down. All, that is to say, of those who are initially sane. For, ironically enough, the only people who can hold up indefinitely under the stress of modern war are psychotics. Individual insanity is immune to the consequences of collective insanity

[notch656a]

Eh it is fun to an extent. When I fought with the YPG I saw a lot of Kurds jumping with exuberance cheering at the enemy "he tried to shoot me" and then joyfully shooting back. Many wars are mostly intense boredom, punctuated by occasional bouts of terror or joy. Also there's a weird sort of release from the typical responsibilities of life -- _all_ you have to do is fight (which as fucked up as it sounds, can be more simple than worrying about the next side hustle / the wife / the kids). If you're on a rear-guard type of situation it's mostly drinking chai and smoking cigarettes.

[inglor_cz]

It is well that war is so terrible, otherwise we should grow too fond of it.

Robert E. Lee

There definitely seem to be combatants that enjoy at least some aspects of war. If you look at the historical military literature, including poetry, it is not all just negative.

It is true that with increasing industrialization of war during the last 150 years, the overall tenor has changed.

[MomoXenosaga]

Look how they re-enact the civil war. Nobody wants the historical truth of dying from cholera in a Confederate stockade or burning down farms in Georgia with crying families in the background. Humans are really good at cognitive dissonance.

[8jef]

War is a way for mindless and aggressive men to do whatever they really crave (which is escaping from a state of victimhood), without much justification and little immediate consequences to themselves, mostly under cover of patriotism. To kill and rape for fun and pleasure, and hopefully die fast, absolutely ecstatic.

To such men, please note: life never really ends, and you and your offspring gets eternally impacted by all miserable and soulless destruction of life's beauty you may have caused, inflicting more hardship and perpetuating novel state of misery upon flocks of others.

[notch656a]

War is a terrible waste. On the other hand, an able bodied man not willing to use destructive faculties to defend young and old against perpetrators of violence is as irrational as the able bodied man who refuses to use constructive faculties to provide necessities of life to same.

[ThrowawayR2]

There's a video floating around of Ukrainian soldiers managing the unusual feat of destroying a helicopter (and obviously its pilot) using a Stugna-P anti-tank guided missile: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MT8Um69fbHA Fun might not be the right word for it but you can't tell me that the cheer from the soldiers when the missile struck home wasn't born of positive emotion, even in the midst of the hell of war.

[jgwil2]

Yes, victory is a great thrill. Especially, I'm sure, a rare victory against a powerful enemy that has invaded your homeland. That doesn't mean that in the aggregate war is great fun.

[psi75]

> Is actual war fun? Is the Ukraine war fun? I doubt it’s fun for any of the participants. It’s not fun for Ukrainian soldiers, it’s not fun for Russian soldiers, and it’s not fun for Russian or Ukrainian civilians.

War seems to rewrite the brain. People are miserable and bored most of the time, are terrified while in combat, and come back with psychological issues we're still just beginning to understand. It's hell. And yet, people do get addicted to the mayhem and the rush. The mercenary life is attractive to a lot of people. There's still a lot being debated here, but one of the theories about PTSD is that much of the damage is done (or, at least, is made permanent) when people return to civilian life. Having been exposed to life-or-death situations, they find daily life to be low-stakes and artificial; the time in which they were most alive as in combat (even if they hated the experience and what it did to them).

Still, I agree that actual war is not at all "fun".

[zozbot234]

War is plenty of fun as long as nobody gets hurt - but that's kind of tautological. Real wars are no fun, and that's what pacifists argue against.

[whatshisface]

>Eh, war is simply fun. It’s appealing to males in particular, and our testosterone tends to lock in the intoxication. There’s a reason that Battlefield is one of the most successful gaming franchises of all time, and that it’s very hard to find any videogame that doesn’t involve some kind of warfare.

I think there is an argument to be made that Battlefield doesn't involve any warfare.

[zbrozek]

Outer Wilds! I just played it on the basis of a recommendation in an earlier HN thread and loved it.

