1 year later....still glad u went to law school?

[c o l o m b u s]

[...]

It can not resort to illegal tactics and strategies that by actually being used and reluctantly endorsed by its citizens have the effect of legitimizing them, with the end result being over-accumulation of power, beyond that that was originally intended to be invested, and conferred, by the people onto their government.

And so, the more innocent their victim of persecution, the more afraid people will be - as they too might as well be in the victim's place - with more and more power that governments will be able to steal from the people.

Will you walk me to my car, I don't think you have to worry too much about this - do you think The People would allow such a thing? At least in the US of A? I mean, sure, things have happened, but not to the extent that would make one so intent on stressing it out.

Could first figure out, though, as to how you got to this stuff, as you were initially commenting on "spillover"s response to another poster ... anyway ...

that guest, what do you really mean when you ask as to whether The People would allow such a thing? You are using the term "The People" in the sense of "We The People," are you not?!

'Cause in that case, I think it'd more correct to say, "do you think The B i t c h e s would not allow such a thing?" - again using "The B i t c h e s" in the sense of "We The B i t c h e s."

I mean, are you nuts, have you not heard about all the * & ^ % the American government has done on its own people, let alone what it does to the entire world on a daily basis - raping the entire globe of its resources, stealing the oil of the Middle East and waging wars there to scare the * & ^ % outta them!

We Fly for Your Smile, your other post kinda contradicts the above - if Hitler was looking to come sorta clean before the public opinion, don't you think that today's America would care even more about its actions and how they'll be judged by the people (its own citizens and the worlds' citizens?)

With one part of the equation (paranoia) in mind, let us further examine the other part (homosexuality). People have looked into the actual social milieu Hitler was part of to deduce that he, too, practiced homosexuality. For instance,

• Hitler's Youth leader, Baldur von Schirach was bisexual and a pedophile;
• Hitler's private attorney, Reich Legal Director, was homosexual;
• Minister of Justice, an adamant fag basher Hans Frank was a homosexual (typical);
• Hitler's adjutant Wilhelm Bruckner was bisexual;
• Walter Funk, Reich Minister of Economics and Hitler's personal financial advisor has frequently been called a "notorious" homosexual;
• Hitler's second in command Hermann Goering liked to dress up in drag;
• Rudolph Hess, the handsome Hess, nicknamed "Miss Emma" was gay;
• All of his personal bodyguards were gay;
• Even his chauffeur was gay.

Hitler quit school at age 16 and in 1909 moved to Vienna, where he twice took and failed the Art Academy's entrance examination. Shortly after his move, August Kubizek, a young man from his hometown, joined him and they lived together for 4 months. Intensely jealous, Hitler wrote Kubizek, "I cannot endure it when you consort and converse with other young people." For the next several years, Hitler drifted aimlessly. Despite immense Nazi efforts to erase as much of his past as possible (by destroying his massive police records, for example) it is known that he spent 5 months at a men's hostel known as "a hub of homosexual activity." In May 1913, he moved with another young man to Munich (said to be "a regular El Dorado for homosexuals") and, in September 1914, joined the Bavarian army. He spent the war years as a behind-the-lines messenger, enjoying a long and active sexual relationship with another runner, Ernst Schmidt. At war's end, Hitler returned to Munich and more homosexual activities. He met at that time Capt. Ernst Roehm, a well-connected army officer who soon offered him his first job — as a political spy for the army within a newly organized workers' party.

Hitler's rise largely was due to the two brilliant homosexuals who mentored and tutored him: Roehm, a notorious pederast and a contemporary, and Dietrich Eckart, 21 years his senior. Roehm, a career staff officer during the war, had access to both secret army funds and to military and right-wing groups such as the ultranationalist, anti-Semitic and homoerotic Freikorps — the fiercely anticommunist terrorist squads that sprang up, especially in eastern Germany, in response to the political chaos of the early Weimar Republic. Eckart was a fiercely anti-Semitic journalist and playwright who taught Hitler political tactics and introduced him to Munich and Berlin society, as well as to other wealthy people throughout the country.

Most of the top ranking SS from the very beginning were also homosexual. Ernst Roehm, whom Hitler was a protégé, created the Nazi party on the idea of being proud so called ultra-masculine, male supremacist pedophiles. When you cast a net with that kind of bait what kind of fish do you think you are going to catch? In fact, they actually thought because of their homosexuality they were ultra-masculine because they didn't need women for anything, including sex and companionship. The idea was that because they had no personal need for women, homosexual men were superior to even heterosexual men. They believed that homosexual men were the foundation of all nation-states and represented the elite strata of human society. Naturally, to support their argument they drew much of their pride from the accomplishments of the Greeks, quite possibly the gayest civilization ever to walk to earth.

