Battling Men 2 (2022) Dessin par Edwin Loftus

About 600 years ago, a Master Artist, (whose name I don't remember), created a complex drawing called, "Battling Men". It was by no means the finest example of drawing at the time. It shows eight nude men with angry faces, all in essentially the same pose, appearing to be arrayed in four groups of one-on-one fisticuffs. One arm is raised above their heads, poised to strike like a hammer. The other arm is held away from their sides as though about to swing in a "roundhouse" blow.
It is an oddly inartistic piece. I am convinced that it was probably an anatomy guide for apprentices or journeymen in the Master's shop, just as cartoonists produce "character studies" as guides for the lower ranked artists in an animation studio today.
It is probably not indicative of this long ago Master's real skill, just a working tool developed so followers could better copy their employers style, never intended to be on display. And yet, it is a work of considerable craftsmanship and includes a background and the ground they stand upon.
It has stuck with me because of the absurdity of these eight men gathered naked to do battle, the fury on their faces, and the truth in the totality of the image.
Men battle other men. We do so from an early age, instinctively, and I believe, by the nature of our design.
We seldom do so, like our animal cousins, as a way to eliminate rivals for the females in our herds. Rather, most of my fights, (and they were many because I grew early and though barely over six feet now, I reached that height at 10 to 11 years, and was always the "boy to beat", for those who liked to fight more than I did), were as a defense of my right to exist and occupy whatever space I was in at that moment.
I think it is the desire to exist that fuels our battles, and the failure to equally respect the right of others to exist that ignites them.
As a cost versus gain equation, at a very early age I realized that even if you win the fight, (which, at my size, I tended to do unless fighting boys years more mature than I was), fighting was a very poor means of resolving existential issues. I was always cognizant of my ability to actually injure others, and respecting their right to exist, I didn't want to live with that on my conscience. And win or lose, one seldom really fights another without sustaining damage to oneself, and that hurts.
Oddly, peace came as I abandoned my unwillingness to harm other people, (and coincidently became more than averagely strong and experienced and capable of doing so). As I became more potentially dangerous, I assumed that those being aggressive toward me were also more capable and decided that, if they were insistent on fighting me, I would quickly end their ability to do so. I would ignore insults and angry mannerisms. I would allow them to take a first punch without responding. But not a second punch.
After adopting this approach, I lived almost violence free. (that's not quite true because working in Psychiatry, I had almost daily, to overpower and restrain people who were violently insane, and did that for 12 years. But I counted only a few of those thousands of fights as "real fights"). I think it was because I projected an impression that I was someone not worth fighting with.
In life and international relations, there are axioms that describe this:
- "Walk softly, but carry a big stick."
- "The best defense, is a good offense."
- And the motto, "Peace through preparedness." or "The best way to not have to go to war, is to always be prepared to go to war."
Like many things in this existence, battling men is an absurdity and a reality and the answer to it is a paradox that we either learn to live with, or not.

Thèmes connexes

WarMenBattlePreparednessNude