September 18, 2014

"When parties of males encounter single individuals from other communities, they sometimes launch brutal assaults that leave victims gravely wounded or dead."

It's in their nature, those chimpanzees.

26 comments:

Kevin said...

Ok, I've had to backspace over a number of comments that would probably get me banned. But somebody will take the bait.

Hagar said...

Jane Goodall covered that territory long ago. And i isn't just about attacking single individuals. The bonobos sometimes have real tribal warfare and use weapons.

Nonapod said...

We hominids certainly are a violent, opportunistic family of critters who enjoy ganging up on lone individuals.

David said...

There was a scene in a chimp documentary of a line of about a dozen males going down a trail, all with rocks or sticks in their hand. They were on their way to slaughter the neighboring tribe. The revenge of J. Fred Muggs.

Anonymous said...

When parties of white males encounter single individuals from black communities, they sometimes launch brutal assaults that leave victims gravely wounded or dead.
It's in their nature, too, those white people.

Wince said...

But the question remained: Why are chimps violent? One early study reported that after researchers fed bananas to chimps in 1962 at the Gombe National Park in Tanzania, the primates began attacking each other. After the bananas stopped, so did the violence. It led “some researchers to conclude that these killings were the consequence of human intervention,” Silk wrote.

Maybe that's why Darren opposed Samantha intervening with her witch magic to get what they wanted?

Hagar said...

The males of most species will attack when they find a strange male on their territory.
This article is B.S.

Lucien said...

But one group likes to climb trees and drop rocks on other passing chimps in order to avoid "paws on the ground". It is forbidden to classify such activities as chimp "warfare".

Fernandinande said...

"Obviously, stereotype threat is at fault. Or lack of universal pre-K. Redlining no doubt plays a role. Clearly, the police dressing in military body armor contributes. Whatever it is, we know that chimps have no agency and thus can’t possibly be responsible for their high rate of chimp-on-chimp violence."

Michael The Magnificent said...

Someone needs to tell these chimpanzees they need to stop behaving like African Americans.

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...


How about we start calling the 'knockout game', something else?.

I suggest calling it "chimpin' out".

Maybe that will lessen it's status.

n.n said...

Mob violence, huh. There have been several rounds of mob violence in recent years, which were intended to intimidate and establish dominion over people. It was swept aside as tolerable collateral damage by the social complex.

Kevin said...

Bait, taken. Sometimes I can see the metagame Ms. Althouse is playing, but often I can't. This one was obvious though.

HoodlumDoodlum said...

Kevin said...Bait, taken. Sometimes I can see the metagame Ms. Althouse is playing, but often I can't. This one was obvious though.

Yeah, pretty obvious, but as long as everyone feels superior to those backwards rubes with their ugly views it's all good.

To the extent that 60's era peace philosophy was underpinned by contemporaneous antropology (and other social science) that claimed both Man and Nature in their pure states eschew violence, though, actual impartial science sure seems to have dented that dream.

traditionalguy said...

Is this like one NFL running back meeting eleven defenders.

Ann Althouse said...

"Bait, taken. Sometimes I can see the metagame Ms. Althouse is playing, but often I can't. This one was obvious though."

Was it? Or was there another level above it that you're not seeing because you are pleased at seeing what you did see? I'm leveraging your pride in a master move in my metagame.

(My computer wants to correct "metagame" to "mets game.")

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...

Kevin said...
Bait, taken.


It's not bait, if it's obvious what it is. In this case, it was a way for Ms. Althouse to say it, without really saying it. Plausible deniability. Maintain the illusion that such inferences are beneath her.

And that's not exactly brave, either.

It's sort of like writing "the N-word", or n*****er. You get to appear all high and mighty, while forcing the reader to sound out that actual word, in their head - making them the racist, but not you!.

Cowardly.

Fernandinande said...

Hagar said...
The males of most species will attack when they find a strange male on their territory.