[claudiawerner]

>Eh, war is simply fun. It’s appealing to males in particular, and our testosterone tends to lock in the intoxication. There’s a reason that Battlefield is one of the most successful gaming franchises of all time

This seems like it's essentializing psychology into core biological elements (with a shaky, uncited relationship to evolutionary psychology) without question. When statements are made this way, don't you think it closes off possible avenues for research beyond the bare facts of war and competition in future societies, at least without genetic modification? I think questions like these should be left open rather than dismissed as "war is fun, testosterone".

[8jef]

> There are dozens of wonderful counter examples: Minecraft ...

Younger boy of mine spent years fighting and smashing and destroying other avatars /players in Minecraft, not so interested in _building_ anything. One's experience may vary.

[nazka]

Sometimes it's a little too much. And it starts to be a little dumb. One time on an Assassin's Creed I was like wow why kill that guy?? It wasn't even for the part to gather info. That was so unnecessary (even for the story itself). Can I just talk to him and persuade him first or something?

[MichaelCollins]

Even minecraft has combat in the default game mode. No guns, but it does have swords, axes, arrows, and numerous kinds of explosives.

Obviously it's better than Grand Theft Auto, but it definitely falls short of pure pacifism.

[Coolerbythelake]

I'm fairly certain you haven't been involved in a war if you make a statement like "it's fun"!! Or at least you've never had to kill someone !!

[axiomsEnd]

But Battlefield is not war, it's a simulation of war. It lacks real stakes, extensive physical activity, death and basically everything that make war a war.

[watwut]

None of the things you mentioned is like war, like not at all. They are fantasies designed to be as pleasant as possible.

[wolfgang42]

There’s an amusing short story about “tin pacifists”, The Toys of Peace.[1] The introduction claims that this is a “primitive instinct”; but I tend to agree more with the conclusion.

On a related note, a Tumblr post[2] that’s been making the rounds recently:

> “In a game with no consequences, why are you still playing the ‘Good’ side?”

> Because being mean makes me feel bad.

> Because my no-consequences power fantasy is being able to help everyone.

[1]: https://gutenberg.org/files/1477/1477-h/1477-h.htm#page3

[2]: https://deflare.tumblr.com/post/157885054221

[anigbrowl]

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.1600451

[wffurr]

Stardew Valley has the monsters in the mines. I thought it would have been a cute farming simulator game to play with my toddler, but shortly after we discovered the mines it was all he wanted to do.

[koheripbal]

It's interesting that Socialism was so synonymous with pacifism in the early 20th century, and how that radically changed.

Mussolini famously broke with his Socialist Party to abandon the pacifist doctrine of Socialism and form his own movement which he called Fascism.

[waffle_ss]

That speaks more to socialism's enduring PR successes than reality. Lenin's Red Army didn't roll into Poland in 1918 to spread worldwide revolutionary socialism with just flowers and poetry. That happened basically immediately proceeding from the success of the October Revolution.

[johnfn]

I don't know; I loved SimCity as a kid. I tend to think this sort of thing rather signifies a lack of imagination on the part of video game authors.

[dleslie]

City simulators still exist and are still made; so are countless other economic simulators and puzzle games.

Their popularity is a reflection of demand for them, not developer creativity.

[etempleton]

I loved city builders and tycoon games as a kid. I think many of them tend to follow the same formula and so the returns becoming increasingly diminished.

I am excitedly looking forward to a follow up to Cities Skylines.

[agumonkey]

a few personal notes:

- as kids we all did fight games, from just kung fu fights for fun, to team fights where we somehow considered a group strongly as "not our friends"

- maybe remains of evolution needs to make kids ready to fight for survival ? it might sound primitive but some bits are important because life may become chaos and ability to secure your own vital space is life critical (even in a modern world)

[MikePlacid]

>as kids we all did fight games

My daughter would not have touched toy soldiers with a stick. And her older brother always picked up war movies from a dump on the floor, while she picked up only films about "relationships".

>team fights where we somehow considered a group strongly as "not our friends"

I was amazed, watching myself playing on a PvP server in World of Warcraft, how easy it is to hate another faction - even though you play it yourself half of the time.

