Is There a Vengeance Gene?

Printer-friendly versionSend to friendPDF versionDr. Laina Farhat-Holzman Is vengeance in human beings hard-wired, or is it cultural? If it were hard-wired, we would all have it – but we don’t. It is worse in some places than in others. I remember as a child being told that “sticks and stones can break our bones – but names can never harm us.” This mantra instructs children in our own society that we are not compelled to get even for an insult. As a matter of fact, ignoring provocation drives the provoker crazy. But looking at Western history and peering at the map, we can see a vengeance belt that surrounds the Mediterranean – although growing feebler in the European northern Mediterranean – and we find it elsewhere in countries still in the grips of feudal warlordism (Afghanistan, Iraq, Sudan, Nigeria). The common culture shared by most of these vengeance societies appears to be Islam, which emerged from a tribal culture in which, as they themselves said: me against my brother; my brother and I against our cousins; my cousins, brothers, and I against the stranger. The Koran chronicles the struggle of tribal prophet Mohammad to either convert other clans or wipe them out (or expel them) until the whole Arabian Peninsula was united under one leader and one religion. This is no different than anywhere else in the world where tribalism reigns; but because of Islam’s moral power, literalists have kept primitive vengeance alive even when no longer appropriate. Islam’s unity lasted only while Mohammad was alive and strong enough to maintain it. Upon his death, the leadership of Mohammad’s successors, the Caliphs, was challenged, which led to an immediate split that has poisoned Islam ever since – the Sunnis and the Shiites, who backed different candidates. Revenge is central to Shiite Islam, whose religious holidays rehash the original insult in not having had their candidate win – and the death of that candidate’s children on the battlefield when they attempted to challenge the other party by force. As Islam overran the Middle East, North Africa, and Iran and Central Asia, it also attacked the Christian parts of the Mediterranean world. They seized Spain and almost got France. They occupied Sicily, Sardinia, and Corsica, parts of southern Italy, and continually threatened the once peaceful Mediterranean world through Muslim pirates seeking loot and slaves, until the 19th century (remember President Jefferson and the Barbary Pirates). The contagion of vengeance infected all of the areas once taken by Muslim power. Even as late as the 16th century, Spain, whose Christians had retaken it from the Muslims, picked up one of the less savory aspects of their former conqueror: getting even. The popular plays turned out by Spanish authors (and picked up by some of England’s best – even Shakespeare) were “vengeance plays.” Shakespeare dealt with this topic often – but the locale was always Italy, as in Romeo and Juliet. Even today, our movie-goers love vengeance stories (think of Quentin Tarantino’s work, such as the recent Inglourious Basterds). Edgar Allen Poe, a 19th century American, wrote a great revenge story: , The Cask of Amontillado with the setting in Spain; and gentle Robert Browning wrote the nastiest little revenge poem ever: “My Last Duchess” – set in Italy. The characters were obviously not northern European – for whom such obsessions were less common. In our contemporary world, the only remnant of vengeance as a motivating issue can be found in such criminal groups as the Mafia and the drug cartels. Outside of that, we find the most murderous varieties of getting even in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Syria, Sudan, and until recently, Algeria. We also find it in some of the Muslim immigrant populations in the murder of daughters and wives who “bring shame” on their families through even rumored violations of the sexual code. Only blood vengeance removes the shame. To remove such a nasty cultural artifact from the world requires real education, a society of civil law and order, and an economy that can produce a good, large middle class. We will not see this artifact go away until that happens. FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Dr. Laina Farhat-Holzman is an historian, lecturer, and author who also writes for the Santa Cruz Sentinel. You may contact her at Lfarhat102@aol.com or http://www.globalthink.net/.