Why We Love War
(Page 4 of 7)
January / February 2003
By Lawrence LeShan, Adapted from The Psychology of War: Comprehending its Mystique and Madness
The way that people begin to perceive reality in the period typically preceding the outbreak of war is very seductive. I call it the “mythic” mode of perception, as opposed to the “sensory” mode we ordinarily use. Once mythic perception takes over, we cease to structure the world in our customary way and turn to the ways of a fairy tale or a myth. In the mythic reality we never question why evil exists; it simply is. Since the enemy is evil, we’re quite ready to starve, torture or kill them; after all, they cannot really be considered part of our own species.
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During a mythic war, God, history, and destiny are clearly on one’s side. The division of the world into Good and Evil is so complete that not only similar qualities but also similar actions on the opposing sides are seen as fundamentally different. For instance, the World War II bombings of Rotterdam by the Germans and Hamburg by the Allies were seen as two different kinds of behavior. We bomb civilian centers for the good of mankind. They do so because they are evil. In a mythic reality, the enemy can only be stopped by force. Our defenses are never adequate; we always need a larger military, more atomic bombs, and so on, without end. Because the enemy has no regard for truth, words can no longer be relied on and real discussion stops. In regard to our own leaders, a “Teflon factor” appears; we quickly forget their mistakes and believe anything they say.
Ever since the philosopher Friedrich Schelling first described the mythic orientation in the early 19th century, many have noted that the shift to mythic consciousness is natural and easy for humans. More recently, social scientists from Ernst Cassirer to Erik Erikson have noted that it takes energy not to shift to this perspective. In times of stress and uncertainty the pulls become particularly strong. If enough people begin thinking mythically, a society can “tip,” making it extremely unpopular or even dangerous to express the sensory mode of perception.
One fascinating dimension of mythic reality is that it usually applies to only two general areas: human behavior and interaction, and the great forces of the cosmos. It is not applied to the tools and routines of everyday life. We are perfectly clear about how these modes of reality relate, and about when and where to use each. We may be on a great crusade to make the world safe for democracy, but we drive on the correct side of the street to get there. “All my means are sane, my object and motives are mad,” said Captain Ahab of his mythic quest for Moby Dick.
In order for a war to retain its mythic aspects, many of the facts of how war is really waged must be concealed. Any information that lessens war’s psychological satisfaction is generally rejected. Since the birth of modern war correspondence and the telegraph in the mid 19th century, the public has shown a great desire for news about war—as long as it makes the conflict seem heroic. Mythic wars have proven to be the greatest way ever discovered to sell newspapers. Wars like Vietnam, which came to be viewed through the sensory mode of perception, are a different story. As the terrible jungle fighting went on and on in Vietnam, even those who had first seen it in mythic terms were disillusioned in the face of so much visual evidence to the contrary, via photos and television. After the conflict ended, war in general became unacceptable to many Americans.
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