in “Culture of Honor,” nisbett and cohen argued that the scots-irish of appalachia are more violent than, say, yankees ’cause of their … you guessed it … culture of honor.
*sigh*
this article [opens pdf] has a good description of what nisbett and cohen found when they researched the flying-off-the-handle-ness of southerners vs. northerers:
“Their laboratory experiments are most relevant to our argument here. Cohen and Nisbett recruited subjects with Northern and Southern backgrounds from the University of Michigan student body, ostensibly to work on an psychological task dealing with perception. During the experiment, a confederate bumped some subjects and muttered ‘asshole’ at them. Cortisol (a stress hormone) and testosterone (rises in preparation for violence) were measured before and after the insult. Insulted Southerners showed big jumps in both cortisol and testosterone compared to uninsulted Southerners and insulted Northerners. The difference in psychological and physiological responses to insults was manifest in behavior. Nisbett and Cohen recruited a 6’3” 250 lb (190 cm, 115 kg) American style football player whose task was to walk down the middle of a narrow hall as subjects came the other direction. The experimenters measured how close subjects came to the football player before stepping aside. Northerners stepped aside at around 6 feet regardless of whether they had been insulted. Un-insulted Southerners stepped aside at an average distance of 9 feet, whereas insulted Southerners approached to an average of about 3 feet. Polite but prepared to be violent, un-insulted Southerners take more care, presumably because they attribute a sense of honor to the football player and are normally respectful of others’ honor. When their honor is challenged, they are prepared and willing to challenge someone at considerable risk to their own safety.”
sooooooooo, they found a biological response in the southerners who were insulted and concluded that the cause of that biological response was … culture. ooooh-kaaaaay.
-OR-
how about southerners are, for whatever evolutionary reasons, somewhat different biologically-speaking than northerners and they, therefore, respond differently biologically to insults. and that, taken collectively, the way all these southerners behave — innately — amounts to their culture.
seems kinda obvious, don’t it?
so what is the evolutionary history of the good folks down in appalachia? we know that they come from the anglo-scottish border areas. what were (are) those people like?
clannish. probably practiced some sort of inbreeding throughout the medieval period — unlike the english, whose descendents became the more chilled yankees in the new world.
and war-ish. for hundreds of years. or, battle-ish anyway:
“Border Reivers were raiders along the Anglo–Scottish border from the late 13th century to the beginning of the 17th century…. The border families can be referred to as clans, as the Scots themselves appear to have used both terms interchangeably until the 19th century…. Other terms were also used to describe the Border families, such as the ‘Riding Surnames’ and the ‘Graynes’ thereof…. Both Border Graynes and Highland septs however, had the essential feature of patriarchal leadership by the chief of the name, and had territories in which most of their kindred lived…. Although feudalism existed, tribal loyalty was much more important and this is what distinguished the Borderers from other lowland Scots.“
“culture” of honor? gimme a break!
footnote: one of the major anglo-saxon border clans is the clan nesbitt. heh! (^_^)
previously: outbreeding, self-control and lethal violence and which came first?
(note: comments do not require an email. reivers!)
“seems kinda obvious, don’t it?”
Nope, genes affecting the development of culture and culture affecting biological responses are entirely consistent with one another and nature cares not for the obvious.
What qualified as a Northerner or Southerner in this study? If it was simply someone from that geographic area, there could have been plenty of participants with an ancestry besides Scot and English.
Also the upland / pastoralism connection again
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Border_Reivers
“Also, much of the border region is mountainous or open moorland, unsuitable for arable farming but good for grazing. Livestock was easily rustled and driven back to raiders’ territory by mounted reivers who knew the country well.”
http://www.avex-asso.org/dossiers/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/UK-relief.png
without the population density or surplus needed to support a communal rule of law then clan protection and vendetta is the alternative. as well as encouraging inbreeding it also means killer-kin are a valuable commodity.
you can imagine the cucuteni becoming very peacable over their 3000 years living in their dense towns and then being forced onto the steppe by the climate and gradually getting more violent again over the next 2000 as they go back to being clannish and the killer-genes are selected for again instead of against.
knowing the “type” quite well it’s very easy to imagine a small population with 12% killers being able to dominate a larger population whose killers have been reduced to a residual 1%.
###
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feud
“They can be interpreted as an extreme outgrowth of social relations based in family honor.”
