"Blood Rites"

Paper Summary:

This paper explains that Barbara Ehrenreich in her book, "Blood Rites: The Origins and History of the Passions of War" traces war's origins back to Paleolithic man's struggle against predators on the African savanna. According to the book, war soon required a symmetrical form that resembled sacrificial rites, which gradually developed into a merger of religion with militarism that transformed battle into a religious rite. The author points out, in the closing chapter, that Ehrenreich pointedly cites the horrifying figure that there have been 160 wars since World War II, which took the lives of 22 million people. The paper contends that mankind is prey, who, through its own efforts, has become a predator; thereby, society continues to prey upon itself, not for sport, but from a residue of insecurity and blood lust that no society yet has managed to suppress.

From the Paper:

"The following chapters address the notion of the warrior elite. The author uses the example of General MacArthur's evocation of the long, gray line of West Pointers and Hitler's fantasy of a "race of Aryan god-men." However, the warrior elite has disappeared with the modern army, because when everyone has a gun, everyone is equal on the battlefield. The elite doesn't start wars anymore, since anyone can access the massive international arms market. Wars are free to everyone now. One example is the Russian war in Chechnya that was fought by special-forces soldiers."

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