by Steve Rose | Aug 23, 2015 | Identity, Purpose, and Belonging
On the go? Listen to the audio version of the article here:
As a sociologist, I have been interested in what makes up our social needs. Although we have basic psychological and biological needs, our social needs are often neglected in the modern individualistic world.
What are our social needs?
As described in Abraham Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, our social needs are of the need for love and belonging. The need for love and belonging consists of a sense of connection, intimacy, trust, and friendship.
When these social needs are fulfilled, we feel a sense of well-being. When these needs are not met, it can cause suffering and despair.
If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health issues, you can check out my resource page for suggestions on how to find help.
Let’s take a closer look at why our social needs are important and how these needs can be fulfilled.
Why Social Needs are Important
Human beings have social needs that are just as important as our biological need for food.
Just as we may risk death by starvation if we stop eating, those whose social needs are not met may find themselves at risk of a form of extreme emotional pain that leads to thoughts of suicide.
If we want to understand human thriving, the social component is essential.
According to an 80 year long Harvard study that followed a group of individuals since their college years, the quality of our close social relations is the best predictor of health and happiness:
…people’s level of satisfaction with their relationships at age 50 was a better predictor of physical health than their cholesterol levels were.
In a TED Talk on the study, Robert Waldinger emphasizes the dangers of social isolation, stating:
Loneliness kills. It’s as powerful as smoking or alcoholism.
This situation is all the more concerning, given the increasing rates of social isolation in affluent societies, particularly among the aging population.
Modern conveniences allow us to live more independently than ever, but we need to consider the costs to our mental and physical health. We need to consider the health of our communities.
What Happens When Our Social Needs are Unmet?
Let’s do a recap on a definition of social needs. Although Maslow used the words “love and belonging,” I prefer to use a more specific definition.
Here is my sociological definition of our fundamental social need:
It is the need for a perceived sense of personal significance, achieved through a perceived sense of both social belonging and social contribution.
See the resources section below for a list of studies that have formed the empirical foundation for this theory of social needs.
When our social needs are not met, and our sense of personal significance is threatened, we compensate through fight or flight responses in an attempt to restore or escape our lost sense of significance.
Fight responses include displays of superiority and displays of power. Demonstrations of superiority include harnessing status symbols or sabotaging others, and displays of power include aggressive attempts to control or manipulate others. Flight responses include social withdrawal.
Social withdrawal is dangerous because it further diminishes the likelihood of having our social needs met, increasing the risk of suicide.
In Why People Die by Suicide, Thomas Joiner describes how intense emotional pain often comes from a perceived lack of belonging, in addition to feeling like a burden. Thwarted belonging is characterized by the statement, “I am alone.”
Thwarted belonging has two aspects: loneliness as the result of feeling disconnected from others (living alone, single, no children, etc.), and the absence of reciprocal care (family conflict, loss through death, divorce, domestic or child abuse, etc.).
As Jean Vanier states:
“To be lonely is to feel unwanted and unloved, and therefore unlovable. Loneliness is a taste of death.”
Humans are social beings and social isolation is a form of torture. Social isolation and extreme loneliness are different than merely being alone or enjoying time to oneself.
It is a profound sense of disconnection, usually marked by shame and hopelessness about one’s ability to reconnect.
To read more about the experience of isolation contributing to suicide risk, you can check out my article, Inside the Mind of a Suicidal Person.
What Happens When Our Social Needs are Fulfilled?
When our sense of significance is fulfilled, we experience a high degree of subjective well-being, feel a strong sense of identity, belonging, interpersonal connection, social support, and maintain the sense that our efforts are contributing to a cause beyond ourselves.
Classical sociologist Ferdinand Tönnies describes the joy of community when he states that man is “his best and happiest when he is surrounded by his family and his own circle.”
In my research on veterans in transition to civilian life, this had been a common theme. Many experienced a strong sense of community in the military, fulfilling their social needs. As one veteran states:
Bullets don’t discriminate, so watching each other’s back was an unwritten rule. Everything was everyone’s and for that moment in your life it’s true communal living.
It is not coincidental that Maslow’s definition of self-actualization aligns with the Army slogan, “Be all you can be.”
