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Comment by joushou | Hacker News Reader

There is no "them" or "us". "They" are just people. They are rarely even people that we disagree with - they're innocent civilians that were unlucky and lived in what turned into a war zone, or soldiers that are simply following orders to protect what they consider their home. The decision is whether or not to take hundreds, thousands, or even millions of lives exactly like the one of the navy officer with the launch code embedded in his chest. Lives that had nothing to do with the conflict at all.

The "bad guys", the ones you might actually refer to as "them", are sitting somewhere comfortable, far out of reach of any of this. Their only interaction in this is that they pressed a button.

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It's scary that even here on HN, a comment like this would get downvoted. Seeing the world through a lens of "us" and "them", and seeing "them" as being less worthy of our humanity & consideration, has led to more human-atrocities throughout history, than almost anything else.

It's pretty clear that the grandparent meant that for better or worse, ingroup-outgroup bias is a very real thing in human psychology abd sociology, and there wouldn't be many wars without demonization of the outgroup. I saw no indication that they actually thought that this is a good distinction to make. Is-ought problem.

But there has to be an "us" and "them" unless we live in a truly post-scarcity society.

You can label whatever group you find yourself in to be "us", and the rest as "them", but they're no different than you. You're just being selfish in valuing your life more than theirs.

This selfishness if of course natural for any human, but that does not make it better.

Does there have to be? It seems more accurate to say that we like there to be.

It is naive to think we are all one happy human race. I wish it were so but it isn't. The "others" will have no problem killing you and dance on your grave. I guess that is why the saying goes "If you want peace, prepare for war"

Usually, and judging by the numbers, it's the inverse.

It's the self justified "us" than do most damage, not some "others".

It doesn't matter which army is battling me, whether it is Russian, Chinese or American. They will have no problem killing me, because that's their job, and there is war. Dancing on my grave would be difficult, because that would require retrieving my body.

I'm not saying that war is not necessary, but pretending that you're fighting zombies thirsting for nothing but your blood is idiotic. The soldiers you're fighting joined their army to protect their people. The people itself most likely just want to passively continue with their life, not understanding what the war is about, knowing nothing but the date of the first bomb. The people that started the war is sitting somewhere cozy, out of reach.

> The soldiers you're fighting joined their army to protect their people.

Simply not true in the case of, say, an aggressor who initiates conflict by invading other countries.

Many a times there is definitely a right an wrong in war.

The side which is right has no choice but to respond with aggression. Fight, or else be laughably annihilated for the sake of a pacifist ideology.

> The "others" will have no problem killing you and dance on your grave.

Any evidence for that?

Read a history book. The human nature is well documented.

You're not reading the same history books, obviously.

Because again and again, humans are well-documented to NOT dance on each other's graves. We consistently pull back from the brink of destroying the "other" and not only let them live, but help them rebuild.

>Seeing the world through a lens of "us" and "them"

And yet you demonstrate it yourself with, "I expect them to do it, but not us in the HN community. We're different here."

Armchair psychology: I suppose media can be blamed partly for this view. Bad news sell, and the further away places are correspondingly, stereotypically, only the worst of the news are of reporting value. Thus, people in far away places are associated with fear and chaos.

Also: Baseline human psychology is tribalistic and violent. We need education and culture to behave as modern - and sustenance amd safety.

The media give the people what they want.

When I come to put you up against the wall for holding dangerous to the nation ideas like that, will you still think of me as one of your own?

I have no one labelled as "my own", at least not in the nationalist/patriotic sense. My family and friends my go into that category if we really must, but that's it.

If you put a gun to my head, I'm certainly not going to care if you're my local baker or a North Korean soldier, just to name a random nation. Hell, I'll probably have sympathies for the soldier, as they are just doing what they were told, like any other soldier would. Getting angry at them would be pointless, although I'd of course do my best to fight for survival, and if I came out the winner, I would be upset that the life I had to take was not the life that was to blame.

For the baker, it would be hard to tell if the hand was forced, or if the idea of slaughter was of their own making.

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