TomeAlone reviewed On Killing by Dave Grossman
None
2 stars
This is a tough one to review, and I don't know if the star rating fits. It's certainly an interesting book, and while you read it, it makes a lot of sense, but there is also a lot that doesn't seem to stand. The cover and subtitle indicate that it's going to be an exploration of PTSD from combat, being forced to kill, and the training that requires. That's not really what the book is about.
Mostly, he repeats endlessly, that humans do not like to kill other humans, and have to be trained and conditioned for it. He cites research on firing rates, and how they, pre Vietnam- were in the low 20%. And then after Vietnam, training was more realistic and firing rates went up. That's pretty much the bulk of the book.
There are a few eyebrow raising elements, like him saying that Vietnam was justified by …
This is a tough one to review, and I don't know if the star rating fits. It's certainly an interesting book, and while you read it, it makes a lot of sense, but there is also a lot that doesn't seem to stand. The cover and subtitle indicate that it's going to be an exploration of PTSD from combat, being forced to kill, and the training that requires. That's not really what the book is about.
Mostly, he repeats endlessly, that humans do not like to kill other humans, and have to be trained and conditioned for it. He cites research on firing rates, and how they, pre Vietnam- were in the low 20%. And then after Vietnam, training was more realistic and firing rates went up. That's pretty much the bulk of the book.
There are a few eyebrow raising elements, like him saying that Vietnam was justified by the fall of the Berlin wall(he's a Reagan guy, no doubt). He decries communism, glosses over American atrocities, goes on and on about videogames, celebrates the militarization of police, and also calls close range killing(as in hand to hand) the sexual range. Which is a very strange thing.
And, on top of it all, he now trains police to be behave as if in a war zone and be more effective killers.
All in all, it is nice to believe that we have a very deep resistance to killing each other, but I don't know if that is borne out by reality and history.