Human beings are inherently social creatures and can only become the best version of ourselves when we are in communion with others. The classic sociologist, Émile Durkheim coined the concept of “homo duplex” to describes our dual nature as both individual and social:
Far from being simple, our inner life has something like a double centre of gravity. On the one hand is our individuality … On the other is everything in us that expresses something other than ourselves. Not only are these two groups of states of consciousness different in their origins and their properties, but there is a true antagonism between them.
As Matthew D. Lieberman states in his book, Social: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Connect:
“socially connected will be a lifelong need, like food and warmth.”
He goes on to state:
“Living for others [is] such a relief from the impossible task of trying to satisfy oneself.”
We are social beings by nature and find a great deal of purpose in living in service of others.
Conclusion
Our social needs are fundamental when it comes to living a good life.
We need a perceived sense of personal significance, achieved through a perceived sense of both social belonging and social contribution.
If you are interested in reading more about our social needs, you can check out my article, The Need to be Needed.
by Steve Rose | Jan 20, 2015 | Identity, Purpose, and Belonging
As our modern times become ever-more chaotic, the fear of loneliness and uncertainty becomes an increasingly prominent feature in our life.
Moral certainties have turned into lines drawn in the sand and community is washed away by the waves of individualism, clearing the slate for us to write and write our own life stories.
Nietzsche proclaimed the death of God, the superiority of the church eroded, neighborhoods turned into sterile suburban refuges, and the nuclear family gave way to a plethora of novel household possibilities.
We are now free from Rousseau’s chains of tradition. We are born free and we will live free.
No longer dominated by the church, we are free to further science. No longer confined to a traditional family, we are free to form households that better fit with our unique desires.
Free from moral certitudes, our desires burst into infinity. We explore the dark corners of our subjectivity, experiment with our bodies, and seek self-identity in a multitude of fleeting social groups.
Life has exploded with complexity, yet, our fundamental desire remains the same; we just want to be happy. But now, more than ever, happiness does not bring certainty, just as certainty does not bring happiness.
We have become artists of our own lines in the sand. Amidst the tides of modernity, we are tasked with redrawing ourselves again and again, but we need to remember that we can’t do it alone.
Uncertain CommunityÂ
As the late Marina Keegan describes this in her book The Opposite of Loneliness,
“It’s not quite love and it’s not quite community; it’s just this feeling that there are people, an abundance of people, who are in this together. Who are on your team… Yale is full of tiny circles we pull around ourselves. A cappella groups, sports teams, houses, societies, clubs. These tiny groups that make us feel loved and safe and part of something even on our loneliest nights when we stumble home to our computers – partnerless, tired, awake.â€
Unlike traditional community life, modern community is something we are responsible for forging ourselves. We find a fleeting sense of community life in our hobbies, memberships, and casual associations.
Community is ever-more fluid. Like joining a gym, you find yourself surrounded by the same people for a little while, only to find a new rotation of members the following year.
But even in these fleeting communities, if we are lucky, we can find a sense of meaning. As Marina Keegan states, “an abundance of people who are in this together”.
Uncertain Love
As our modern times become ever-more chaotic, the fear of being alone becomes an increasingly prominent feature in our life.
In The Normal Chaos of Love, Sociologists Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim explore how romantic love is both a bastion of uncertainty, and a place of refuge. Love itself has become increasingly chaotic in modern times with the loss of clear-cut courtship rituals.
In this age of uncertainty we are primarily driven to find and hold onto romantic love out of a fear of loneliness in a world lacking communal bonds.
In the absence of meaning, we seek fulfillment in a romantic partner. According to Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim:
Some powerful force has pushed its way in and filled up the gap where, according to previous generations, God, country, class, politics or family were supposed to hold sway. I am what matters: I, and You as my assistant; and if not You then some other You.
Seeking love in the intensity of Eros should not be equated with fulfillment, states Beck:
That is its glowing side, the physical thrill…. How easily having one’s hopes fulfilled can turn into a chilly gaze! Were only a moment ago overwhelming urgency made a knotted tangle of two walking taboos, merging me and you, all boundaries gone, now we are staring at one another with critical eyes, rather like meat inspectors, or even butchers who see the sausages where others see cattle and pigs.
