Emile Durkheim noticed that when European countries went to war, suicide rates dropped. This was true in Paris during both world wars, and during civil wars in Spain, Algeria, Lebanon, Northern Ireland. Suicide rates dropped 50% in Belfast during riots of ‘69-70.
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1992 study: Almost all rape victims experience extreme trauma, yet almost half experience decline in trauma symptoms within weeks and months. This is a much faster recovery rate than for soldiers. Why?
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It may have to do with the interwovenness of positive experiences with the trauma. (Reminds me of in The Body Keeps The Score: soldiers felt that overcoming trauma meant forgetting&disrespecting their fallen brethren.) The worst of times were also the best of times
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Veteran suicide rate is often misunderstood - most veteran suicides over 50yo; suicide likely unrelated to trauma - deployment actually lowers risk of suicide for younger vets, bc soldiers with obvious mental health issues aren't deployed
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- voluntary service leads to disproportionate # of young people who were sexually abused signing up for military service - easy way to get away from troubled home - military men 2x as likely to report childhood sexual assault than civilians (AMA, 2014)
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Danger and trauma aren't as connected as people tend to assume Unmanned-drone pilots have the same PTSD rates as pilots flying actual combat missions in war zones In 1973 Yom Kippur War, rear-base troops had 3x the psychological breakdown rate as frontline troops (elites)
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High unit cohesion is correlated with lower rates of psychiatric breakdown (We need each other goddamnit) Sri Lankan special forces experience far more combat than line troops, but lower rates of all physical and mental issues (but they did lead in "hazardous drinking"
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US military has the highest reported PTSD in its history, and probably the world. Some of it is error and fraud. But even people who didn't experience combat return alienated and depressed. The problem isn't battlefield trauma but reentry into society. Also true for Peace Corps
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"Modern society is mortally dispiriting to come home to."
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"For the first time in our lives, we were in a tribal situation where we could help each other without fear." 15 men to a gun, no hopes of becoming officers. For the first time in their lives, a cooperative rather than competitive environment. No boundaries, no phony standards.
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"I wouldn't mind having an evening like it, say, once a week - ordinarily there's no excitement." - a Londoner who missed the air raids of WW2
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"I am an AIDS survivor. Now that AIDS is no longer a death sentence, I must admit I miss the days of extreme brotherhood - deep emotions and understandings above anything I have felt since the plague years."
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"We are an antihuman society. Our society is alienating, technical, cold, mystifying. Our fundamental human desire is to be close to others, and our society does not allow for that." - anthropologist Sharon Abramowitz, Peace Corps volunteer during Ivory Coast 2002 civil war
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"PTSD is a disorder of recovery. If treatment only focuses on identifying symptoms, it pathologizes and alienates vets. But if the focus is on family and community, it puts them in a situation of collective healing." - anthropologist Brandon Kohrt
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Because modern society has almost completely eliminated trauma and violence from everyday life, anybody who *does* suffer those things is deemed to be extraordinarily unfortunate. This gives people sympathy & resources, but also an identity of victimhood which can delay recovery
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3 factors affecting combatants' transition to civilian life - overall social cohesion (do people generally look out for each other?) - victimhood identity (do people feel sorry for you?) - feeling necessary to society (do people need you?) USA scores poorly on all these fronts
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"Social resilience" - how much people communicate, share resources, look after each other, etc - is an even better predictor of trauma recovery than the resilience/resourcefulness of the individual!
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Junger has a fun story about drinking in a Spanish bar- how some men fought over a toy helmet, and nearly ripped it in two when someone filled it with red wine. The helmet was passed around, and eventually all 5 men were drinking and singing together, the helmet forgotten
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Junger likes this story because it reveals how close the energy of male conflict and male closeness can be. Two facets of the same quality, it just varies depending on whether men think their interests are in conflict or aligned
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Modern society is a kind of paradise - and yet. There are costs and tolls on the global ecosystem all the way down to the human psyche - but the most dangerous loss may be to communities. And the survival of our species depends on communities.
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The earliest and most basic definition of community/tribe: the group of people you help to feed, and defend. You make sacrifices for them, they make sacrifices for you.
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The public is often accused of being disconnected from its military, but frankly it's disconnected from just about everything: farming, mining, gas&oil production, bulk cargo transport, logging, fishing, construction - dangerous jobs - mostly overlooked
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More Americans die every year doing dangerous jobs than in the entire Afghan war. Over 90% are young men. These jobs are less respected and pay less.
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When the Navajo were rounded up and confined to a reservation in the 1860s, they developed their own version of rampage shooters, called Skinwalkers. Murder and mayhem, perpetrated by isolated young men who rejected all social bonds and attacked the vulnerable and unprepared
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Rampage killings happen predominantly in affluent or upper-middle class communities, or otherwise majority-white, Christian, and low-crime. Gang shootings in poorer urban neighbourhoods, in contrast, are rooted in a strong sense of group loyalty and revenge
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The first wave of rampage shootings in the US was during the 1930s, when society had been severely stressed and fractured by the Great Depression. Rampage killings dropped during WW2 and rose again in the 80s.
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Violent crime, suicide and psychiatric disturbances all dropped significantly in NYC following 9/11; no rampage shootings for 2 years
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Junger spends some time talking about Native American ceremonies and rituals, and how ceremonies in general (weddings, funerals, etc) are designed to communicate the experience of one group of people to the wider community - and how veterans don't have any good way to do that
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Junger suggests allowing veterans all over the country to use their town hall every Veterans Day to speak freely about their experiences. Communities should show up to support and listen - to whatever those veterans have to say.
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Veterans are willing to die for their country, but they're not sure how to die for it. Politicians often accuse rivals of deliberately trying to harm their own country- a statement which makes no sense to a soldier in combat. People are contemptuous towards fellow citizens
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Liberals and conservatives are both right: the perennial conservative concern about freeloaders has legitimate roots in our evolutionary past. And so does the liberal concern about being compassionate to the ill, elderly, wounded and unlucky.
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