From what I gather here, it looks like Nazis were a lil' bit into this homosexual thing (homoerotic thing, to put it a bit more mildly - or should I say a bit more harshly? And that Hitler, later on, did what he did with homosexuals to 'purge,' come kinda clean in the eyes of P.O. (public opinion) ...

[C a s i n o]

Mother here ... I was like, do I post post this, or is it better not to post it at all ... but then, I thought, I'm gonna post it anyway ... I am aware that talking about two men having a baby sounds crazy and that several posters on this board may ridicule the idea ... now, I don't know if I'm being naive, but science has made possible for us things that 50 years ago we'd think were impossible ... my question is - is this something that scientists are working on and that they are bound to bring to fruition? I have a son who's gay, who very much loves his partner  - I know deep down myself he loves children, it's just that he does not go with women. I sometimes 'rave' he might have a biological child with his partner, his boyfriend ... now I wonder, is this just a poor woman's imagination, or something that will come true sooner or later?

Meria, in all due respect, I'm trying to think what is it that you're really thinking?! You say, "it's 'just' that he does not go with women" - I mean, what's that supposed to mean - for this kind of thing, going with women really matters!

Just take a look at the date the electronic article was posted on BBC - more than 10 years ago - doesn't that make you think they're not making their "best efforts" on that?!

spillover - as the other poster advised you, I think you should be more careful and try to maintain the boundaries a lil' bit better - you can't go ahead and try to put people down just like that!

Exactly, 2 young 2, spillover can't even pretend s/he was being friendly to Meria when putting it bluntly and telling her about the whole thing as it is - I mean, we're not living in some kind of ex-communist country where people called themselves "brothers" and "sisters," pretending that they really were such to a certain extent!

In the Western world, people draw strict boundaries between one another - in fact, they are expected to fully rely on themselves psychologically and economically for their own maintenance (be self-sufficient) - with solidarity and like concepts not being too much attended to.

Things function in these societies bureaucratically, based on the laws, drawn and enforced by the governments, the ones that same people elected to govern them.

So they do not, for instance, go and kill their fellow citizen to get even for him having say, raped, their child - they address the issue with the government - take the guy to the courts of law.

The government, on the other hand, has to abide by a set of norms (laws) and not overstep them, abusing the power conferred on it by the people. It can not curtail their citizens' liberties, for instance, overtly or covertly, unless good cause is shown first.

It can not resort to illegal tactics and strategies that by actually being used and reluctantly endorsed by its citizens have the effect of legitimizing them, with the end result being over-accumulation of power, beyond that that was originally intended to be invested, and conferred, by the people onto their government.

And so, the more innocent their victim of persecution, the more afraid people will be - as they too might as well be in the victim's place - with more and more power that governments will be able to steal from the people.

Will you walk me 2 my car, I can see your post has elicited a bit of controversy - I'd have to say that there are safeguards in place that would not allow a certain branch of the government go off the limits and employ "illegal" tactics, as you say, on its citizens - the executive body, would need, for instance, a warrant from a judge (the legislative), which would make the tactic that you talk about, "legal."

The Investment of Power by the People into its own Government, as outlined in the Constitution, works in such a way that there exists a separation of powers between the 3 branches of the government (thus, operating on a system of checks and balances).

James Madison, writing in "The Federalist," No. 47, said, that the accumulation of all powers - legislative, executive, and judiciary - in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, lead to the very definition of tyranny [dictatorship].

There's no doubt about it - the police will have to show you an warrant, for example, to search your house; even for the car, to search your car, they have to have you on record saying you allow them to search it. More lenient requirements are in place when in comes to frisking, as the police may have to do it to make sure you have not any guns on yourself.

[Dhorothea]

Depressive position

In the depressive position, the infant is able to experience others as whole, which radically alters object relationships from the earlier phase. Before the depressive position, a good object is not in any way the same thing as a bad object. It is only in the depressive position that polar qualities can be seen as different aspects of the same object. Increasing nearness of good and bad brings a corresponding integration of ego. [...] In a development termed the "primal split," the infant becomes aware of separateness from the mother. This awareness allows guilt to arise in response to the infant's previous aggressive phantasies when bad was split from good. The mother's temporary absences allow for continuous restoration of her "as an image of representation" in the infant mind. Symbolic thought may now arise, and can only emerge once access to the depressive position has been obtained. With the awareness of the primal split, a space is created in which the symbol, the symbolized, and the experiencing subject coexist. History, subjectivity, interiority, and empathy all become possible. [...]

