FS, I do not think you grasped the point I was trying to make.
In the first place, I did not ask you whether you had "served" in a war, but whether you had been in a war zone -- as a soldier, as an observer, or as a "targeted" civilian.
Anyone who has been knows what "fear" is, and indeed would not survive if he/she did not feel it at all.
I would agree with you on only one point: after it is all over, many people suffer grievously, and for years, with post-traumatic stress syndrome, and thus have to learn how to "erase from their consciousnes thousands of hours of memories of hate, anger, death and destruction." At that point, fear no longer serves a useful purpose; it is maladaptive, as they say. But while the bloodbath is going on, fear is "adaptive": it is what spurs you to "fight or flee." If you do neither, you are not going to last very long, as I originally said.
jbe |
