Thursday, 22 October 2026

Psychodynamics

"License."

A psychodynamicist's analysis:

men evolved to hunt;

they are adapted for it biologically and psychologically;

their eyes are most sensitive to the colour of sunlight through leaves;

their feet are adapted to walk on yielding surfaces and are flattened by pavements;

they want to run freely and to sleep after a full meal;

they want the excitement of a chase and a kill, followed by a feast;

they need both tribal intimacy and opportunities for solitude;

they do not want crowding, confinement or subordination of life to a routine job;

psychodynamics showed that most men subconsciously but intensely hate civilization;

hatred must be vented;

soldiers could vent it;

but war has become too destructive and must be prevented;

the destruction, chaos and suffering of the Smashup vented a lot of anger;

now, crime has been legalized and regulated as a safety valve;

imprisonment has been abolished and outlawry instituted;

most people could not live happily in a world with neither war nor crime so they are allowed regulated crime.

The narrator, who makes this analysis, accepts a kidnapping job but would he have accepted a murder job? These also are regulated and legal.

(My task here has been to summarize this analysis, not to agree with it.)

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