“Vendetta is common in societies with a weak rule of law (or where the state doesn’t consider itself responsible for mediating this kind of dispute) where family and kinship ties are the main source of authority. An entire family is considered responsible for whatever one of them has done.”
“The Middle Ages, from beginning to end, and particularly the feudal era, lived under the sign of private vengeance.”
“At the Holy Roman Empire’s Reichstag at Worms in 1495 the right of waging feuds was abolished.”
“Throughout history, the Maniots have been known by their neighbors and their enemies as fearless warriors who practice blood feuds”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maniots
“The Maniots are the direct descendants of the Spartans and through the Spartans the Dorians. The terrain is mountainous and inaccessible”
I was thinking after the last few posts about cultures as an expression of killer percentage i.e.
- more than 10%: limited to low-level society, constant clan (or gang) warfare
- 3-6%: mid-level society, some ritualistic control, honour culture, duels etc
- 1%: residual level, high-level society possible
then i was thinking about how you could have a high killer percentage and yet still have a viable mid-level society and it came down to needing a helot class like Sparta because killer types won’t do anything productive if they have a viable means of taking it off someone else. aristocracy in general, breed a killer caste while culling killer-genes in the peasantry.
if you did spend a many generations selecting for killer-genes in your culture and then after it broke down the population remained remote, clannish and pastoral then it wouldn’t be surprising if the male population still had very high percentage of killer-genes because without an internal change (outbreeding?) or an externally imposed culling through rule of law you’d need another reason for the frequency to drop.
(which as an aside leads to clan vendetta systems being a good reason for as early a marriage as possible to make sure there’s an heir in case of untimely death)
“In Corsica, vendetta was a social code that required Corsicans to kill anyone who wronged the family honor. Between 1821 and 1852, no less than 4,300 murders were perpetrated in Corsica”
“In Albania, the blood feud has returned in rural areas after more than 40 years of being abolished by Albanian communists led by Enver Hoxha. More than 5,500 Albanian families are currently engaged in blood feuds. There are now more than 20,000 men and boys who live under an ever-present death sentence because of blood feuds. Since 1992, at least 10,000 Albanians have been killed due to blood feuds”
When you read this stuff you realize organized crime pretty much comes from this – or at least the winners of the competition to run organized crime come from these very specific regions.
so, people wanting to do research into MAOA but for PC reasons can’t look among the gang-ruled underclass areas in the states could look for it in
- Corsica
- Albania
- Mani
###
“Among them was the survival in the Borders of the inheritance system of gavelkind, by which estates were divided equally between all sons on a man’s death, so that many people owned insufficient land to maintain themselves.”
Interesting side-point – it’s similar in a way to polygamy encouraging younger men to go raiding for wives.
@ks – “Nope, genes affecting the development of culture and culture affecting biological responses are entirely consistent with one another and nature cares not for the obvious.”
well, it just seems odd to me that when there’s a biological event that some researchers go and give an only cultural explanation for it. did they even consider a biological explanation? if not, why not?
of course a biological explanation does not preclude a cultural explanation — i would say that it may also include a cultural explanation (where does culture come from, after all?). nature AND nurture, etc., etc.
@ks – “What qualified as a Northerner or Southerner in this study? If it was simply someone from that geographic area, there could have been plenty of participants with an ancestry besides Scot and English.”
i don’t know if they controlled for that or not. but, again, my point was — why not consider a biological explanation?
p.s. – the data are not just the results from this study, but the well-known, well-established fact that southerners are more given to violence. that’s why this study was undertaken in the first place.
@g.w. – “Also the upland / pastoralism connection again”
yup! (^_^)
@g.w. – “Vendetta is common in societies with a weak rule of law….”
or weak rule of law is common in societies with vendetta.
@g.w. – “Since 1992, at least 10,000 Albanians have been killed due to blood feuds.”
wow! i gotta go read that wikipedia feud page. thnx!
“wow! i gotta go read that wikipedia feud page. thnx!”
Albanians are getting very big in organized crime – and seemingly for the same reason as Sicilians in the past.
Damn you beat me to it! :p ;) The “Culture of Honor” study has been referenced numerous times, notably by both Steven Pinker in The Blank Slate and by his self-styled arch-rival Malcolm Gladwell in Outliers. Both were discussing how “culture” impacts behavior, to the point where one can see physiological signs, as you noted.
