Aggressive feelings and behavior are a natural part of human nature. But this naturalness of aggression is often, and absolutely erroneously, perceived as a capacity for its boundless manifestation, up to such violent actions as murder. And from such an incorrect interpretation of the nature of aggression, a conclusion is drawn about the impossibility of eradicating violence from human behavior, since without it a person would become a “willless vegetable,” incapable of many types of activity that require aggressiveness from them. But this absurd substitution of concepts can be easily refuted with one practical example—the statistics of domestic violence in the families of American football players and police officers.
If you believe that aggressiveness is a necessary component of many types of human activity and social communication, then you will agree that American football is a fairly aggressive sport, and a person cannot do without this component to participate in it. Why it is necessary for police officers, I think, does not even need to be explained. But there is one categorical difference between players and police officers. As American domestic violence statistics show, the level of violence in police families is up to 4 times higher than the national average. At the same time, in the families of players, it occurs almost 2 times less than the average.
Why is this so? While players simply need to achieve good sporting results, the immediate task of a police officer is to carry out violent attacks on other people, who themselves often committed no violence at all, but were merely accused of violating some state laws and “victimless crimes.” Obviously, the first profession may attract people who clearly demonstrate their aggressiveness but are still non-violent, and whose aggression is limited and under inhibiting control. The second profession will more often attract precisely violent people, since their official duties require violence.
Using the example of these two professions, we can clearly see the difference between functional aggression under inhibiting control and pathological violence that has spiraled out of control. The former is absolutely sufficient for a person to perform any activity, provided, of course, that it does not consist of committing violence itself. A person will not become some kind of “willless vegetable” if their aggressiveness is limited. Moreover, it is naturally limited in the vast majority of people, who could never intentionally cause serious harm to someone, let alone kill, feeling a strong repulsion toward such acts. Therefore, calling the capacity to commit violence an important trait for many types of human activity would simply be an absurd substitution of concepts.