Released from traditional norms, our desire to seek fulfillment in a loving relationship because “other social bonds seem too tenuous and unreliable.â€
As this desire grows with increasing individualization, its fulfillment is more difficult to attain amidst the ever-growing emphasis on the thrill of Eros.
Expanding on Ulrich Beck and Elisabeth Beck-Gernsheim’s characterization of love as a means to peruse, a happy “life of one’s own†in our culture of “do-it-yourself lifestyles,â€
He goes on, in The Art of Love, to state that humans are in search of a lost union with nature. We have developed large brains, giving us a high degree of self-consciousness and awareness of our own mortality. This creates an existential need for meaning in our lives which was the source of religious life. In modern times, market capitalism took the place of religion as the central organizing force:
“Modern man has transformed himself into a commodity; he experiences his life energy as an investment with which he should make the highest profit, considering his position and the situation on the personality market. He is alienated from himself, from his fellow men and from nature.â€
Just like uncertain market forces, love has become a normal chaos. Dating apps give us powerful technological tools to market ourselves to potential partners. Hookup culture has been institutionalized and fire of eros burns bright.
We are liberated from the shackles of tradition, able to peruse our unique passions in places forbidden by fading taboos. But In order to balance the potentially lonely price of freedom, we need to find meaning in Agape – a form of altruistic love that requires commitment and ongoing effort.
Kahlil Gibran said, “work is love made visible;†but love is also work made visible.
Eros without agape is lustful, while agape without Eros is ascetic. Romantic love requires the fiery passion of Eros, but amidst the institutionalized chaos of contemporary life, we must not lose sight of loyalty and commitment.
When Eros and Agape come together, Self-fulfillment is a byproduct of self-giving; not in the form of submission or domination, but as equals who respect one another and genuinely care for each other’s well-being.
This way, love can weather the darkest of life’s storms, giving refuge to those who seek solace amidst the chaos.
Uncertainty in the Professional World
Traditionally, transitions throughout the life-course have been guided by clear social expectations or rites of passage. These expectations still exist but are not nearly as clear-cut as they once were.
A post-secondary student is often expected to seek employment and an eventual marital partner after graduation, but unlike the times of highly gendered courtship rituals and readily available local careers, there are often no clear paths to follow in the transition from studenthood to professional life.
Rather than a handful of job offers, many recent graduates are forced to get creative, volunteering, moving away, or picking up applied skills with extra college courses. The strict codes of conduct that guided the life-course have been reduced to a single moral imperative: to offer value to society without harming others. This is the imperative of modern liberalism.
Modern liberalism is a double-edged sword. Its benefit is that it allows for greater social mobility, equality between diverse lifestyles, and a wider array of opportunities for individuals to pursue their unique passions. This is the modern idea of the ‘life-project’. The catch is that this modern project lacks a clear template.
As long as the individual does not pose too much of a risk to others, they will have an infinite number of opportunities to restart or change paths. This can seem quite liberating compared to the traditional one-size-fits-all life-template. Although it is liberating, the drawback is that individuals are tasked with the responsibility to figure out the direction of their project on their own, without being prepared to take on this responsibility.
Each generation experiences a gap between themselves and their parents. Just as the baby boomers experienced a significant change from the courtship expectations of their parents, children of the baby boomers are experiencing their key distinction in the transition to the work world.
The traditional school-system taught this generation’s children and adolescents that is they follow rules and perform well on tests, everything will be okay – but this is far from the case in today’s entrepreneurial economy where the rules are minimum, factual knowledge is readily accessible by simple Google searches, and success is strictly measured by the amount of value you can offer an organization.
Rather than the ability to memorize factual knowledge and follow rules, creativity and the ability to put knowledge to work are the prized possessions in today’s work world.
There is a gap between what is required to succeed in the professional world and what is taught in elementary school, high-school, and even many university programs.
The ability to sit attentively through lectures and memorize facts for an exam are not the skills we should be instilling in a generation whose major challenge is finding a creative way to offer value. The professional world requires more than obedient automatons who can regurgitate a benign set of facts they will shortly forget after an exam.
I very frequently encounter students in the social sciences struggling with the idea of writing an essay based on their own analysis of a problem. Far too many students are deeply uncomfortable coming up with an innovative idea – even in their final years of university. Today’s professional world requires innovators and problem-solvers, people who know how to use knowledge to make a positive change.