>remains of evolution needs to make kids ready to fight for survival

Evolution does not need anything. It just so happened that populations where boys did not like to play war games are now dead. That's the process of evolution. But it does not care if your population is dead or alive in the next step. It goes on anyway.

[agumonkey]

Yeah, no need for semantics, we agree on evolution "emergent" property.. I was just trying to explain that the aggressive nature of boys is not just a poor defect. In a random bath of beings, if you're too passive, the more aggressive ones will stomp you brainlessly.

[Banana699]

I don't see it as a problem. War games don't transfer to real world violence, anymore than street racing games translate to real world dangerous driving.

I remember when I played need for speed most wanted for the first time and they had the main actress in the opening cutscene to the game telling you that... this is all just a game and in real streets you should drive safely and responsibly and wear your seatbelts. I never skipped the cutscene because Josie Maran (the actress) is really really pretty, but the message is absolutely and unimaginebly dumb.

You're sitting in front of your computer manipulating a car through an interface that doesn't look remotely like the controls of any real car, "driving" through a world with bizarre physics and collision logic with zero haptic feedback, again, an experience unlike any in a real car. Does any reasonably intelligent person really need an actress telling them that "remember, this is all just a game" ? isn't it all kinda obvious ? would a person who somehow got the idea that real driving is as easy as mashing some buttons on a keyboard with zero consequences be snapped back to reality by a character inside the game telling them that it's not true ?

The only real way I can see a "fiction leads to the real thing" argument working is through propaganda, a military might invest in war movies and war games to make it look glamorous to a gullible teenager who will be of military age soon. But how can you prevent that without demonizing all fiction ? Before video games, before movies, before even reading and writing, the military had no problems whatsoever with getting recruits. Propaganda is just the symptoms, the real problems are all downstream.

[benreesman]

Giving in to the violent tribalism that’s obviously part of humanity’s matrix is bad, but pretending it isn’t there will get you into a tight spot pretty fast too.

Violence sells better than sex at the cinema.

[lostlogin]

The regulation in this space is weird. It’s more acceptable to show someone getting shot than to show a nipple.

[alex_sf]

I don't understand why that's toxic. Striving, struggle, and violence are critical for any living thing to survive. Short of reaching post-scarcity, this can't change.

If we define toxic as harmful, then violence is the opposite. It's the only reason we have civilization.

[fwip]

Cooperation, not violence, is the reason for civilization.

[scandox]

I think possibly cooperation and violence. Or even cooperation for the purpose of enhanced violence.

[wsc981]

Perhaps a bit of both.

> So before I was nine I had learned the basic canon of Arab life. It was me against my brother; me and my brother against our father; my family against my cousins and the clan; the clan against the tribe; and the tribe against the world. And all of us against the infidel.

- “The Haj” by Leon Uris

Perhaps applies to other cultures as well. After all, the Western world is now struggling against Russia and tries to define “us versus them” through this struggle.

[alex_sf]

Cooperation is certainly critical, violence is what allows for it to take place.

You can build a utopian commune, but if your neighbors want your crops you would be wise to get a weapon.

[umeshunni]

Cooperation within the group and violence outside the group.

[dotgov]

What if both are?

[chriscappuccio]

Post-scarcity is not (ever going to be) reality

[refurb]

Pretty much this.

Humans are not peaceful by nature. And when one group of humans want something another group of humans don’t want them to have, violence is the ultimate option to solving that conflict.

Thankfully many countries see the cost of solving conflict through violence and seek to avoid it, but it’s always there.

[kruuuder]

> Humans are not peaceful by nature

I also believed this until recently when I finished reading "Humankind: A Hopeful History" by Rutger Bregman. What an amazing book ... Bregman analyzes why we commonly believe that humans are not peaceful and that this assumption turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy. But there is surprisingly little evidence that being aggressive or violent is in our nature, pretty much the opposite is true.

To me, reading this book did the opposite of what reading the news usually does: I finished every chapter with an optimistic smile. :)

[int_19h]

I don't see how this squares with all the violent primitive societies (which are more common than the non-violent variety).

