Is All Violence Bad ?
Naive
people of the modern PC variety sprout nonsense like “violence
never achieves anything”.
This
is manifestly untrue!
Evil
people who use violence do frequently achieve their evil ends.
Bandits, murderers and rapists to name a few, cause a great deal of
suffering by their violence.
If
this mantra-like saying is intended to mean something like “never achieves anything good” it is false in this sense also.
It
is simply a sociological commonplace that violence or the threat of
violence as an ultimate sanction is the basis of all civil order.
True,
those who prize individual liberty will have a much more restricted
view of how much control is beneficial and necessary for social order
than say the leaders of a totalitarian regime! This is very important
– but a topic for another time. For the moment let us take the case
of a liberal constitutional democracy, where the rights of the
individual are equitably balanced against the rights of others
What do I mean by the threat of violence? To take an
everyday example : We (mostly) obey the speed limit. It would be nice
to say we do it because we know that it is the right thing to do.
However we all know this is not the case. Our motivation to obey the
speed limit owes a lot to the fact that we will be fined if we don't.
In
Melbourne radar controlled speed cameras were introduced some decades
ago. Very quickly people discovered that a flash in their rear view mirror heralded a
letter from the police telling them they had to pay a speeding fine
or go to court. Government statistics as well as anecdotal evidence
showed that the new speed cameras produced a dramatic reduction in
speeding right across the community.
We
obey for fear of being fined. If we transgress and get fined we pay
the fine because we know that if we don't we will be summonsed to
appear in court where the fine will be much greater. We are mostly
smart enough not to refuse a summons because we know that eventually
that would result in the police knocking on our door. If things do get to that stage, people generally submit quietly to arrest because they know
that if they resist arrest the police will resort to violence. In the
very rare instances where someone has taken resistance to greater
levels we know that ultimately the authorities have will use however
much violence is necessary to subdue them.
So
while compliance with the laws of the land is generally achieved
without actual resort to violence, this is only because the ultimate
threat of violence is well understood.
It
is simply a fact of life that in this world – where there is evil
and people bent on doing evil – we need police and soldiers who can if need be “out-violence” any evildoer.
So
it should come as no surprise that the Bible highly commends many
people in military callings
and
says of civil powers that (the ruler) “does
not bear the sword for nothing he is God's servant, an agent of wrath
to bring God's punishment on the wrongdoer.” (Romans 13:4ff) (This
flags the really big question of the proper role and limitations of authorities –
but another time please!)
The
list list of commended warriors is very large. And for those who
would say it is only in the Old Testament the counter examples are
many. A few examples are: John the Baptist's command to soldiers who came to him: “No
bullying, no blackmail – make do with your pay” is a classic –
soldiers were needed: but ones who did their job honestly! Jesus
extravagantly commended the faith of an officer in the army occupying
their country. Another officer in the occupying force, Cornelius, was
singled out as a man approved by God.
One
bit of history from Melbourne where I live illustrates this: In 1923
there was a strike by police constables over poor pay and conditions.
The
police strike lasted only about three days. But civil order quickly
broke down with rioting and looting in the city, and three people
were killed. Order was only restored after some 5,000 volunteers –
mostly ex-servicemen – were sworn in as 'special constables' and
sent onto the streets.
A
disturbing fact was that the rioters and looters were later
determined by the courts to have been, not criminals as one might
expect, but ordinary citizens with no previous record of crime. This
is a salutary lesson that we need police and that they need to wield
the threat of violence.
So
my conclusion is:
Violence
in the service of evil is indeed evil. Appropriate violence or the
threat of it to restrain evil is quite a different matter.
