Violence and Morality

Last weekend I was reading a nice book while on my way to the beach (very early in the morning). The book was explaining how internal violence (or conflict-inside) gets manifested in the form of external violence. Just the other day I was arguing with my friend how wrong it is to kill someone for his food-habit (ref: mob lynching in India killing people who were accused of eating beef). And in a moment of inspiration it all seemed to fall into place. How disturbed one must be to kill another person? How loveless his life must be? How unsettled, dry, and melancholic his life must be? Then followed an instant surge of pity and sadness for the men who did such a barbaric deed. 

Then I was trying to think, what might be the reason of internal violence? I think most of internal conflicts arise when the way I am is different from the way I am expected to be. Why that might be the case? It can be the case because of two reasons: viz. A- I have not understood myself and my natural tendencies carefully and deeply. B- I try to follow certain accepted standards set by peers, parents and priests. That externally enforced morality creates tension within myself. 

Morality is natural. No one should have to learn morality. And when we start teaching morality we create both of the above conditions for internal conflict. We stop the internal independent inquiry of a person and we enforce external rules. The more morale a society tries to be the more hypocrisy it fosters and that in turn create more internal violence which is reflected in external violence. 

I shall give one simple (but macabre) example. Child sex abuse is a horrible skeleton in the cupboard of our society. India is one of the very few developing nations to have done a proper exhaustive study on this and the results are shocking. The percentage of minors facing sexual abuse in India is much higher than that in a developed country (development defined by economic advancement). Not only this, also India is the only nation (I could find) where the prevalence of male-minor sexual abuse is higher than female-minor abuse. 

When shall we realise that we need to stop “following” moral rules and start looking deep into our own selves? We do not need a police to keep morality; we do not need a God to teach us morality. The more morality we preach the more chaos we shall bring upon ourselves.