[refurb]

I mean peaceful societies only exist because of the threat of violence to anyone who attacks them.

[kruuuder]

Well yes, I already understood that's your point of view, but the book offers a different perspective which I found pretty convincing.

[michaelchisari]

| Humans are not peaceful by nature

You can't make a broad sweeping generalization like this. There have been so many peaceful, even pacifist civilizations throughout history.

That they have been wiped out or dominated by the violent ones is a valid historical point, but it doesn't disprove that human "nature" can just as easily be peaceful, given the right conditions. Failing to protect yourself from external violent pressure is not the same as intrinsic nature.

The only strict statement about human nature that we can confidently make is that we are extraordinarily adaptive to and malleable by the conditions we live under.

[alex_sf]

That's semantics imo. If pacifism results in extinction, then any revision of human nature that involves it is irrelevant. Humans don't exist without violence.

[michaelchisari]

It's not semantics at all. "Human nature" implies a universal, inherent state. If we have peaceful, pacifist civilizations regularly cropping up throughout history, then saying that human nature is violence just simply isn't true. It doesn't matter if the violent civilizations come to dominate. That the peaceful societies exist at all (let alone are abundant and common) means that argument falls apart.

[alex_sf]

> universal, inherent state

It's not a universal, inherent state in any humans that survive. It's an aberration.

That being said, I'm not actually aware of any of these abundant/common peaceful/pacifist societies you're referencing. It's entirely possible I'm ignorant of them, but I'm suspicious that they weren't actually 'peaceful'. Can you name a few of them?

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

> There have been so many peaceful, even pacifist civilizations throughout history.

> That they have been wiped out or dominated by the violent ones is a valid historical point [...]

The violent societies have also been wiped out and dominated by other violent ones. Or have caused their own collapse by other means. So violence has not yet shown itself to be a successful strategy for societial survival.

Survival, it turns out, is a game one cannot win. Everything and everyone comes to an end eventually, even the universe itself apparently. Justification of violence on the sole grounds of continued survival is therefore very suspect.

[bitwize]

> The engineer in me wishes we could substitute the soldiers with construction workers or something,

LEGO® Minifigs?

[tomkat0789]

Yes! I spent many hours with Legos growing up!

I also remember playing a basic little kid video game about road construction. You’d select various heavy machinery to plow snowy roads and build bridges. I vaguely remember laying down pavement for a road being very satisfying.

[brazzy]

While there are no modern LEGO soldiers, there are Knights, Ninjas and Pirates, all equipped with weapons.

[derbOac]

I think the substitute are explorers, where the enemy is the unknown. Tin astronauts works.

[cm2187]

Post-ww1 pacifism didn't do much good to France.

[MomoXenosaga]

And building a military machine didn't do much good for Germany.

[goodpoint]

> but I can’t deny enjoying war games growing up

Depending on the player and the social context around it the same game can be glorifying war, or be neutral, or even be a way to release steam and become more relaxed around people.

Confusing real war, violence, genocide with a game is quite stupid. Or prudish.

[kergonath]

Lego bricks is a perfectly acceptable substitute, from my experience. Or something like Minecraft.

[sbf501]

Isn't Orwell kinda trolling here, or is he unaware of his fallacious statement? Not all kids of WW2 generation played with tin soldiers, like 50% of kids, namely: girls. This oversight is a bit of a bias in his false-dichotomy: there are only soldiers or pacificts as toys/role-models.

[etempleton]

Play fighting is observable in many adolescent mammals. It is perhaps, in a way, vestigial for humans, but not really because conflicts do still arise often enough.

As you get older you become increasingly aware of the horrors of war and fighting and it losses much of the naive appeal it had when you were young.

[ant6n]

Duplo, Lego, Brio

[megablast]

So, Bob the builder??

[rayiner]

Is war play “toxic” or “essential to the survival of human communities?”

It’s interesting to me how “humanism” veers into “human denialism” (denying the nature of the human condition) or active “trans-humanism” (seeking to transcend the human condition).