When does killing become murder?
Killing outsiders does not elicit the same moral reaction as killing members of the in-group
Image: Dani warriors, from the 1963 movie Dead Birds - shot by Robert Gardner as part of the anthropological work of the Harvard Peabody 1961-1965 expedition.
In the 1930s the Australian and Dutch colonial powers of respectively the eastern and western halves of New Guinea, discovered that large populations lived in the interior Highlands. There were fertile upland valleys supporting thousands growing sweet potatoes, raising pigs and fighting ongoing tribal wars.
The contemporary European spin was this world was a microcosm of social well-being. The equitable climate, the topless men and women, productive gardens along with communal feasting and sing-sings (dancing competitions) all seemed to indicate an idyl, a “Shangrila”.
The Second World War interrupted things, but then colonial authority was imposed through patrols, mission stations, medical centres, and offices for ‘kiaps’ (patrol officers). Before limits were imposed on fighting (to some extent) anthropologists captured a snapshot of neolithic life.
Karl Heider lived with the Dani in the Great Valley of western New Guinea (now Irian Jaya – a province of Indonesia). There were about 50,000 people in this 315 km2 valley. Heider wrote: “The cycle of Dani warfare is a years-long series of battles and raids between alliances of confederations, broken by a brief outburst of fighting which splits alliances and rearranges constituent confederations into new alliances, setting the stage for a new series of battles (P 103; Grand Valley Dani, Peaceful Warriors).
Our World in Data has a remarkable chart of the death rates from violence in non-state societies. Homicide rates in contemporary rich countries are around 1/100,000. Rates of homicide in these ‘non-state’ societies range from 20 (Andamanese in the Indian Ocean ) to 1,450 / 100,000 for mid-19thcentury Cahto of California. The Dani were #2 at 1,000 / 100,000 – 1,000 times the rate in our society.
Imagine a family group – parents, elder or elders, children and youth. If there were 10 families of around 10 people, this 1,000 per 100,000 death rate means one of those hundred dies violently each year. If life expectancy averages 20-25 years (not unusual for “neolithic” societies), then two to three of your immediate family group will die violently during your lifetime.
Is killing someone from another tribe murder? Not for the Dani. When you are fighting another tribe, defending your border and your lands, with the risk of violence and violent death so salient, you must fight, and kill if you get the opportunity.
Humans have evolved the ability to make the moral distinction – killing your people is murder. Killing outsiders is different, it is killing for the tribe, for those you belong to, and who will look out for you.
An intriguing study by University of Monash psychologist Pascal Molenburghs (and five colleagues) put people in fMRI machines and then had them participate in a video game-like simulation where they shot someone – an enemy soldier or a civilian. Brain responses were appreciably different depending on the purported victim. When these poor experimental subjects shot a civilian there was greater activation of the lateral orbitofrontal cortex (OFC for short), and of the junction between the temporal and parietal lobes (TPJ). The OFC is brain-central for making moral judgements. The brain is telling these shooters – shooting innocent civilians is bad. In contrast, shooting an enemy soldier is not bad.
People with damage to the lateral OFC are more likely to behave ‘immorally’ and to be rated as more psychopathic. This makes sense – there is a weaker ‘this is bad’ signal to get through to these individuals’ awareness.
People are very good at distinguishing who is part of our group and who is not. Or an innocent civilian versus an enemy soldier. The ability to make such distinctions matters because getting it wrong could be fatal, for either side of the mistake. A good clue is language – people who communicate in another language are outsiders. Children as young as 12 months (that is before they can communicate verbally; at 12 months most babies have begun using single words), can distinguish a native language speaker from someone speaking another language.
But the Dani in the western Highlands all spoke the same language. During their tribal battles, they would taunt each other. They emphasized the opposing individual’s incompetence at waging war, and also more serious lapses – such as thievery and sexual indiscretions. One aspect of such disrespect is to express the inhuman moral failure of their opponents. Killing those who are not one’s moral equals is more justifiable.
In 1979 militants took control of Iran and also occupied the American embassy. These revolutionaries described the US as morally corrupt, or “The Great Satan.”
Before the outbreak of inter-ethnic fighting in what was Yugoslavia different groups blamed each other for their moral depravity. Serbian and Croatian TV stations aired identical images of victims, with each side blaming the other for these atrocities.
But humans are complicated, and their social arrangements can get complex. Michael Moncrieff and Pierre Lienard demonstrate in research of post-conflict urban and rural Croatia that perceptions of right and wrong are not simply based on what the in- or the out-group did (or were blamed for doing). People with more flexible, wide-ranging social networks can see the wrong-doings of both in- and out-group members as morally bad. Those low in such relational flexibility (who were more likely to be those living rurally), rely on distinguishing whether the offender is one of them or one of the others to make such moral judgements.
When leaders describe others as morally depraved, they are encouraging violent action against these people by ‘their’ followers. ‘Culture wars’, predicated on the moral failures of the other side are dangerous.
Alternatively, to help people understand the humanity and moral basis of outsider’s actions increases the opportunity to see them as human – acting with a moral compass.