[...]

In working through depressive anxiety, projections are withdrawn, allowing the other more autonomy, reality, and a separate existence. The infant, whose destructive phantasies were directed towards the bad mother who frustrated, now begins to realize that bad and good, frustrating and satiating, it is always the same mother [...]

[...]

From this developmental milestone come a capacity for sympathy, responsibility to and concern for others, and an ability to identify with the subjective experience of people one cares about. With the withdrawal of the destructive projections, repression of the aggressive impulses takes place. The child allows caretakers a more separate existence, which facilitates increasing differentiation of inner and outer reality [...]  When all goes well, the developing child is able to comprehend that external others are autonomous people with their own needs and subjectivity.

[...]

Now some of you might say this 'breast' thing is all feasible ...  it makes sense ... and yet, one might naturally pose the question: what about children who never had a female figure near during their childhood? What about, for instance, babies raised by gay partners (males) that we see more and more these days?

Klein put down in words her intuitions during a time when gay parenting and the like, e.g., were not even thought of - I'd guess, her theories need a bit revision. I don't want to sound rude, but speaking nowadays in her terms is a bit funny!

Experts nowadays still maintain that breast milk is the best nutritional choice for infants.

However, in some instances, breastfeeding (or exclusive breastfeeding) may not be possible or an option. The decision to breastfeed and/or formula feed should be based on comfort level, lifestyle, and specific medical considerations.

Breast milk is all that is needed for about 6 months, at which time complementary foods are introduced. Most babies can exclusively breastfeed without the need for any formula.

Some experts feel that giving bottles too early can create "nipple confusion," leading a baby to decide that the bottle is a quicker, better option than the breast. To avoid this, be sure that your little one has gotten used to and is good at breastfeeding before you introduce a bottle.

[stayover]

In Europe, the state pays for the institutional costs of instruction; students pay little or no tuition, but are responsible for living costs; and most universities are public.

In the US, by contrast, student loans have become the most profitable, uncompetitive, oppressive, and predatory type of debt of any in the nation. This has occurred due to legislation that was largely paid for by the the lobbying machine of Sallie Mae, the largest student loan company in America. Vast personal fortunes are being made by both Sallie Mae executives, and others who paid for this legislation, at the expense of decent citizens who were not able to capitalize on their education. This has effectively crippled MILLIONS of decent citizens who want to repay their original debt, but are prevented from doing so by staggeringly higher amounts being demanded from them by both "non-profit", and for-profit student loan companies.

I don't know about Sallie Mae, but I have loans with Access Group, under the auspice of Deutsche Bank - I was given these loans, although being a non-US-resident and without a US co-signer, to attend college. Now, I defaulted on the loan and they appear on my credit report as such. What do I do to clear my credit report and boost my credit score a lil' bit? Anyone?!

SallieMae is ridiculuous - I just do not get how those guys are still allowed to stay in business - what are the Courts doing - where are the class action suits?!

Are we missing something here?!

[sollicitus]

The world would end without them (and those like them) that is why.

[Tahiri]

Exactly, 2 young 2, spillover can't even pretend s/he was being friendly to Meria when putting it bluntly and telling her about the whole thing as it is -

I mean, we're not living in some kind of ex-communist country where people called themselves "brothers" and "sisters," pretending that they really were such to a certain extent!

In the Western world, people draw strict boundaries between one another - in fact, they are expected to fully rely on themselves psychologically and economically for their own maintenance (be self-sufficient) - with solidarity and like concepts not being too much attended to. Things function in these societies bureaucratically, based on the laws, drawn and enforced by the governments, the ones that same people elected to govern them.

So they do not, for instance, go and kill their fellow citizen to get even for him having say, raped, their child - they address the issue with the government - take the guy to the courts of law.

The government, on the other hand, has to abide by a set of norms (laws) and not overstep them, abusing the power conferred on it by the people. It can not curtail their citizens' liberties, for instance, overtly or covertly, unless good cause is shown first.

