全部列癲 │ Harry Wu

Four years ago, 911 event started to make us feel uneasy. Recently, those violence we tend to condemn even put us at stake, such as the bombing in London tubes, explosion in Jordan Radisson Hotel, and the riots in Paris and Lyon.

A recent film, A History of Violence (2005), without following the Hollywood formula fighting fire with fire, retrospects the primitive violence remaining in human beings even following the process of civilization. This year happens to be the 90th anniversary of World War I. In 1915, Sigmud Freud wrote an article not only to blame the war but also raised the concept that civilization actually represses the life and death instinct beneath us. In reality, evil in us cannot be "eradicated" at all.

Facing violence, our attitudes vary with the different situations. The riot in Paris was at first due to human right issues in thief crime. Now it's not only a simple problem but tangled with classes, ethnicities, cultures and religions. Scholars even stated that the riots were mainly caused by the reluctance of French government's being not able to practice the spirit of a welfare nation.

75 years ago in Taiwan, the indigenous Saideke Tribe (賽德克族) rebelled against the Japanese colonists by storming Wushe (霧社) Primary School when the Japanese Imperial Anthem was being played. nearly six tenth of the tribe were killed. A poet, Lai Ho (賴和), wrote, " Although we don't have the happiness in front of the eyes, we should fight for our offspring! " in his famous peom Southern Territory Lament(南國哀歌). They killed for the sake of justice.

On the contrary, the civilized side did not admit it's "killing" purpose. For example, Japanese government killed in order to tame the barbarians in the mountains. the USA invades Iraq in order to "free" it. What they have already done to the children and women there are not killing but so-called "collateral damage".

Whether the following example belongs to violence or not remains disputable: Ju-men Yang (楊儒門), put to jail due to his putting 17 rice-made explosives in public areas. Raised up in an agricultural town in the middle part (my home county, too) of Taiwan, worrying about the living of farmers facing the massive effect of WTO, he chose to act extremely to conjure up the awareness of the government.

To some extend, Yang's motives can be understood. Yes, The capitalized Taiwanese government is bureaucratic. It ignores the exacerbating living situations of farmer and labours. Many NGOs started campaigns to advocate his motives and to free him from jail. Unfortunately when more people get involved, this complicated issue becomes hot for the two political parties to fight with dichotomy. In this, people behave belligerent against one another as if they are those people, observed by Freud, who did not go to the front lines but also thought that the killing/murder should be done. They are far more brutal.

Facing violence, we and behave more discreet and fearful, or more aggressive and radical. It's our free will, depending where we are leading ourselves up to.