(Of course, theoretically, an entirely cultural difference could still lead to differing physiological markers—say if one’s reaction to a stimulus were regulated by years of social conditioning. Of course, I can’t see how one can rule out a genetic explanation a priori.)
It was also discussed in the Brainwash episode on violence. I really wish Eia had done this episode after he did his episode on race. Early on in the show, he points out that people in Norway with elevated rates of violence are immigrants who come from countries with “cultures of honor”; which are all (coincidentally, I’m sure) Muslim countries… :\
Eia interviews Nisbett about the study. Nisbett notes that “cultures of honor” arise in herding societies (where precious livestock is easily stolen), especially ones without a strong state to mete out punishment to transgressors. Nisbett states that any society (including the peaceable Scandinavian ones) would revert to a violent culture of honor if the state was removed. While I’m sure there’s a certain level of truth to that (e.g., Montreal during the 1969 police strike—but then remember what I’ve heard about Montreal), not once are the evolutionary implications considered.
Eia also talks about the drop off in violence that occurred in Scandinavia a few hundred years ago, including its rather sharp decline as per your earlier entry.
Interestingly, Glasgow is one of the most violent cities in Europe, apparently having quite a reputation. Edinburgh doesn’t seem to have such a reputation though; I wonder if there were demographic differences in how these places were settled.
For this one, instead of The Godfather theme, I’m thinking the appropriate song is perhaps something by Kenny Rogers or Johnny Cash—or maybe Toby Keith’s “As Good As I Once Was.”
@jayman – “Interestingly, Glasgow is one of the most violent cities in Europe, apparently having quite a reputation. Edinburgh doesn’t seem to have such a reputation though; I wonder if there were demographic differences in how these places were settled.”
yeah, the eastern side of scotland was heavily settled by anglos. the west is full of the more clannish islanders and highlanders, not to mention a more modern influx of immigrants from ireland (also with a recent history of inbreeding).
i’ve been to both cities. edinburgh is beautiful. glasgow is … not. (^_^)
@jayman – “It was also discussed in the Brainwash episode on violence.”
interesting! sounds like eia covered a lot of ground in the series! (i’m planning on doing a post about the second episode [the one on parenting] that i just watched the other day.)
Here is what I know.
I descended from a surname that arrived in Appalachian Pennsylvania circa 1740 as German Unitarians (becoming Episcopal at some point). My paternal grandmother (German Catholic) had a SS number that most likely was issued in northeastern North Carolina or West Virginia (they don’t know?) – so apparently my grandmother would have been born a hick by most standards — but I think she was probably close to genius level (she read alot), because my grandmother was definitely no hick. (I occasionally do some research on it (but not enough, not consistently) because I would like to find out if I am eligible for SCV membership). My maternal relatives are all late migrants to America, after 1880 I believe, one side German, one side Irish. I do not know how they got to northern West Virginia. The only word I ever heard that was not English as a child was Swiss cheese which was called Schweitzer by my maternal grandfather.
Now, as this relates to your post, everybody I meet in Chicago that has somehow known a West Virginian (usually through military service (I don’t meet many, as I work at one of the exchanges)), has a comment about a guy from West Virginia that got into a fight … boy from West Virginia always wins, the challengers, well they got fuct up.
I used to drink with and serve drinks to a few of these Alphas back home when I was in school, regularly (FTR – I am Omega, I know that in 99.9% of situations I am the “smartest guy in the room” (a couple of former employers have actually said this to me at some point) and I am okay with that, I would like to be married to a woman that wants to live in a burb-town and drive to work in the city (she has to drive, I hate traffic), and I wish this woman could be someone who could help me utilize me to the fullest — and not just to find the million of risk capital needed to unleash my algo on the world, that would be a bonus!).
Anyways, these Alphas had Beta hanger-on-ers who wished to be them (IMO) and when I was working I would only get shit from their Beta followers, but regardless the Alphas always sided with me if it a situation got out of hand. I think Alphas knew not to battle me with words …. logic …. for their idiot friends.
I may regret posting this ….. TMI …. How many hit’s do you get on a average day?