It can not resort to illegal tactics and strategies that by actually being used and reluctantly endorsed by its citizens have the effect of legitimizing them, with the end result being over-accumulation of power, beyond that that was originally intended to be invested, and conferred, by the people onto their government.

And so, the more innocent their victim of persecution, the more afraid people will be - as they too might as well be in the victim's place - with more and more power that governments will be able to steal from the people.

I would stress upon the "bureaucracy" kind of thing - I was once in Turkey and I was surprised how people dealt with many situations that in the Western world we normally address/redress with the government.

All things being equal, I would be more concerned were the "power" to be "stolen" by plain people/mobs, rather than the government, so to speak .. to respond to a note that Will You Walk makes.

[Romina]

Exactly, 2 young 2, spillover can't even pretend s/he was being friendly to Meria when putting it bluntly and telling her about the whole thing as it is -

I mean, we're not living in some kind of ex-communist country where people called themselves "brothers" and "sisters," pretending that they really were such to a certain extent!

In the Western world, people draw strict boundaries between one another - in fact, they are expected to fully rely on themselves psychologically and economically for their own maintenance (be self-sufficient) - with solidarity and like concepts not being too much attended to. Things function in these societies bureaucratically, based on the laws, drawn and enforced by the governments, the ones that same people elected to govern them.

So they do not, for instance, go and kill their fellow citizen to get even for him having say, raped, their child - they address the issue with the government - take the guy to the courts of law.

The government, on the other hand, has to abide by a set of norms (laws) and not overstep them, abusing the power conferred on it by the people. It can not curtail their citizens' liberties, for instance, overtly or covertly, unless good cause is shown first.

It can not resort to illegal tactics and strategies that by actually being used and reluctantly endorsed by its citizens have the effect of legitimizing them, with the end result being over-accumulation of power, beyond that that was originally intended to be invested, and conferred, by the people onto their government.

And so, the more innocent their victim of persecution, the more afraid people will be - as they too might as well be in the victim's place - with more and more power that governments will be able to steal from the people.

I would stress upon the "bureaucracy" kind of thing - I was once in Turkey and I was surprised how people dealt with many situations that in the Western world we normally address/redress with the government.

All things being equal, I would be more concerned were the "power" to be "stolen" by plain people/mobs, rather than the government, so to speak .. to respond to a note that Will You Walk makes.

Are you kidding me, Tahiri?! Are you not fed up with all the police abuse in the US? The enormous power they have, or think they have, to treat people the way they like?!

Foreign citizens (tourists) are surprised, for instance, how many cops they see during a short time period when taking a tour around the city! 

[garçon]

[...]

It can not resort to illegal tactics and strategies that by actually being used and reluctantly endorsed by its citizens have the effect of legitimizing them, with the end result being over-accumulation of power, beyond that that was originally intended to be invested, and conferred, by the people onto their government.

And so, the more innocent their victim of persecution, the more afraid people will be - as they too might as well be in the victim's place - with more and more power that governments will be able to steal from the people.

Will you walk me to my car, I don't think you have to worry too much about this - do you think The People would allow such a thing? At least in the US of A? I mean, sure, things have happened, but not to the extent that would make one so intent on stressing it out.

Could first figure out, though, as to how you got to this stuff, as you were initially commenting on "spillover"s response to another poster ... anyway ...

that guest, what do you really mean when you ask as to whether The People would allow such a thing? You are using the term "The People" in the sense of "We The People," are you not?!

'Cause in that case, I think it'd more correct to say, "do you think The B i t c h e s would not allow such a thing?" - again using "The B i t c h e s" in the sense of "We The B i t c h e s."

I mean, are you nuts, have you not heard about all the * & ^ % the American government has done on its own people, let alone what it does to the entire world on a daily basis - raping the entire globe of its resources, stealing the oil of the Middle East and waging wars there to scare the * & ^ % outta them!

Unfortunately, I have to concur with We Fly here.

The dilemma posed by the conflict between conscience and authority inheres in the very nature of society and would be with us even if Nazi Germany had never existed. Some dismiss the Nazi example because we live in a democracy and not an authoritarian state. But, in reality, this does not eliminate the problem. For the problem is not "authoritarianism" as a mode of political organization or a set of psychological attitudes but authority itself.

Stanley Milgram conducted in the 50s an experiment on obedience to authority. It measured the willingness of participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that conflicted with their personal conscience. The major finding was that ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality, relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority.

