Human mind--the instrument of violence

 

Violence was a necessary evil in the survival game for our ancestors, the cave dwellers. To survive as one of the lesser animals (in physical terms) in the forests, the humankind used their mind and intelligence as a weapon to overcome the challenges of survival. And over thousands of years got primed to use their intelligence as basically a weapon in the game of violence necessitated by the urge to live, survive and thrive. To overcome the threats posed by the forest animals, the humankind’s organized violence served as a platform for survival. But then it became our habit.

Violence has gone very deep in our cells. We have become a very violent species. As a result, our mind primarily comes as a weapon to us—to control, to manipulate, to exploit, to disempower others. The human species will burn in its own violence if this fundamental instinct to use mind as a weapon of violence is not changed. To beat the survival challenges as a weak forest-dwelling animal among more powerful beasts, violence was a ‘regrettable necessity’. But to further rise from what we have now become, we will have to stop using mind as a weapon of violence. It cannot help us rise further. It’ll only make us a powerful animal that will eat itself when there is nothing left to beat and eat on the earth.

The entire structure of using the mind as a means of violence (manifesting as a paranoid self-interest that pervades at individual and collective hierarchies based on identities ranging from individual, family, clan, caste, religion, nation and region) needs to be overhauled to further rise as a species. After chucking out all the enemies in the rest of the species, we are now creating virtual enemies on the basis of ever-unfolding self-interests, which in turn make us scared of losing out to the enemy out there on the other side of the identity that we have created for ourselves. For one species tamed in the forests, we have hatched 100 conceptualized species in our minds to give it more fodder to continue its violence.

Mind is a wonderful instrument. It can be primed for different nonviolent values like love, trust, care, kindness, consideration and cooperation. But the irony is that those who occupy the throne, and are in a position to start giving an institutionalized twist in that direction, are primarily structured to use mind as a weapon for manipulation and misguided control—the various types of violence in its myriad forms of the urge to be in control at any cost. It would be like expecting a serpent to cut down its own poison fangs.

The use of mind as an instrument of violence has too deep roots to be dug out. It seems an impossibility. Aren’t we devising more and more means and reasons to unleash more, renewed violence against each other on the basis of nationality, caste, class, creed, religion, ethnicity? We are a haunted species—haunted with hunted by the fear of the enemy. The animals as the threats to our existence are gone. Now we are using our mind to manufacture more and more enemies. We are seeking enemies within the house in the form of soured family relations and domestic clashes. We are aiming sniper rifles against rivals, competitors and enemies in the neighborhood, offices, business sphere, even in the fields of art and culture. We are baying for the enemy’s blood across the border, over the religious fence, beyond caste lines, beyond ethnicities.

It’s plain raw fear blasting in a nuclear fission reaction. On and on. Acquiring atrophied mental shapes from the real physical threats of animals in the forests. The phantoms of the mind that haunt us always keep us insecure about our interests. We are tensed. We see danger everywhere. Everyone seems seeking to eat our share of the pie. But in seeking enemies everywhere, we have turned our own enemies.