I can't shake the scent of trial-by-combat—with an attendant, further, taint of victory as the LORD's endorsement—in any actual approval of duelling.
I think the system would, as it did, make people good at killing and readily doing so the arbiters of what were correct. An armed society might have strict etiquette, but that were different to politeness, which as Emily Post observed is born of consideration, rsspect, and honesty (moderated, I'll guess) which I'll declare are made _more_ difficult by fear for one's life.
(Heinlein may have disagreed because his ideal society was his belovèd-and-lost-to-him Navy, belovèd not least because it was rational compared to his religious family and because by dint of luck and hard work he had seemed bound for a good position in it. There, as in any military, etiquette may be more important than actual politeness because one wants strong restraints on a society largely made-up of deadly, young, men.) (Note as well that the work in which his 'armed society' comment first appeared is one long plea for eugenic care in passing-on our forty-eight chromosomes.)
The thing about not saying exactly what you think is that it gives you greater liberty to think as you will without worrying as much about hurting other people as expressive honesty might otherwise compel you to do.
So insightful. I'm reminded of Macintyre's critique of Erving Goffman's sociology where Goffman "has liquidated the self into its role-playing, arguing that the self is no more than ‘a peg’ on which the clothes of the role are hung." He sees this as a symptom of our buy-in to the "emotivist self." Whereas, in pre-modern societies you can never strip away membership in certain social groups to get to "the real you." He writes "They are part of my substance, defining partially at least and sometimes wholly my obligations and my duties. Individuals inherit a particular space within an interlocking set of social relationships; lacking that space, they are nobody, or at best a stranger or an outcast." Dueling seems to be a way to deal with the effects of this social dislocation after the fact whereas returning to a pre-modern way of living would be getting at the cause. I think we'd be more likely to see dueling in our day than a Benedict option!
My favourite thing I learned about dueling was a paper I read long ago about military discipline in the British Army that included a segment about dueling among officers stationed on Majorca in the 18th century.
Because it was a dull peacetime posting (it is literally where mayonnaise is from) but far enough from Britain to be left to one's own devices, the officers had plenty of time to get into quarrels and challenge each other to duels. Dueling was, of course, illegal in the British Army as it was in pretty much all European armies since the kings of Europe didn't want their officers killing or wounding each other over petty feuds. However, an officer who refused a duel could be court-martialed for conduct unbecoming of an officer and a gentleman since no man with so low a regard for his own honour could possibly be trusted to carry the king's colours.
A fun little conflict between the law and the European honour culture. The British famously shot an admiral for refusing to throw away his command in a pointless battle against a superior force in attempting to defend Majorca so that little island was a veritable wellspring of wounded British military pride.
"War [dueling] is the truest form of divination. It is the testing of one's will and the will of another within that larger will which because it binds them is therefore forced to select. War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War [dueling] is god."
What would a Twitter dueling scar look like? A slash through one's avatar?
I can't shake the scent of trial-by-combat—with an attendant, further, taint of victory as the LORD's endorsement—in any actual approval of duelling.
I think the system would, as it did, make people good at killing and readily doing so the arbiters of what were correct. An armed society might have strict etiquette, but that were different to politeness, which as Emily Post observed is born of consideration, rsspect, and honesty (moderated, I'll guess) which I'll declare are made _more_ difficult by fear for one's life.
(Heinlein may have disagreed because his ideal society was his belovèd-and-lost-to-him Navy, belovèd not least because it was rational compared to his religious family and because by dint of luck and hard work he had seemed bound for a good position in it. There, as in any military, etiquette may be more important than actual politeness because one wants strong restraints on a society largely made-up of deadly, young, men.) (Note as well that the work in which his 'armed society' comment first appeared is one long plea for eugenic care in passing-on our forty-eight chromosomes.)
The thing about not saying exactly what you think is that it gives you greater liberty to think as you will without worrying as much about hurting other people as expressive honesty might otherwise compel you to do.
So insightful. I'm reminded of Macintyre's critique of Erving Goffman's sociology where Goffman "has liquidated the self into its role-playing, arguing that the self is no more than ‘a peg’ on which the clothes of the role are hung." He sees this as a symptom of our buy-in to the "emotivist self." Whereas, in pre-modern societies you can never strip away membership in certain social groups to get to "the real you." He writes "They are part of my substance, defining partially at least and sometimes wholly my obligations and my duties. Individuals inherit a particular space within an interlocking set of social relationships; lacking that space, they are nobody, or at best a stranger or an outcast." Dueling seems to be a way to deal with the effects of this social dislocation after the fact whereas returning to a pre-modern way of living would be getting at the cause. I think we'd be more likely to see dueling in our day than a Benedict option!
My favourite thing I learned about dueling was a paper I read long ago about military discipline in the British Army that included a segment about dueling among officers stationed on Majorca in the 18th century.
Because it was a dull peacetime posting (it is literally where mayonnaise is from) but far enough from Britain to be left to one's own devices, the officers had plenty of time to get into quarrels and challenge each other to duels. Dueling was, of course, illegal in the British Army as it was in pretty much all European armies since the kings of Europe didn't want their officers killing or wounding each other over petty feuds. However, an officer who refused a duel could be court-martialed for conduct unbecoming of an officer and a gentleman since no man with so low a regard for his own honour could possibly be trusted to carry the king's colours.
A fun little conflict between the law and the European honour culture. The British famously shot an admiral for refusing to throw away his command in a pointless battle against a superior force in attempting to defend Majorca so that little island was a veritable wellspring of wounded British military pride.
"War [dueling] is the truest form of divination. It is the testing of one's will and the will of another within that larger will which because it binds them is therefore forced to select. War is the ultimate game because war is at last a forcing of the unity of existence. War [dueling] is god."