In the wake of large-scale economic uncertainty, education at all levels needs to support the new imperative to creatively offer value by taking responsibility for one’s individual life-project.
ConclusionÂ
Finding meaning in our uncertain modern times requires accepting the uncertainty and finding creative solutions to life’s problems.
It requires taking responsibility for our lives, forging a sense of community, and making ourselves useful, amidst an ever-changing economic landscape.
Although the chaotic nature of modern life is not our individual responsibility, we are still responsible for building our own sense of meaning and purpose.
If you would like to read more about building a sense of purpose, you can check out my article: What Does It Mean to Have a Purpose?
by Steve Rose | Dec 21, 2014 | Suicide and Mental Health
Suicide is often thought of as an individual problem.
The field of psychology has advanced our understanding of why people die by suicide and has contributed valuable insights into its treatment, but it can be limiting when emphasizing the individual at the expense of their broader social realm.
The problem with only viewing suicide as an individual problem is that we neglect the importance of social forces contributing to suicide.
So how is suicide a social problem?
The risk of suicide in a population increases when the social context fails to provide a healthy sense of purpose and belonging, contributing to an individual’s sense of contribution and connection.
What Sociology Says About Suicide
In his classic sociological text, Suicide, Durkheim develops a typology of suicide based on the concepts of ‘social integration’, and ‘moral regulation’. He identifies four different types of suicide: altruistic (high integration), egoistic (low integration), fatalistic (high regulation), and anomic (low regulation).
Altruistic suicide results from a very high level of integration into one’s social context; Durkheim gives the example of religious sacrifices, but suicide-bombers are a contemporary version of this.
Being so highly integrated, the individual’s own personal aims are completely aligned with those of their social group to the point of self-sacrifice. Although there is a moral distinction between various types of altruistic suicide, Durkheim used the word ‘altruism’ to describe group integration which differs from its popular use to denote acts of normative moral goodness.
Egoistic suicide results from a very low degree of social integration. Durkheim found that this type of suicide was common among the most educated populations in his day.
These populations were more prone to social disintegration because the higher levels of critical thinking lead to lower levels of tradition which promoted common beliefs and practices that bind people together.
Fatalistic suicide is a concept briefly mentioned in a footnote of Durkheim’s text, referring to suicide that results from a very high degree of social regulation (e.g. prison or slavery).
For some reason, Durkheim lists “young husbands” as being at risk of this type of suicide – but this is one of his more theoretical statements, lacking empirical support in the text.
Anomic suicide results from a very low degree of social regulation. Durkheim gives examples of large-scale social transitions such as revolutions or economic chaos in the market.
The fundamental issue causing this type of suicide is the loss of a guiding morality or a meaningful sense of purpose. This form of suicide is common in wealthy societies.
Suicide in Wealthy Societies
Anomic suicide is most common among developed capitalist nations where wealth is abundant. Durkheim states:
“…those who suffer most are not those who kill themselves most. It is too great comfort which turns a man against himself. Life is most readily renounced at the time and among the classes where it is least harsh.”
When the central guiding force in our lives is the pursuit of material luxury, it becomes a bottomless pit requiring ever-more stimulation. As Durkheim states:
“Unlimited desires are insatiable by definition and insatiability is rightly considered a sign of morbidity. Being unlimited, they constantly and infinitely surpass the means at their command; they cannot be quenched. Inextinguishable thirst is constantly renewed torture…”
Viktor Frankl echoes this sentiment when he states:
“Ever more people today have the means to live, but no meaning to live for.”
And according to Frankl, suffering without meaning is what leads to despair.
In The Happiness Trap, Russ Harris makes a similar statement:
“Today’s middle class lives better than did the Royalty of not so long ago, and yet humans today don’t seem very happy.”
Chasing pleasurable feelings distracts us from meaningful pursuits and long-term goals, keeping us on the hedonic treadmill. Western ‘feel-good’ consumer culture fuels this problem with its quick-fix ideology of pain-free solutions. One only needs to take a look at the ridiculous workout equipment produced over the years to get the idea (“Take the work out of your workout… If you can sit, you can get fit” – The Hawaii Chair)
The Happiness Trap is based on two opposing concepts of happiness: short term pleasures (hedonic), and meaningful fulfillment (the good life). Too much focus on the hedonic pain-avoiding route prevents individuals from attaining deeper fulfillment since the latter form of happiness requires a degree of suffering and limitation on one’s impulsive desires.
