Young People Rejoice! War is NOT the Answer.
NB: Not something from The Onion nor our pals at TDB.
‘In the 1700s it was normal to go to war to expand your country’s territory. This strategy has passed its sell by date. But, demands for democracy may be suppressed with violence and result in more violence in the short term. As in Libya.’
His research has found there has been a decrease in armed conflicts and the number of people killed since World War II and this trend will continue.
‘War has become less acceptable, just like duelling, torture and the death penalty.’
I’ll leave it to you to read further at the link if this resonates. Keeping in mind that the article uses excerpts of a scholarly paper I haven’t read I still found the snippets interesting. Before you closet neo-hippies begin partying you should note the disappointment:
‘Prior to the Arabian spring, we expected 5 per cent of the countries in the world to be involved in a conflict in 2050. This percentage has now risen to 7 per cent.
‘The conflicts in the Middle East weaken the clear correlation between socio-economic development and the absence of civil war. The conflicts in Syria and Libya show that we also have to include democratisation processes in the model.
‘To achieve this, we are now working on projecting democratic systems of government and regime changes,’ explains Prof Hegre
Rats… reality bites don’t it?
Category: Geezer Alert!
War stops becoming an issue when people get too apathetic to fight for something they believe in. I don’t see humans curing the human condition anytime soon..but I do see humans becoming more apathetic.
I means we are living in a time where people think the government taking care of them is freedom(Obamacare is a right etc.) when government dependency is the epitome of tyranny.
Holy crap! We’re THAT close to a major world war?! Kind of similar to how Norman Angell wrote “The Great Illusion” back in 1909 claiming war would no longer be economical…
I remember someone saying something about WW1 — the war to end all wars? Something like that.
“. . . . we also have to include democratisation processes in the model.”
In other words, democracies are less likely to fight other democracies. What a revelation!
This “fine academic” is a bit late to the party, Zero. R. J. Rummel, now Professor Emeritus of Social Studies, University of Hawaii, figured that out over 30 years ago.
http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/PERSONAL.HTM
Hondo #4: Gotta shrug a bit. And repeat that reality bites don’t it?
Aside: Woulda done this post as a Sunday Silly, but our weather might just preclude posting tomorrow and this cracked me up.
Black Friday shoppers disprove this little theory.
Zero: not a dig at you, amigo – but at the twit that thought that observation was “earth shaking”. (smile)
Yeah, the expiration date on that professor’s opinion will kick in right around the time drought in major food-producing countries shortens the exported food supply.
I will be doing container and patio gardening (on my deck) come summer for tomatoes, zukes, cukes, peppers and radishes. A pack of seeds is about $1.25 from a seed catalog. Plenty of pick-your-own farms around here, too, and I have a terrific recipe for dill pickles.
As long as there are countries like the muslim countries of the middle east, North Korea, China, etc., wars will be nessesary. Anything else being said is pure fantasy. Academia liberalism at it’s best.
Guess someone needs to brush up on their reading of Santayana.
Haven’t there been delusional idots willing war to end throughout history? I seriously wish it were that easy. Really.
Bold prediction? I can predict that Pele will have a fist fight with St. George with Anansi and Amaterasu providing color commentary, that doesn’t mean I have any scientific basis, let alone the delusion to call it a bold prediction.
Also, I find it vaguely funny that the spell checker recognizes all of those deities except Anansi.
What was the Question?
Yat Yas 1833 Says: As long as there are countries like the muslim countries of the middle east, North Korea, China, etc., wars will be nessesary. Anything else being said is pure fantasy. Academia liberalism at it’s best.
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Yep. Until Islamic Republics are eliminated and and Islam is removed from government — as Shintoism was removed from government and NAZIism was removed from government — there will be war. That’s what Islam is about. Domination and war.
I like the photo in the Daily Mail article with the guy firing the RPG who has his beret on top of his helmet.
“My good friends, this is the second time there has come back from Germany to Downing Street peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. Now I recommend you go home, and sleep quietly in your beds”
-Another guy who was dead wrong
Only the dead have seen the end of war.
