Topical Guide 913
Mark Dorset
Man’s Inhumanity to Man, Examples Thereof: Tribalism and the “Amity-Enmity Complex”
Folly
Leaving Small’s Hotel, Chapter 13:
BALDY closed his show that night with this: “[…] be careful, because there is someone out there somewhere, who knows where, who hates you because you belong to the wrong tribe and because we have not grown up enough as a species to stop living in tribes. Do you understand that? Neither do I. […]”
Wikipedia, “Amity–enmity complex”:
The amity–enmity complex theory was introduced by Sir Arthur Keith in his work A New Theory of Human Evolution (1948). He posited that humans evolved as differing races, tribes, and cultures, exhibiting patriotism, morality, leadership and nationalism. Those who belong are part of the in-group, and tolerated; all others are classed as out-group, and subject to hostility […].
Conscience in humans evolved a duality: to protect and save friends, and also to hate and fight enemies. […]
Desmond Morris makes a prescriptive point: “We must try to step outside our groups and look down on human battlefields with the unbiased eye of a hovering Martian.” And he warns that “the truly violent species all appear to have exterminated themselves, a lesson we should not overlook.” The inherited aggression of the amity–enmity rivalry between communities is rationalized under a “persistent cloak of ideology . . . a matter of ideals, moral principles, social philosophies or religious beliefs. . . . [O]nly an immense amount of intellectual restraint will save the situation.”
See also:
Folly TG 28, TG 545, TG 767
Man’s Inhumanity to Man, Examples Thereof: Expulsion of the Acadians TG 715
Have you missed an episode or two or several?
You can begin reading at the beginning or you can catch up by visiting the archive or consulting the index to the Topical Guide. The Substack serialization of Little Follies begins here; Herb ’n’ Lorna begins here; Reservations Recommended begins here; Where Do You Stop? begins here; What a Piece of Work I Am begins here; At Home with the Glynns begins here; Leaving Small’s Hotel begins here.
You can listen to the episodes on the Personal History podcast. Begin at the beginning or scroll through the episodes to find what you’ve missed. The Substack podcast reading of Little Follies begins here; Herb ’n’ Lorna begins here; Reservations Recommended begins here; Where Do You Stop? begins here; What a Piece of Work I Am begins here; At Home with the Glynns begins here; Leaving Small’s Hotel begins here.
You can listen to “My Mother Takes a Tumble” and “Do Clams Bite?” complete and uninterrupted as audiobooks through YouTube.
You can ensure that you never miss a future issue by getting a free subscription. (You can help support the work by choosing a paid subscription instead.)
At Apple Books you can download free eBooks of Little Follies, Herb ’n’ Lorna, Reservations Recommended, Where Do You Stop?, What a Piece of Work I Am, and At Home with the Glynns.
You’ll find overviews of the entire work in An Introduction to The Personal History, Adventures, Experiences & Observations of Peter Leroy (a pdf document), The Origin Story (here on substack), Between the Lines (a video, here on Substack), and at Encyclopedia.com.