War is murder. And the military preparations now being made for a potential major confrontation are aimed at collective murder. In a nuclear age the victims would be numbered by the millions. This naked truth must be faced.
Alva MyrdalRead
Because war and preparations for war have acquired legitimacy, and because of the tremendous proliferation of arms through production and export, so that they are now available more or less to all and sundry, right down to handguns and stilettos, the cult of violence has by now so permeated relations between people that we are compelled to witness as well an increase in everyday violence.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The normalization of war and violence has led to greater acceptance and occurrence of everyday violence in society.
In this quote, Alva Myrdal reflects on the disturbing normalization of war and how the widespread availability of weapons has contributed to a 'cult of violence' that permeates societal interactions. She emphasizes that as societies legitimize the military and violence, this acceptance bleeds into everyday life, resulting in an increase in interpersonal violence and aggression.
Themes
WarViolenceSocietyArmsEverydayNorms
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about promoting peace, this quote can highlight the dangers of normalizing violence.
More from Alva Myrdal
All quotes →There is a cultural factor promoting violence which nowadays undoubtedly is highly effective is the mass media. And particularly everything that enters our minds through pictorial media.
Alva MyrdalRead
The longing for peace is rooted in the hearts of all men. But the striving, which at present has become so insistent, cannot lay claim to such an ambition as leading the way to eternal peace, or solving all disputes among nations.
Alva MyrdalRead
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I begin each day with holy Mass, receiving Jesus hidden under the appearance of a simple piece of bread. Then I go out into the streets and I find the same Jesus hidden in the dying destitute, the AIDS patients, the lepers, the abandoned children, the hungry, and the homeless. It's the same Jesus.
Mother TeresaRead
How we live is so different from how we ought to live that he who studies what ought to be done rather than what is done will learn the way to his downfall rather than to his preservation.
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The pursuit of otherness, the sense that we are somehow different than our brothers and sisters, no matter where we find them, allows for all the other great evils: racism, sexism, homophobia, violence against gay people and against women.
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The question of questions for the politicians should ever be-What type of social structure am I tending to produce? But this is a question he never entertains.
Herbert SpencerRead
Even today we raise our hand against our brother... We have perfected our weapons, our conscience has fallen asleep, and we have sharpened our ideas to justify ourselves as if it were normal we continue to sow destruction, pain, death. Violence and war lead only to death.
Pope FrancisRead