Roots of Violence

An article in the Free China Review (Liao 1996) reports the Ministry of Justice announcing that “out of the 860 elected county level councilors, approximately one- third has a criminal record or close connections with known underworld figures.” Furthermore, the Justice Minister, at a meeting of the European Council of Commerce and Trade, identified the drive for instant gratification, money, and social status as the primary reasons for increases in larceny, mugging, kidnapping, and extortion are increasing.

This theme is frequently repeated in newspaper editorials, the speeches of politicians, and the lectures of academics. The high visibility of individual wealth and the prevailing perceptions of power associated with wealth spur the desire for others to seek equal or greater status.

Taiwan’s consumers increasingly want to be part of Veblen’s (1899/1953: 45) “leisure class,” to elevate themselves from mundane positions as laborers to positions of ownership and control. The majority of Taiwanese are entrepreneurial in spirit and work hard to achieve or maintain a position in the leisure class. For example, ordinary citizens have added almost 2,000 registered factories a year over the last forty years to build an industrial base of over 100,000 registered factories. On the down side, rapid industrialization has led to rapid changes in the types of families. As often pointed out, Taiwan is experiencing changes in divorce rates, the motivations for marriage, and the structure and size of families. One of the most dramatic outcomes is the emergence of youth sub-cultures that challenge classical Confucian values and Taiwan’s strong work ethic.

Shaw (1994) cites his earlier argument that there is a growing population of Taiwan youth which does not want to work but rather prefers to have fun, to break away from “the only positively sanctioned social identity for youth—the ‘good student’— modeled the future-oriented, self-sacrificing, hard-working orientations.” If the youth cannot achieve the status of the good student and if the home environment offers no psychological support, then the student can easily drop out and adopt deviant behaviors.

Shaw (1994) describes two important youth sub-cultures. Members of one sub-culture called the kah-a say that after inhaling glue fumes they like to place lit cigarettes to their skin and watch it burn away. Evidently, the lack of feeling and the inability to feel pain causes fascination and enjoyment. Another sub-culture called the Iiuomang (hoodlums, or entry-level gangsters) ridicule drug use as a “meaningless distraction from the serious business of life such as earning money or cultivating one’s status and reputation locally.” The liuomang find pleasure in beating up local youths and bullying others into paying them to keep away.

The kah-a’s deviant behavior may be linked to feelings of guilt that causes depression, self-punishment, self-sacrifice, martyrdom, and masochism (Gilligan 1996). Thus, the kah-a maintain self-respect by sacrificing their bodies in front of others without crying out in pain. Gilligan also notes that the issue of “respect” is central to the vocabulary of violent criminals and that murders can occur simply because someone “dissed” (disrespected) the criminal. Violent acts also occur when guilt-laden individuals tire of punishing themselves and begin punishing others to alleviate their feelings of guilt. Some university students report being attacked by young kah-a carrying machetes. The reason, simply enough, is that the students “looked at them” and did not show respect.

Gilligan (1996) equates shame as the root cause for selfishness, sadism, and revenge. Gang members feel the greatest shame from not having the power to do or buy the “right” things and from not having status in the community. Shame plays a larger part as a component of Taiwan violence than guilt because of the pervasiveness of gangs relative to kah-a and common criminals. Gangs may be the largest source of shame-related violent behavior, but they are not the only source. Anyone or any group that is willing to pursue wealth at any cost, as a means to cover their shame for being poor or powerless, will likely increase the level of behavioral violence.

Since the power to buy whatever one wants whenever one wants instantly alleviates shame, people forego rational opportunities to work their way out of demeaning social positions.

Increases in fatalities related to arson and violation of fire safety ordinances, increases in graft and corruption, increases in assassinations of rivals and enemies, and increases in drug use, game-fixing, prostitution, extortion, and kidnapping are, for the most part, the result of organized gangs in Taiwan. Initial acts of violence occur when the gangs force their way into power or extort money from others. Then a cycle of retaliation begins against those who act to limit the gangs' power and wealth. Random acts of violence, such as drive-by slashings, are frequently the results of juveniles who feel guilty because they failed in school. Psychosis and mental illness also contribute to behavioral violence but this source is believed to be the smallest source of all.

In 1995, the Council of Economic Planning and Development reports roughly seventy-five crimes per 10,000 people (Taiwan Executive Yuan 1996a). The same year, 160,130 crimes were committed by a total of 151,591 criminals (28,524 juveniles), but not all of these cases were violent. In the Monthly Bulletin of Statistics (Taiwan Executive Yuan 1996b), of the 170,264 cases known to the police for offenses against the penal code in 1995, 10% were violent crimes. The level of violent crimes doubled between 1994 and 1995 and remained at the same high levels in

1996. The crime wave continues. Although the official statistics were not yet available, at least 14,000 violent crimes were expected for 1996 and over 16,000 for

1997.

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Source: Anderson M. (ed.). Cultural Shaping of Violence: Victimization, Escalation, Response. West Lafayette: Purdue University Press,2004. — 330 p.. 2004

Roots of Violence

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