Durkheim’s concept of fulfilling happiness occurs when the individual is in a state of sufficient social regulation, whereby the social role places limits on an individual’s individual aspirations. Contrary to Karl Marx, Durkheim argues that economic class categorizations can actually contribute to individual happiness and social harmony:
“This relative limitation and the moderation it involves, make men contented with their lot while stimulating them moderately to improve it; and this average contentment causes the feeling of calm, active happiness, the pleasure in existing and living which characterizes health for societies as well as for individuals.”
This leads Durkheim to a conclusion resembling the contemporary maxim that happiness is not about getting what you want, but about wanting what you have.
It is not economic class that provides this happiness in individuals, but the regulatory force it provides. Similar regulatory forces can be found in the family, as well as one’s specific occupational role.
The key is that 1) the individual feels a sense of fair compensation for their labor, and 2) that their labor is contributing to the collective. Without these elements, social regulation disintegrates into chaos or the despair of detachment from collective life.
This despair of detachment from collective life is most evident among veterans transitioning out of the military.
Suicide Among Veterans in Transition
As described in my massive article on transitional stress, a veteran’s sense of what matters in life may be uprooted during the transition.
In the memoir, Unspoken Abandonment, Bryan Wood writes the following lines regarding the conversations of his civilian co-workers:
“I couldn’t believe the kind of silly bullshit these people thought mattered in life… I couldn’t believe I once thought these same things were important.”
Upon sharing some of my earlier writing on this topic on r/veterans, exgiexpcv responded:
“…you’re used to doing things that mattered, and suddenly your life is simply digesting bullshit and consuming instead…”
As a Canadian veteran told me:
“I don’t necessarily miss being blown up and shot at, but you miss the purpose that comes with the combat.”
In an article called What Vets Miss Most Is What Most Civilians Fear: A Regimented, Cohesive Network That Always Checks On You, the author states:
The truth is that I had never been in such a supportive social environment in my life.… when Veterans leave military service, many of them, like me, are leaving the most cohesive and helpful social network they’ve ever experienced. And that hurts. Most recent Veterans aren’t suffering because they remember what was bad. They’re suffering because they miss what was good.
A comment below the article expands on this sentiment in terms of the concept of ‘trust’: “Veterans mostly miss bonds built on trust, demonstrated through actions not just words.” The experience of this demonstration beyond words can be witnessed in the following lines from the book, Memoirs of an Outlaw: Life in the Sandbox:
“We had relied on one another to have our backs and would have given our lives to protect the others. We had built a relationship that was stronger than just rank: we were a family, a brotherhood, sewn together by trust, respect, blood, tears, and sweat. Everything we had built together was slowly being torn apart.”
Training instills this commitment to the group, evidence of this commitment solidifies it, and the transition to civilian life can tear it apart.
The social cause of suicide is the macro-level we need to consider when trying to uncover reasons why certain populations experience higher rates of suicide. On the individual level, intense mental pain may be a fundamental driver of suicide.
Interpersonally, this pain may be the product of thwarted belonging, a sense of burdensomeness, and hopelessness about this situation. This interpersonal situation may be the product of broader social realities; for example, the lack of institutional support during social transitions has the potential to radically uproot individuals from a sense of social solidarity.
Suicide and the Sacred
In the book Suicide, Durkheim describes the function of the ‘sacred’ as an ideal that binds individuals together into moral communities; he states:
“It’s object is to raise man above himself and to make him lead a life superior to that which he would lead, if he followed only his own individual whims.”
Moral communities provide individuals with a sense of purpose by giving them a cause to serve outside themselves.
As described in the previous section, in his memoir, Unspoken Abandonment, Bryan A. Wood states how this sense of service assisted his recovery after leaving the military.
Bryan found himself unable to connect with friends whose infuriating black and white view of the war drove a wedge between them. At work, he could no longer derive a sense of purpose from the office job he had once held:
“I started looking through the work files…trying to find a purpose to any of them. Strangely, I could not find a single one that seemed to matter.”
