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Comment by vearwhershuh | Hacker News Reader

I'm indifferent towards the content of this article, but a meta-point: it is interesting how our civilian society has militarized so thoroughly. There are the obvious things like the militarization of the police forces, but it has trickled down to seemingly frivolous things like "Cupcake Wars" and "Cutthroat Kitchen".

I wonder if this is organic or not.

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It might be because members of developed societies are so unlikely to come into contact with actual war that they can call even the most minor conflicts a war. Lack of stimulus accentuates what little you can get.

Or just more broadly people trying to market their things as being a higher level than their competitors. This escalates the language used and we end up with things like cupcake wars and every other article claiming someone "slammed" or "destroyed" another by just making a comment.

Totally agree. I think to some degree it started with the first Iraq war when the first GPS bombs made war look like a cool video game. I think it’s a very bad trend that eventually will lower the threshold to real war. Same for torture. Movies have made torture look cool and useful.

I think these analogies are way way older than Iraq, and I'd bet they exist in cultures all over the world. War is probably the most intense part of the human experience, and using War analogies lends easy power to your statements.

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