Milgram explained this kind of behavior via his "agentic state" theory, wherein, the essence of obedience consists in the fact that a person comes to view themselves as the instrument for carrying out another person's wishes, and they therefore no longer see themselves as responsible for their actions.



The experiment itself: the volunteer subject was given the role of teacher, and the confederate, the role of learner. The participants drew slips of paper to determine their roles, but unknown to the subject, both slips said "teacher," and the actor claimed to have the slip that read "learner," thus guaranteeing that the participant would always be the "teacher". At this point, the "teacher" and "learner" were separated into different rooms where they could communicate but not see each other. In one version of the experiment, the confederate was sure to mention to the participant that he had a heart condition.

The "teacher" was given an electric shock from the electro-shock generator as a sample of the shock that the "learner" would supposedly receive during the experiment. The "teacher" was then given a list of word pairs which he was to teach the learner. The teacher began by reading the list of word pairs to the learner. The teacher would then read the first word of each pair and read four possible answers. The learner would press a button to indicate his response. If the answer was incorrect, the teacher would administer a shock to the learner, with the voltage increasing in 15-volt increments for each wrong answer. If correct, the teacher would read the next word pair.

The subjects believed that for each wrong answer, the learner was receiving actual shocks. In reality, there were no shocks. After the confederate was separated from the subject, the confederate set up a tape recorder integrated with the electro-shock generator, which played pre-recorded sounds for each shock level. After a number of voltage level increases, the actor started to bang on the wall that separated him from the subject. After several times banging on the wall and complaining about his heart condition, all responses by the learner would cease.

At this point, many people indicated their desire to stop the experiment and check on the learner. Some test subjects paused at 135 volts and began to question the purpose of the experiment. Most continued after being assured that they would not be held responsible. A few subjects began to laugh nervously or exhibit other signs of extreme stress once they heard the screams of pain coming from the learner.

If at any time the subject indicated his desire to halt the experiment, he was given a succession of verbal prods by the experimenter, in this order:

1.Please continue.
2.The experiment requires that you continue.
3.It is absolutely essential that you continue.
4.You have no other choice, you must go on.

If the subject still wished to stop after all four successive verbal prods, the experiment was halted. Otherwise, it was halted after the subject had given the maximum 450-volt shock three times in succession.

The experimenter also gave special prods if the teacher made specific comments. If the teacher asked whether the learner might suffer permanent physical harm, the experimenter replied "Although the shocks may be painful, there is no permanent tissue damage, so please go on". If the teacher said that the learner clearly wants to stop, the experimenter replied, "Whether the learner likes it or not, you must go on until he has learned all the word pairs correctly, so please go on".

[garçon]

Perception of authority The first condition needed for transformation to the "agentic state" is the perception of a legitimate authority. From a psychological standpoint, authority means the person who is perceived to be in a position of social control within a given situation. Authority is contextually perceived and does not necessarily transcend the situation in which it is encountered.

Authority is normatively supported: there is a shared expectation among people that certain situations do ordinarily have a socially controlling figure. Authority need not possess high status in the sense of "prestige." For example, an usher at a theater is a source of social control to whom we ordinarily submit willingly. The power of an authority stems not from personal characteristics but from his perceived position in a social structure. Police, military, and other service uniforms are the most conspicuous signs of authority within common experience.

It is the appearance of authority and not actual authority to which the subject responds. Unless contradictory information or anomalous facts appear, the self-designation of the authority almost always suffices.

Coordination of Command with the Function of Authority. Authority is the perceived source of social control within a specific context. The context defines the range of commands considered appropriate to the authority in question. There must, in general, be some intelligible link between the function of the controlling person, and the nature of the commands he issues. The connection need not be very well worked out but need only make sense in the most general way.

Because the experimenter issues orders in a context he is presumed to know something about, his power is increased. Generally, authorities are felt to know more than the person they are commanding; whether they do or not, the occasion is defined as if they do. Even when a subordinate possesses a greater degree of technical knowledge than his superior, he must not presume to override the authority's right to command but must present this knowledge to the superior to dispose of as he wishes.

A process of tuning occurs in the subject, with maximal receptivity to the emissions of the authority, whereas the learner's signals are muted and psychologically remote. Those who are skeptical of this effect might observe the behavior of individuals organized in a hierarchical structure. The meeting of a company president with his subordinates will do. The subordinates respond with attentive concern to each word uttered by the president. Ideas originally mentioned by persons of a low status will frequently not be heard, but when repeated by the president, they are greeted with enthusiasm. The person in authority, by virtue of that position, is in the optimal position to bestow benefits or inflict deprivations. Because of this, authority tends to be seen as something larger than the individual. The individual often views authority as an impersonal force, whose dictates transcend mere human wish or desire. Those in authority acquire, for some, a suprahuman character.