“@jayman – “Interestingly, Glasgow is one of the most violent cities in Europe, apparently having quite a reputation”
literally tribal
“the west is full of the more clannish islanders and highlanders, not to mention a more modern influx of immigrants from ireland”
now you remind me Glasgow is also a good example of the cultural aspect i.e. people will shield their own side’s killers from the law (and put up with their general scariness) because they’re needed for protection from the other side’s killers – so it doesn’t breed out and if anything provides some reproductive advantages (as long as you don’t get killed).
reminds me also of a particularly psycho soccer hooligan who everyone in that crew stayed away from when they weren’t fighting another crew but stood as close to as possible when they were.
aren’t virtually all of the founding stock Americans a British admixture, though? if memory serves the 13 colonies were about 80% English at the time of the revolt. certainly millions of these English lived in the south. certainly they interbred with many Scots-irish and regular Irish (and I guess Welsh, although you never hear about them in the colonies). I think Appalachian Americans just call themselves “Scots-Irish” because it sounds more romantic.
PS. West Virginia has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the country, and
Culture and genetics tend to drive one another in a feedback loop. If your population is suited genetically, for instance, for occupying a herding and raiding niche, then your culture is probably going to reinforce that, which leads to further genetic reinforcement because your cultural alphas are going to get to multiply more and be considered more attractive by your women. Trying to tease apart culture and genetics is really tricky because of this—the answer is almost always both.
@hbd chick
@jayman – “It was also discussed in the Brainwash episode on violence.”
interesting! sounds like eia covered a lot of ground in the series! (i’m planning on doing a post about the second episode [the one on parenting] that i just watched the other day.)
I kinda beat you to it with my first blog post, thought I didn’t know about Eia’s series at the time. :D I’d like to see your take on the matter, though. :)
Jayman
“Of course, theoretically, an entirely cultural difference could still lead to differing physiological markers—say if one’s reaction to a stimulus were regulated by years of social conditioning.”
The US army research after WWII relates to that – how they changed from simple bullseyes to man-shaped targets for target practise as conditioning.
Jehu
“Trying to tease apart culture and genetics is really tricky because of this—the answer is almost always both.”
Yes, it’s interesting to wonder though what would come first if a population adapted for one environment switched to a new one e.g. a people who’d been densely packed communal farmers moving onto the steppe because of climate change and adapting to pastoralism
or
recently ex working class newly underclass adopting a pre-existing underclass culture as the optimal template for that environment – at least for the successfully fierce – and trying to mould themselves to it.
Was that a proposal, rjp? Just kidding. Are these propensities for violence being corrected for IQ? Lower class people tend to get into fights more often just about everywhere I am told. New Englanders were middle-class, peaceable people. Dueling was an aristocratic custom on the other hand. But then aristocrats are descended from warriors.
Why is the murder rate so high in Central and South America?
None of this is meant to dispute hbd’s main contention however: inbred hill-billies are an especially violent lot all over the world. It is a bio-cultural fact.
@rjp – “I descended from a surname that arrived in Appalachian Pennsylvania circa 1740 as German Unitarians (becoming Episcopal at some point).”
wait. german hillbillies?! that’s something i never, ever contemplated. (~_^)
much to my regret, i’ve never spent much time in appalachia. never gotten down to west virginia at all. been through kentucky and tennessee on the way to florida, but again, never spent more than sorta a day and a night en route. and the mountains are friggin’ beautiful! and i usually feel pretty at home, prolly ’cause of my own “inbred” background (note that my own parents, thankfully, did not inbreed, but my ethnic background? one of those pretty recently inbreeding populations.). lots o’ hospitable folks. (^_^)
and all i have to say is: i <3 waffle house! (^_^)
@luke – “Was that a proposal, rjp? Just kidding.”
well, i wish a had a sister for rj! (^_^) and sisters for all the geek guys out there who need a wifie, ’cause lord knows we need our geeks to be breeding! (~_^) (i’m taken. (^_^) )
@g.w. – “now you remind me Glasgow is also a good example of the cultural aspect i.e. people will shield their own side’s killers from the law (and put up with their general scariness) because they’re needed for protection from the other side’s killers – so it doesn’t breed out and if anything provides some reproductive advantages (as long as you don’t get killed).“
aaaaaaaaah. i never thought of that. that makes sense.
but — and pardon my nit-picking — how is this a cultural aspect of the glaswegians’ behavior? i mean…
“reminds me also of a particularly psycho soccer hooligan who everyone in that crew stayed away from when they weren’t fighting another crew but stood as close to as possible when they were.”
