Some years ago, I was talking to my wife about my teenage years in the Navy. Sometimes, he was amazed by the stories of the various pranks the marines did, especially the way we treated each other. Common interactions often involved talking to each other in ways that most people would consider cruel insults, or horseplay that would in many cases be called assault. One time he asked me, “Why do you guys always treat each other so badly?” And my immediate response was “For the same reason monkeys poke each other in the eyes.”
In case this doesn’t clear things up for you, let me elaborate.
I had recently read a book called The Games Primates Play: A Secret Inquiry into the Evolution and Economics of Human Relationships. This book looks at social behavior among various primates and shows how that behavior is reflected in human institutions and rituals. Another common behavior among primates is to signal loyalty, and build an alliance, by doing little harm.
For example, some monkeys take turns to deliberately expose their vulnerable parts to another, and allow that other monkey to drive, manipulate, or hold these parts. After that, the procedure is repeated on the other side. The operative sign here is, “If I wanted to, I would have hurt you badly, but I didn’t.” And I allowed you to be able to hurt me a lot, but you didn’t either. Now we know we can trust each other, because we both had the perfect opportunity to cause a lot of damage but we didn’t.” The book included, among other drawings, pictures of monkeys taking turns poking each other in the eye as part of this process.
The same cultural practice was always in effect in the Waters. The unspoken understanding was “You can insult me in more ways than you can imagine and I won’t get mad – sure, I’ll laugh with you.” I can do the same to you, and you will laugh with me.” In the same way, the trend regarding the rough and tumble aspect of maritime culture showed the same signal. As Max Uriarte once put it, Terminal Lance himself:
Events associated with birthdays in the Marine Corps are secondary. Say your birthday, someone else’s birthday—even your mom’s birthday—and you’ll be real physical abuse. A birthday in the Marine Corps is a dangerous time, lay down the day and hope no one remembers tomorrow; lest you find yourself in an angry, blinded world. In a way, this furious whirlwind of fistfights and brawls is the Marines’ way of showing love to their mate.
I miss my 21st birthday. October 112007-Iraq. Although I can assure you that my beating was great, I remain convinced that in the end it was for love.
Although these phenomena are taken more extreme in the Navy than they are among ordinary (civilized?) people, the same ideas apply. When you get to know someone and they fall into the “just getting to know each other” zone, the social norm is to be polite, ignore mistakes, pretend you don’t notice embarrassing noises, and so on. But when you move into friendship, things change. Friends make fun of each other, make fun of each other, highlight embarrassment rather than pretend they don’t, play practical jokes, and more. And often, making a move like this is how one shows the other that the relationship has moved from a casual acquaintance into a true friendship.
I’m sure I’m not the only one who, at times, has felt like such a change has happened, and I took the first step in “friendly banter” with someone, but that person got really upset, which made me realize that maybe they and I weren’t as close as I thought. (It can’t just be me, right?) And that’s why such behavior is taken to such extremes by the military. In the Navy, people had to be able to stick together in extreme, high-pressure environments with life and death stakes. That kind of cohesion required people to be able to put up walls – so everyday life depended on constantly showing that all walls were down. So no matter how badly you insulted me or I insulted you, we’ll both be laughing about it together over beers in the pub that night.
And there is another side of the coin – this kind of signaling doesn’t send much of a signal if it doesn’t have the potential to at least cost something. Trying to show friendship by engaging in behavior that is indistinguishable from polite, anodyne behavior among people you know sends an invisible signal. Sometimes, the signs are misread, and jokes or actions are made that cause people to really get upset. But if that danger had not existed, there would have been no signal.
In the course of my life, I have seen many pushbacks from the ground up, formal and informal, to try to shut down these counter-friendly expressions in favor of a kinder, gentler society. But if the thesis of Games for Beginners well, it may not be the case that kind, gentle social interaction works as a real part of building social cohesion, because these ideas are deeply rooted in our psychology.
If a committee of monkeys decided that eye-checking was an unnecessarily hostile behavior and prevented the monkeys from engaging in this behavior, the result would not be a greater level of social cohesion in that troop. It could lead to the breakdown of the social order that this army relies on. And there is a real possibility that the modern campaign to move public spaces to “softer, softer” places where dissenting behavior is prohibited may backfire. Rather than strengthening social bonds, it may only serve to weaken the fabric that keeps social bonds strong.
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