Liminality and War

Senator Joe McCarthy once said that “a good war has clear sides,” where there is absolutely no question as to which nation or people in question is “right” and the other “wrong.” Psychologically this makes sense; it is easy to fight for a cause when a person believes he is totally justified in his actions, and thus free from any wrongdoing. But if each side has that same view, what higher power decides the true essence of justice? True Morality? Causality? Unfortunately there is no way to tell for certain; each side stands true to their “right” and “wrong,” and history decides which one prevails. This was not a new idea in American cultural history; the American frontier’s “war” had been “fought” with virtually the same ideological fuel: the savage Native American threatened “civilized” American, and had to be vanquished. Two different generations of Americans fighting two different battles, where cultural differences were not resolvable because the enemy was simply incapable of understanding. For the Americans and the Japanese, their World War II in the Pacific was not fueled by political differences or disagreements but rather by cultural nationalism. The same thing occurred shortly after September 11th; there was an outcry against any follower of Islam; anyone with black hair who happened to pray several times a day was ostracized and became the iconic image of "the enemy."

I've always found such things to be a perfect example of Liminality's truth: human beings need clear boundaries and limits to survive. It is the only way that they can create ambition or willpower to accomplish anything at all; having a defined goal also generates clearly defined endpoints and restrictions on how to reach it, which defines "self" propose. In times of chaos therefore human beings will resort to creating limits and boundaries to reestablish stability. We create a clear image of the enemy, who he is and what he represents, in order to direct our energies for war. Without that, we find ourselves in much the same situation that occurred in the Vietnam war.

Makes you think, eh?