…well, that just sounds like pretty basic primate behavior to me — like i could picture chimps or baboons doing the same. like it’s an instinctive behavior rather than a learned (i.e. cultural) one.
i could be wrong, though. (it has happened before. (~_^) )
@bleach – “aren’t virtually all of the founding stock Americans a British admixture, though?”
well, there’s british, and there’s british. hackett fischer says they wuz different. (~_^)
@jehu – “Culture and genetics tend to drive one another in a feedback loop…. Trying to tease apart culture and genetics is really tricky because of this—the answer is almost always both.
absolutely!
however — and this is (one of) my personal little bug(s) — where does culture come from?
i understand that some of it is sorta accidental or dependent on circumstances — people in papua new guinea decorate themselves with bird of paradise feathers ’cause that’s what’s available to them, whereas austrians use pheasant feathers. (interesting, tho, that most/all? people do decorate themselves.)
but isn’t a lot of what everyone calls “culture” just a reflection of underlying biological traits?
like the maori hakka dances. they’ve got a high frequency of “warrior genes” in their population, and then maybe not surprisingly their dances look like this instead of this.
or what about what happened to christianity when it first reached the germans? for who knows how long, they had been warring, tribal peoples and, presumably, the “love thy neighbor” wimpiness of christianity didn’t really make sense to them — so early medieval german christianity became more of a warrior religion. jesus was a warrior. ’cause that felt right to the germans. (seems like some people today still think of jesus as a b*d*ss! (~_^) )
i just wonder what people mean when they throw around the word culture. it often sounds to my ears like they’re talking about sets of behaviors that are somehow operating independent of our biology.
bleach
“if memory serves the 13 colonies were about 80% English at the time of the revolt”
the north and southwest of England is hill-country too so the argument comes to the same thing (the southwest is where all the pirates came from). the difference – if there is one – is really between the flat, square bit in the southeast and the hilly periphery.
http://wdict.net/img/geography+of+the+united+kingdom.jpg
@luke – “Are these propensities for violence being corrected for IQ…? Why is the murder rate so high in Central and South America?”
wrt your first question — you would think so. isn’t that pretty well established that higher iq individuals are less violent (on average)? so if your whole population has got a high average iq….
why are the murder rates so high in central/south america? well, there are lower average iqs there — but there’s also been a h*ckuva lot of endogamous mating there. the article that professor harpending linked to here indicates that. gonna do a post about that article (and related articles) as soon as i make some sense of it. (~_^) cool stuff!
@rjp – “How many hits do you get on a average day?”
i’m gonna assume you mean traffic to the blog. (~_^)
’round about 300 uniques per day now. a small, but discerning crowd. (^_^) and the stats keep going up every month, so that’s good. the sky’s the limit!
@jayman – “I kinda beat you to it with my first blog post, thought I didn’t know about Eia’s series at the time. :D I’d like to see your take on the matter, though. :)”
oh, yeah! i’ll make sure to link to your post on parenting (remind me if i forget). i’m looking forward to what you’ve got to say about appalachia. i didn’t have much new to say, but i happened across the reivers the other day, and they were new to me. (^_^)
hbdchick
“but — and pardon my nit-picking — how is this a cultural aspect of the glaswegians’ behavior? i mean”
it’s not in anyone’s interest. among the black underclass there’s a reproductive advantage to the gang culture and being successfully fierce. i would say the same is true for other cultures where fierceness has become dominant like the yanomani. however in Glasgow – (this may be 20 years out of date now but the argument still holds for back then) – both sides have a culture of strict religious monogamy. plus there’s no loot, no cattle rustled, just lots of people sliced up with boxcutters for no advantage.
i can see the point of the standard underclass gang culture from a genetic point of view. it’s very much in the interests of the 16% or so of males who are the most fierce as they can impose what they are best at as the primary way to compete for females but Glasgow’s not like that. Glasgow was just a mistake.
with Glasgow (and Liverpool to a lesser degree) you had a sudden migration and two tribe conflict that overloaded the pre-existing rule of law leading to people going back to tribal self-defence which then got locked in culturally. even though the rule of law later became strong enough to deal with the problem it can’t because the culture has locked the behaviour in place by locking the rule of law out.
(nb this is my understanding of the Glasgow situation from conversations rather than direct experience so could be all wrong.)
.
