So this is Christmas

So this is Christmas

And what have you done?

Another year over

And a new one just begun

Happy Christmas (War is Over) is a song written by John Lennon and Yoko Ono, released in 1977 as a single by John & Yoko/Plastic Ono Band with the Harlem Community Choir.  It was originally a protest song about the Vietnam war.

Thirty six years later, there is still armed conflict all over the world and anti-war protests continue but to no avail.  The problem as I see it, and I'm certainly no expert, is that efforts to prevent war or bring wars to an end, seem to focus on the symptoms (i.e. unnecessary bloodshed) rather than the underlying causes.  But that is probably due to the fact that it is usually extremely difficult to understand the underlying causes.  In my opinion, the big question is why are human beings intent on destroying themselves?  Is it all in the genes?  Is it learned behaviour?  Or is it a combination of those and other factors?

There are many psychoanalytical views on the causes of war, too many to review in this post.  But one theory held by E. F. M. Durban and John Bowlby is that human beings are inherently violent and their natural aggression is sustained by for ever wanting to convert their grievances into bias and hatred against other races, religions, nations or ideologies.  If this is true then there surely can't be any hope for sustained world peace in the future.  Indeed it does appear that when conflicts are supposedly resolved, later, more horrific consequences raise their ugly heads.  I suppose the adage: Today's problems come from yesterday's 'solutions', holds true.  Conflict resolution will inevitably be based on short-term 'solutions', because extrapolating the long-term effects of resolutions is usually impossible.  There are just too many unknowns.  It's easier to look back and suggest what should have been done, than to look forward and establish what has to be done.  It's called being wise with the benefit of hindsight.

So is the future really so gloomy?  Maybe, but perhaps we should see if there are any common threads within the hindsights of past conflicts.  One of the lessons that I think we can all learn from looking back at the life of Nelson Mandela, is that good leadership is a very important ingredient of peaceful solutions to conflicts.  Leaders, such as Hitler, can incite hatred and extreme forms of racism.  Conversely, leaders like Mandela inspired his followers to strive for peaceful and democratic roads to justice built on a vision of equality and not dwelling on the inequalities of the past.

The last verse of John and Yoko's song is poignant.

War is over

If you want it

War is over

Now

On that note, a Merry Christmas and a Happy and Peaceful New Year.