A bloody era

Submitted by Peter Herz (United States), Feb 4, 2012 at 19:04

Rummel's study shows that we are coming out of an extremely bloody era in human history, and it should be a very sobering tale. I was raised to believe that untamed religion is a very dangerous thing, but the numbers of victims of government (absent war) which Rummel counts during the 20th century alone are higher than all those who suffered for the wrong kind of Christianity or non at all during the 15 centuries between the conversion of Constantine and 1811 (Ruggles v. New York).

I've read an earlier edition of Ruggles' book. He's an advocate of the Democratic Peace thesis (common among a number of students of international politics), a thesis which holds that democratic countries don't fight each other that much (in a nutshell), and hence are better for world peace. While I can't say I agree with the idea, I have to admit that, as an American, I find it attractive.

But perhaps the deeper issue is that we humans are not a very pacific species.

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