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Violence Innate Behaviour

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The debate of whether violence is an innate or acquired behaviour has been increasing since these past years due to the appalling events -terrorist attacks and gender-based violence- society has been part of. Some scientists claim that violence is an innate behaviour, but what made a man enter a school and choke his daughter’s teacher till death was not an instinctive reaction but a premeditated action. So, what leads people to act violently? In most of the cases, people who commit a crime were either victims of marginalization or thought to be or react violently by their families or friends.
Supporters of violence as an innate drive base their opinions on Darwin’s theory of evolution, in which violence is part of humans since through competition …show more content…
Victims of exclusion, bullying, discrimination or any kind of indifference usually accumulate inside of them a feeling of frustration and setback, which can lead to future aggressive behaviour. People who once were so powerless now have a desire for revenge and have the urge to hit back. In most of the cases of murder, the murderers were marginalized in their teens. Jakob Wagner is an example. According to his classmates, he had a fascination with weapons and was constantly teased because of his bad hygiene. On the night of his prom, he took his bicycle and went to the party where he later shot two students and then was killed by police. This example illustrates that bullying can lead to a more serious consequence. Human mind is very delicate and actions of repression or alienation may turn outward as aggression against …show more content…
It has been scientifically proved that we are born good, not evil: the results of an experiment carried out at Yale show that babies are able to distinguish between what is right and what is wrong. The experiment was a puppet show in which one of the puppets tried to climb a hill helped by another puppet that has pushing it up from behind meanwhile another puppet was pushing back the climber from above. After the show, the babies chose to reach for the helper rather than the hinderer. According to studies made in the University of Washington, children who were exposed to violence at home are prone to have higher levels of aggression than others who were not exposed to it since children learn from their parents’ way to deal with life. If a child is surrounded by friends who have an aggressive behaviour he is also likely to act the way their peers do –maybe because of conformity or deindividuation. Mass media and video games are also important contributors to violence as most of the content they have it is considered disturbing and can minimize acts of violence to fun or entertaining activities. Taking this into account, parents should make sure that the environment in which their children are involved is healthy and teach them good

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