Mr. Blue is the closest; by 1909 a very large number of people were convinced that large-scale war was a thing of the past. There were many reasons, and one of the most pernicious was the idea that social/economic class would trump nationality. The Progs, Socialists, and Communists all thought that the proles would finally unite against the bourgeois and refuse to fight their brethren in other countries. The sad truth was that -even in Germany- the Socialists couldn’t wait to vote war credits to the government.
Someone should also remind that professor that another academic loudly proclaimed the “end of history” about a quarter-century ago, after the fall of the Soviet Union. See how well that worked out.
@14 Now does that include Christianity or does that exclude Christianity?
And as long as we continue to make War, American lives will be lost.
Of course there will be more War. As long as Nations will have standing militaries and reserve the sovereign right of being able to defend themselves then there will always be more War. Maybe some World leaders will be more cautious from starting full-blown Wars, but that sure as hell won’t stop them from bombing each other.
It’s a MAD world.
@19- The crusades ended awhile back, and Christianity no longer requires an oppressive, expansionist government to spread it’s faith and keep it’s followers in line. Certain forms of Islam, however, still think that way.
Unless you can point me to a region that is destabilized by a sabre-rattling Chrisian theocracy. Or a mob of angry Christians beheading people because a cartoon appeared in some city’s newspaper in a country on the other side of the planet.
It is my professional opinion that this professor is a fucking idiot
Parallels of History: “the end of war is nigh”…
While Syria slaughters its own people and Cairo burns yet again, idealism reveals again, that war is to be left in the dustbins of history. Similar predictions were made in 1909, just 4 years before the first World War, and in the 1930’s by Neville Ch…
Students provide excellent fodder for industrialized executions of entire societies, such as the PALs battalions of WWI.
Either the professor has neither an understanding of history nor the basic, empathic understanding of humanity, or the professor is trying to provide more pseudo-science (like global warming) to start dampening the aggressive enthusiasm of students before they get uppity about losing their tax deduction for student loans, and those loans come due.
I favor the idea that the professor is just an idiot (“Professor” is Marxist for “Idiot”). Depends on whether we start seeing this meme in the MSM and Hollywood.
‘Prior to the Arabian spring, we expected 5 per cent of the countries in the world to be involved in a conflict in 2050. This percentage has now risen to 7 per cent.”
I’ve seen this and heard this quite a bit over the last couple months. Can’t hold back anymore.
What the FUCK is with this “Arab Spring” crap and why are we using this politically correct rubbish saying. Last Spring when I was in Afghanistan during the “Spring Offensive” it was the Spring Offensive. Its an Offensive because Islamic Extremists come out of their holes, don’t see their shadow anymore and pick up their RPGs.
Arab Spring makes it sound like we’re going on vacation to someplace like Tuscany.
Spring Offensive Spring Offensive Spring Offensive….
How much grant money did they get to waste on this study? (F–king morons.)
War is part of the human condition. Either you get ready for it or fall. It’s amazing that we’ve marginalized it down to less than 1% of our nation making up a warrior class where during a decade long war civilians literally sacrifice nothing and are completely removed from it. It sure sucks having to pull the weight for ungrateful shits and then have to be lectured by them regarding your actions and future actions to prevent their possible injury but thankfully some men still do it.
Humans are not a peaceful, sharing species…we hate each other for a variety of reasons. Even when we put a thin veneer of civilization on ourselves we are still petty, violent, evil. There are very few Mother Theresa’s and far more mother f$ckers for a reason. Humanity is a blight on the planet, we crawled out of the slime and stopped sh1tting in the ocean and began sh1tting on the entire planet and not much has changed since…we are still pretty much the same animals we always were. We just have better weapons.
Knowing that, and being aware that to survive is sometimes only achieved through the total destruction of your enemies, will better prepare college kids for the future than some chemically induced dreams of an alternate reality where we all sing Kumbaya and share the whole world in peace…that’s a nice vision for artists to introduce in their work, but reality dictates a more pragmatic approach to self survival.
Except For Ending Slavery, Fascism, Nazism and Communism, WAR has Never Solved Anything