That depends. Herbivorous animals care less about territory because plants aren't worth fighting over: they generally only fight over females, and there's rarely any killing. See: herds of various herbivorous species sharing the same area, ignoring each other, vs lions and hyenas chasing the other away or fighting if they're in the same area.

Compare horses and lions.
Horses: a wild herd consists of one male and as many females he can keep an eye on.
Lions: a pride consists of one, sometimes two (brother) males and several females.

In horses, the male will chase off other males, and deaths are rare. The females don't do anything except wait for the winner.

In lions, the males will often fight to the death over the females, and the females help the current male repel the new male because he'll kill their current offspring if he wins.

Fernandinande said...

HoodlumDoodlum said...
...social science) that claimed both Man and Nature in their pure states eschew violence, though, actual impartial science sure seems to have dented that dream.


"Dented" -> "demolished".

As for humans, pre-state (tribal) people are more violent than others, which is the opposite of the Nobel Savage claim. So, more than a dent.

Kevin said...

Sigh. If only the Mets game HAD a metagame.

Fernandinande said...

Hagar said...
The males of most species will attack when they find a strange male on their territory.


Lets not forget insects (since most multi-cell animals are insects): in ants females do all the fighting, and ants have major wars with each other, not just skirmishes as is the case with most mammals.

Bruce Hayden said...

Someone needs to tell these chimpanzees they need to stop behaving like African Americans.

and

How about we start calling the 'knockout game', something else?.

We do tend to talk around the subject of Black on White violence (and, yes, the even more common Black on Black violence). This is esp. noticeable with the MSM, which studiously ignores race when it comes to Black flash mobs or Black knockout game beatings. And, also ignores the violent past of young Black males killed during violent assaults on Whites/Hispanics (e.g. Trayvon Martin and Big Mike Brown).

Ignoring the political correctness here, and tying to the original post, my theory is that we see so much more violence in the lower income Black communities because they were the primary recipients, and therefore victims, of the $22 trillion spent on LBJ's failed War on Poverty. Fatherless child raising was subsidized by the WoP (in the name of "the children"), and illegitimacy morally legitimized in society by the left. And, the natural, consequent, and foreseeable result of this is that the young males, raised without fathers, reverted to more basic primate behavior. It is fathers, marriage, and then fatherhood, that is the primary force at domesticating males to live in our society. Absent that, adolescent, and post-adolescent males tend to run in male packs, terrorizing the community and the rest of society.

I should point out the obvious, that this subjugation of Blacks in this country is primarily the result of Democrats, since essentially the founding of the party some 200 years ago. They were the party of slavery, Jim Crow, the KKK, and, more recently, the breakup of Black families through the ill-conceived and badly waged War on Poverty.

Gahrie said...

And, the natural, consequent, and foreseeable result of this is that the young males, raised without fathers, reverted to more basic primate behavior. It is fathers, marriage, and then fatherhood, that is the primary force at domesticating males to live in our society

Is this the time to point out the study done with elephants?

It seems that in one part of Africa there were groups of elephants wandering around acting like hoodlums...attacking other animals and structures etc.

When they looked at the situation, they discovered that these attacks were being committed by groups of adolescent males lacking mature male role models. (they had been killed off by poachers for their ivory)

They imported mature male elephants from other parts of Africa and the problem was solved.

Drago said...

This is probably just pouring gas on a fire, but here goes:

http://www.myfoxdc.com/story/26565475/cops-say-man-used-banana-to-rob-store

Michael The Magnificent said...

I'm sure someone will be along shortly to inform me that I'm ignorant, or hateful, or whatever, and that the chimp's behavior is all my fault somehow, and all just for articulating an observation we've all made.

Be that as it may, if the chimps don't like being compared to African Americans, it is they who need to modify their own behavior.

This is why we warn our children to stay out of the jungle, and to always keep a watchful eye out for roving bands of chimpanzees.

Rusty said...

This does not bode well for my; monkeys = comedy, meme.
Maybe if we dressed them up..............