Week 5- Helen Jian

Helen Jian
Section A02
Week 5

             In this week’s reading, the article, “Empire of Death and the Plague of Civic Violence” by Darrell Y. Hamamoto, talked about the growing rates of violent deaths and murders in the United States. It focused on post-war serial killer rates and how it increased. The article also mentioned the Vietnam War and how there was an increase in the murder of Asian Americans. It mentioned the U.S. military and how they were involved with imperialisms, which is what they enforced in order for them to conquer what is the U.S. today. There were other parts in the article where it stated how killing and murder have different characteristics, and how they “stem from varying motivations according to time, place, and circumstance” (Boggs, 2003). I thought this specific quote was intriguing because I never thought about it that way. I always thought that killing and murder were based on one term only, that being just for revenge because that is how the media seems to portray it. I never thought about the context of how murder can be used for “territorial expansion” or “political advancement”. When I think about it now, I can see how someone might use it for those causes. Even though it is an extremely wrong concept to even think about doing, to take someone’s life for your own benefit is simply disturbing and sadly, it is a reality that happens throughout our society.

Question: What makes someone gravitate toward killing to get his or her way in something? Is it mainly psychological or for a sense of dominance?

References:

Boggs, C. (2003). Masters of War: Militarism and Blowback in the Era of American Empire. (1st ed., pp. 276-292). New York: Routledge.

Dewberry, J. (2013). Modern day imperialism begets shunned imperialists - Los Angeles Post-Examiner. Los Angeles Post-Examiner. Retrieved 30 April 2017, from http://lapostexaminer.com/modern-day-imperialism-begets-shunned-imperialists/2013/11/19