Reflection Two: Definition of Violence

This course was eye-opening in more ways than I thought it would be. I learnt more than I ever set out to and the content was mind boggling and disturbing at the same time. It was interesting to me that violence is hard to define and when we tried to do so it seemed an impossible task. I personally liked Wolff’s wide definition of violence as it encompassed more than just physical violence. I believe that there is more to violence than just physical violence, like Wolff, as we all know that psychological violence can be very damaging to a person. There were many parts of this course that I found difficult to comprehend, for example, Collins argument that being a victim is a learned behaviour. I found his argument difficult to accept even though it makes a great deal of sense. Collins argument sounds a lot like victim blaming to us which is why it was so difficult to accept. The animal abuse presentation was hard on all of us. Getting rid of the witnesses and stating that you are either for the cause or against it was also difficult to comprehend. How are we supposed to help people half way around the world? But if we don’t help them are we against them? I think my understanding of violence has become more complex than it was before and I can not say for sure what my definition of violence is. This course shed light on a number of complicated questions involving violence, questions I don’t know if we will ever find an answer to. My understanding of violence has changed a lot because of this course. It made me think about what is considered violence and what I consider to be violent. I have tried to think about what my definition of violence is and I can’t come up with a full definition of violence but I know that it would include physical violence, psychological violence, animal abuse, war, and gun violence to name a few. In class, we discussed that we know that violence will never end, that it’s a part of human nature. I believe that humans will always be violent in some way or another as we sometimes need violence to complete tasks. For example, during a revolution we need violence to end the reign of a political party or leader or during genocides like the Holocaust to overthrow Hitler. We all know that Hitler would not have stepped down without violence making him step down. We live in a confusing world where sometimes it’s okay to use violence like in self-defence but in other situations, violence is not condoned like physical abuse of children. How do we teach children about violence when we as adults have no idea what the definition of violence is? Some parents will teach their children that no type of violence is allowed under any circumstances whereas other parents will teach their children to defend themselves if they are experiencing violence. Which parent is right? What will you teach your children? It’s a difficult question to answer and who are we to say which parent is right and which one is wrong? As a society, our definition of violence is vague, to say the least, google defines violence as “behaviour involving physical force intended to hurt, damage, or kill someone or something”. But that does not encompass psychological violence or animal abuse. Do we consider an animal a thing? Or should animals receive personhood? Apes and chimpanzees are similar to humans, they are intelligent and can solve many puzzles, do we consider them a thing under this definition? My whole explanation of my understanding of violence may sound jumbled and disorganized to you. Well good, because my understanding of violence is a jumbled mess of questions and contradictions. This course has made me think about things that I did not want to think about and forced me to reevaluate what I consider violence to be. My understanding of violence has changed, I do consider more than physical violence as violence, I know that violence will always be around, that violence can depend on the situation and that maybe violence is a part of human nature. I do not know how we can eliminate violence or even that we should eliminate violence. I think that we need violence in some respects and that humans would have hard time living in a world where there was no violence of any sort. Somehow though, I still have some hope for more peace on this little green and blue planet we all call home.