After witnessing the profound tragedy of war, Bryan’s sense of what mattered in life was uprooted. Referring to the conversations of co-workers he states:
“I couldn’t believe the kind of silly bullshit these people thought mattered in life… I couldn’t believe I once thought these same things were important.”
After a few years of feeling isolated and battling post-traumatic stress, Bryan received advice from a friend that would begin his healing process:
“If you try to do only for yourself, you’ll only get so far in life. If you reach out to touch other people, you can fix your own soul.”
‘Service’ is the outward manifestation of moral purpose provided by a sacred ideal. The military provides a high degree of moral purpose, leaving veterans vulnerable to feel lost and apathetic in civilian life.
A high degree of responsibility for one’s comrades, guided by the sacred ideal of public service, instills a strong sense of meaning and purpose for individuals in the military community, potentially leading to problems when transitioning to civilian life. An individual I interviewed stated:
“We want to serve, that’s our mantra… a lot of guys will join the paramedics, police, or fire-department, because they want to be in that position of service to other people… that’s who we are.”
Durkheim (1933) explains this sense of service as the following:
“…for the sentiment of duty to be fixed strongly in us, the circumstances in which we live must keep us awake.”
When the circumstances that keep one awake to a life of duty fades, one is thrown into a world of sleepwalkers; or as Durkheim states:
“When community becomes foreign to the individual, he becomes a mystery to himself, unable to escape the exasperating and agonizing question: to what purpose?”
Reducing suicide rates among veterans needs to go beyond individual counseling. It requires creating opportunities for veterans to regain a sense of purpose through the sacred bonds of communal life.
The first aspect of facilitating this sense of community requires governments to uphold their sacred obligation to veterans, demonstrating a degree of warmth, care, and timely access to necessary benefits and services.
The second aspect consists of creating opportunities for veterans to apply their skills in civilian life, regaining a sense of contribution to a common cause.
Conclusion
Suicide is a social problem that concerns us all. Individual treatment is necessary, but it is not sufficient to solve the problem.
Trying to solve the problem in a narrowly individualistic way is like continuing to mop the floor when the sink is overflowing and the water is still running.
Sociological solutions to suicide involve community groups and programs that integrate the individual into something larger than themselves. In the specific case of veterans in transition to civilian life, it may involve a more focus on reintegration training efforts.
Humans are inherently social beings and therefore we cannot be alienated from that part of ourselves without a cost. This is why sociology has been such a passion of mine.
If you want to see my complete definition of purpose, you can check out my article here.
If you want to read my comprehensive post on suicidal desire, you can check out my article Inside the Mind of a Suicidal Person.
by Steve Rose | Dec 3, 2014 | Veterans in Transition
Some Veterans experience traumas beyond the battlefield. One of these can be called, “sanctuary trauma”.
Developed by Dr. Steven Silver, sanctuary trauma “occurs when an individual who suffered a severe stressor next encounters what was expected to be a supportive and protective environment’ and discovers only more trauma.”
Some veterans who face mental or physical injuries from service are finding themselves in a second battle with the bureaucracy upon return.
In Canada, there has been a great deal of politics around sanctuary trauma. Many veteran advocate groups have claimed that the government has not held up their end of the bargain.
The much-anticipated Report of the Auditor General of Canada reviewed mental health services for veterans and determined that although there are several mental health supports put in place, there is still a significant delay in access to disability benefits and clinical care.
These delays may contribute to a secondary traumatization in individuals whose mental health conditions are only exacerbated by stacks of paperwork, a seemingly endless wait, and perhaps even a wrongful denial on initial applications.
Instead of restating these are fairly obvious points, my purpose here is to specifically describe how this can produce “sanctuary trauma,” and how this is deeply rooted in a veteran’s sense of a ‘sacred obligation’.
The concept of ‘sacred obligation’ has gained frequent use in the media among Canadian Veterans Advocates. The Liberal Party also released a video on their commitment to a “sacred obligation” the same day the Auditor General report was released – keep in mind both parties are to blame for problems in the New Veterans Charter.
Politics aside, what is this concept actually referring to? And why is it important to injured veterans who feel uncared for?
Covenants, Not Contracts
A government’s sacred obligation to Veterans goes beyond a legal contract; it is a covenant made by a society to care for those who served in an unlimited capacity.