“well, that just sounds like pretty basic primate behavior to me”
true, the second example doesn’t really make the point i was aiming at which is a twisted version of reciprocal altruism:
“an organism acts in a manner that temporarily reduces its fitness while increasing another organism’s fitness, with the expectation that the other organism will act in a similar manner at a later time”
the point i was trying to get at is that having lots of dangerous people around reduces fitness quite dramatically – because they’re dangerous – but not as much as not having them if the other side does i.e. it’s not a positive thing, it’s a lesser negative – kind of a reciprocal masochism. which is why as soon as people have the ability to create a rule of law they (almost) always will (except in Glasgow).
and why an empire that makes creating a rule of law their first priority will need less soldiers than one that doesn’t.
Hmm. I must retrieve my copy of Albion’s Seed from my pastor. Y’all do know that the State Motto of West Virginia is “Montani, Semper Liber”, right? (Mountaineers, Always Free) I sorta admire the Afghans in that respect.
My people are from Georgia and Mississippi. The GA branch seems more Anglo and nerdy (all the guys went into USAAF in WWII and later), the MS branch more rowdy and “Scotch-Irish”, who all went into the Marines.
Nonetheless, the proudest boast I can make about my family is that all four of my great-grandfathers served honorably against the United States of America in the Lincoln War. My Dad’s paternal grandpa went around the left with Jackson at Chancellorsville and lost an eyeball for his trouble. Obviously he survived, unlike Jackson (suspected Aspie; Yay!) or I would not exist.
@g.w. – “however in Glasgow – (this may be 20 years out of date now but the argument still holds for back then) – both sides have a culture of strict religious monogamy. plus there’s no loot, no cattle rustled, just lots of people sliced up with boxcutters for no advantage.”
sure, but like you say, glasgow was a mistake. it threw together a couple of different sets of “clannish” people in a setting which was unnatural — and they just kept right on behaving as they would’ve if they’d been confronted with a rival clan back in their “natural environment” (back in the highlands, or wherever), only there it would’ve been on their territorial border, not all jumbled up in the close quarters of an urban setting. i don’t see that as culture, but just as biological behaviors that have been scr*wed with. like caging up three or four male pitbulls together, maybe with a view of a couple of females. it’s just asking for trouble.
i would think, too, that the various glaswegian groups were also in competition over resources — jobs, housing, good schools.
i call it biology, but i’m just nit-picking like i said. (^_^)
@g.w. – “having lots of dangerous people around reduces fitness quite dramatically – because they’re dangerous – but not as much as not having them if the other side does i.e. it’s not a positive thing, it’s a lesser negative – kind of a reciprocal masochism.”
i think you’re absolutely right. this is similar to trying to understand honor killings — seems like such a sacrifice, such a waste — until you put it into context.
@justthisguy – “Y’all do know that the State Motto of West Virginia is ‘Montani, Semper Liber’, right? (Mountaineers, Always Free)”
i didn’t know that! i love it! (^_^)
@justthisguy – “Nonetheless, the proudest boast I can make about my family is that all four of my great-grandfathers served honorably against the United States of America in the Lincoln War.”
cool! the war of northern aggression. boo. =/
i remember that in sixth grade, to the great annoyance of my history teacher, i got into a very heated argument/debate with her over the civil war. believe it or not, normally i was very quiet and well-behaved — the wallflower aspie girl who normally went unnoticed in the back of the class. but i got all worked up when she said something about how the north had to go to war with the south ’cause the south had no right to secede. that just didn’t make any sense to me ’cause we had just spent several weeks learning all about the u.s. constitution, and i, for one, couldn’t remember a single clause in there that said anything about not being able to leave the union! (~_^)
i may have been raised amongst yankees, but … montani, semper liber, d*mn*t! (^_^)
@g.w. – lag time is what i’m getting at.
you take several different “clannish” groups and throw them together in an urban setting and, of course, that’s going to be bad ’cause people (or animals or whatever) can’t change their natures over night.
there will be always some lag time before whatever average behavior(s) we’re talking about changes.
given enough time, the problem will sort itself out one way or another. either the more peaceable individuals are selected for and everyone lives happily ever after, or the more violent individuals are selected for and you wind up with an urban afghanistan. certainly, without enough inter-breeding between the two groups, it’ll be difficult to get to the more peaceful scenario.