Loss of Responsibility The most far-reaching consequence of the agentic shift is that a man feels responsible to the authority directing him but feels no responsibility for the content of the actions that the authority prescribes. Morality does not disappear, but acquires a radically different focus: the subordinate person feels shame or pride depending on how adequately he has performed the actions called for by authority. For a man to feel responsible for his actions, he must sense that the behavior has flowed from "the self." Superego functions shift from an evaluation of the goodness or badness of the acts to an assessment of how well or poorly one is functioning in the authority system. Because the inhibitory forces which prevent the individual from acting harshly against others on his own are short-circuited, actions are no longer limited by conscience.

Sequential Nature of the Action As the subject delivers more and more painful shocks, he must seek to justify to himself what he has done; one form of justification is to go to the end. For if he breaks off, he must say to himself: "Everything I have done to this point is bad, and I now acknowledge it by breaking off." But, if he goes on, he is reassured about his past performance. Earlier actions give rise to discomforts, which are neutralized by later ones. And the subject is implicated into the destructive behavior in piecemeal fashion.

The subject fears that if he breaks off, he will appear arrogant, untoward, and rude. Such emotions, although they appear small in scope alongside the violence being done to the learner, nonetheless help bind the subject into obedience. They suffuse the mind and feelings of the subject, who is miserable at the prospect of having to repudiate the authority to his face. The entire prospect of turning against the experimental authority, with its attendant disruption of a well-defined social situation, is an embarrassment that many people are unable to face up to. In an effort to avoid this awkward event, many subjects find obedience a less painful alternative.

[Merci]

While Becker accuses Freud for "being haunted with the death instinct," the ironic thing is that it's him who replaces the Freudian preoccupation with sexuality with the fear of death as the primary motivation in human behavior. (We all know that Freud was very specific when talking about sexuality, and very vague when talking about thanatos).

But I can understand why TMT would make out of the individual the kind of p u s s y it makes out of him - in Western culture we are trained to experience ourselves as separate from each-other, alone, assuming as self evident that other individuals experience the same. It must be, then, that the driving force behind all human behavior is the desire to overcome this sense of aloneness, to feel part of a greater whole, to be liked and accepted by other human beings.

Here it is a related post on this TMT thing:

[...] Freud then went on to outline for Einstein his theory of Eros, the life instinct that "seeks to preserve and unite" and of Thanatos, the death instinct. For Freud, aggression was the manifestation of Thanatos and thus an essential element of human nature. For that reason, he characterized Russian communism as "an illusion trying to make human aggression disappear."

[...]

May it be that "aggression" and "Thanatos" are not necessarily essential elements of human nature, but instead it is the human being that, afraid of the inevitability of one's death and destruction, adopts an aggressive attitude trying to find some "relief" in killing other people -- that is to say, try to reduce one's existential angst by taking an active role instead of waiting passively to die?

something, I guess you're thinking along the lines of the above poster; I'd like to point out though that, as far as Freud is concerned, the "aggressiveness" and "Thanatos" are innate in humans -- that is to say, instinctive -- and humans can not help but "display" them, just like the rest of the universe, after all. You, on the other hand, tend to attribute a great deal of importance to the human consciousness, rendering aggression and the waging of war a "choice" that the humans make consciously.

But after all, that's the whole point, isn't it? 

To be sure, Marcuse worked with Freud's Eros only, disregarding Thanatos - as far as engaging in war and being aggressive "consciously," there's nothing strange or unusual about it (think soldiers in war) - what was being discussed here, I believe, was whether Thanatos is to be called an "instinct" or not ..

So if I get this right, this means killing others (murder) in order not to kill ourselves (suicide) in order to keep up with lack of life meaning and the conscious awareness of our deaths?

And that the deaths of the "other" serves to establish a symbolic immortality buffer for one of the parties? Kind of like the child that is forced to concede its physicality and "trade it in" for a symbolic sense of self (i.e., self-esteem)?

We Fly, I can see your posts provoke a certain degree of response, and they're quite peculiar...

However, this other post, I think you're over-analyzing - are you guys in law school or what?! Because I don't see law students and professors and licensed, practicing lawyers talk like this...