The major difference between a covenant and a contract is this level of liability. Contracts only hold parties liable to a degree limited by the terms and conditions of the contract, whereas covenants hold parties liable to an unlimited degree.
Christopher Coker, in The Warrior Ethos, describes the covenant as distinguished from the contract in three ways:
“First, they are not limited to specific conditions and circumstances; secondly, they tend to be open-ended and long-lasting; and, thirdly, they rarely involve individual advantage.”
What he is describing is the warrior’s covenant.
In the Canadian Armed Forces, the warrior’s covenant is characterized by “unlimited liability” – as described in Duty With Honour. This means:
“…members accept and understand that they are subject to being lawfully ordered into harm’s way under conditions that could lead to the loss of their lives.”
Accepting unlimited liability, serving members enter into a sacred covenant based in an altruistic commitment to self-sacrifice if required by the mission.
The etymology of the word ‘sacrifice’ is linked to the word ‘sacred’ because the two are anthropologically connected to forms of moral solidarity in traditional societies before the modern legal contract replaced these heartfelt bonds based in blood with rationalized bureaucratic state management.
The issue with state management of Veterans care services goes deeper than wait times. At its root, the issue is that the sizable minority of Veterans who experience a difficult transition to civilian life (25%) are coming from a period of their life where they lived the sacred obligation through the warrior ethos of mission before self.
Having held up their covenant to accept unlimited liability, they confront a system that is not able to hold up its end of the covenant. Individuals who suffer traumas in service expect to be taken care of upon return, but some instead find themselves engaged in a battle with bureaucracy.
Sanctuary trauma compounds the issues of war traumas, exacerbating feelings of isolation and hopelessness. For many embittered veterans, this is a feeling of institutional betrayal.
Sanctuary trauma is unique because it is caused by institutions that are initially expected to provide care. Although Veteran Affairs provides a great deal of care and now has increased funding for OSI clinics, Veterans who fall through the cracks may experience this form of trauma resulting from a society that falls short of the sacred standard of unlimited liability.
Legitimately injured Veterans don’t want a handout. They want a sense of security knowing the society they served is committed to serving them as well.
by Steve Rose | Sep 29, 2014 | Veterans in Transition
In the army, everybody sinks or swims together,
What ultimately matters to you most are the guys in your section.
These faceless soldiers in uniform, these guys are friends,
What keeps you going is that you’re there to look after each other.
I might fucking hate you because of what you did to my girlfriend last Saturday,
but in this moment, I need you – everything I did over there was for them.
There was a certain utopia to it…
Everyone’s focused on the same thing, everyone focused on getting the job done.
We were attacked, hungry, tired, wet, stinky, no shower or shitter,
Bullets don’t discriminate, so watching each other’s back was an unwritten rule.
Everything was everyone’s and for that moment in your life it’s true communal living,
What brought us together was conflict, and now that conflict is gone.
I miss being in the forces every day, it’s who I was,
It’s not a job, we’re always military.
It’s the only occupation where you can truly serve in an unlimited capacity,
We would redeploy on a dime to get back to that balance that being in combat brings.
Once you’re out of that environment, it’s like god, what do I do now?
Everybody’s kinda sleepwalking through life here.
When you get out in civilian life, you don’t know who your friends are truly,
You’re always investing in the group… that doesn’t really exist at the office.
Joining a team I intuitively connect as much and as fast as I can with people,
That actually freaks out my civilian counterparts.
Once we leave, we are thrown back into civilian society,
Back to dog-eat-dog competition
I have a really hard time connecting with people in the civilian world now.
Their experiences aren’t relevant to me, and my experiences aren’t relevant to them.
We want to serve, that’s our mantra…
“Society is the end on which our better selves depend…
When community becomes foreign to the individual, he becomes a mystery to himself, unable to escape the exasperating and agonizing question: to what purpose?”*
*This piece is based on 35 interviews with Canadian Veterans of Afghanistan. Quotes were thematically extracted from my interviews and lines were pieced together to form the above narrative. The final quote is from Durkheim’s Suicide in the chapter on Egoism.
I also want to say thank-you to the Canadian Veterans who gave their time and insight in the interviews.