The South had an excellent Constitutional case for secession, but it was, well, let me say, unwise of them to do that. I blame the hotheads in South Carolina, where my Dad’s family came from. (we didn’t show up in GA ’till about 1830)
Someone said at the time that South Carolina was too small to be an independent country and too big to be a lunatic asylum.
I, too, am a shy mild-mannered Aspy most of the time, and try to avoid fights as a good Christian should, but the times other people picked fights with me I immediately got with the program and gave a good account of myself.
I don’t care if you are a boy or a girl, if you aren’t willing to defend yourself you ain’t even sh!t.
Oh, and further: One of the secessionists at the time offered to soak up in his handkerchief all of the blood which would be spilled as a consequence of Secession. He would have required a very big handkerchief, methinks.
The inhabitants of the Atlantic coastal South were more violent than Northerners long before the Scotch-Irish and Borderers began arriving in the early 18th century. The colonists who settled this region were English (according to Albion’s Seed, mostly from southern England) and during the 19th century their descendents would come to dominate the region we now call the Deep South. Their background was very different from the background of those in Appalachia, but the culture of honor, along with higher rates of violence, can be found in both areas.
I am with Lincoln on the right of secession. It would have led to many civil wars.
hbd chick,
“well, there’s british, and there’s british. hackett fischer says they wuz different. (~_^)”
Interesting, I have never heard of that book, will have to check it out.
Personally I can live with the Scots-Irish, but England could’ve kept the Quakers…
@jack r – “The inhabitants of the Atlantic coastal South were more violent than Northerners long before the Scotch-Irish and Borderers began arriving in the early 18th century.”
oh, yeah? can i ask what you base that assertion on? you may very well be right — just wondering. (^_^)
@luke – “I am with Lincoln on the right of secession.”
well, you two may be right, but that still doesn’t mean that “no state can leave the union. eveh.” was ever a part of the deal (i.e. the constitution). (~_^)
@bleach – “Interesting, I have never heard of that book, will have to check it out.”
you absolutely should! me, too. (*ahem*) (^_^)
here’s the wikipedia page for it.
The higher southern rates of violence are covered in the section of Albion’s Seed dealing with the migration of English cavaliers to the Chesapeake. Fischer describes a greater acceptance of violence (and concern with honor) in the tidewater region compared to New England even in 17th century. I think he showed that, compared to New England, rates of violent crime were higher in the south, though rates of some other types of crime were lower.
In most dicussions that I have seen of Fischer’s work, people focus on the backcountry when describing the southern U.S., but the book actually describes two southern regions. Both of these regional cultures remain distinct even today (as do the two northern cultures).
“English cavaliers”
aristos
@jack – ah, ok! interesting. thnx. i think i’d better read Albion’s Seed. (^_^)
@g.w. – “aristos”
yes. the “first families of virginia” — the descendants of hackett fischer’s “distressed cavaliers” — had a tendency to inbreed amongst themselves. i wonder if they’d been inbreeding back in the old country as well?
since this post is still drawing comments I want to point something out. I just referred to my copy of “Everyday Life in Early America” by David Freeman Hawke, a very good book about 17th c. English colonies–but Hawke says something which contradicts Fischer–he says that there were actually -fewer- nobles in Virginia than in NE and the Middle colonies, because the extremely high mortality rate in the Chesapeake drove off most of them. I’m not sure which author is correct. He also makes a lot of interesting observations about how social conditions diverged in the different colonies which touches on a lot of HBD themes, I think. Worth reading.
@bleach – “Hawke says something which contradicts Fischer–he says that there were actually -fewer- nobles in Virginia than in NE and the Middle colonies, because the extremely high mortality rate in the Chesapeake drove off most of them. I’m not sure which author is correct.”
hmmm. interesting.
i was just reading chap. 2 of “Albion’s Seed” (typical me to not start at the beginning) — the chap. about virginia — and fischer says that the big settlement of virginia happened in the ca. twenty years from ’round about 1645 to 1665. also, the aristocratic settlers of virginia were primarily “second sons” — you know, the ones who wouldn’t inherit the family estate back home.
dunno if those facts go any way towards reconciling hawke and fischer?
thnx for the hawke reference! (^_^)
[...] other hand, are inbred and clannish, and in the case of the Scotch-Irish, traditionally herders. It can be seen that the great family feuds of the American South essentially were a continuation of … (as present-day Glasgow attests to). These groups favor more conservative values, such as [...]