When Doves Kill

Isn't a dove carrying an olive branch the universal symbol of peace?

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They do it in slow-motion, one pinpoint strike drawing one drop of blood per peck. They would happily kill faster if they had any weapon deadlier than their puny little beak. Since they don’t, they must peck, peck, peck, until the bloody job is done.

“What? Doves don’t kill each other. Doves are paragons of mildness. They turn away from aggression. They don’t strike back. That’s why a dove carrying an olive branch is the universal symbol of peace”.

It’s a misleading symbol.

Doves aren’t really, “dovish”.

Doves fight as aggressively as any other animal over food, mates and territory. We don’t see them killing each other, so we imagine them pacific. There are two reasons why dove scuffles rarely end in murder.

One - Their only weapons are tiny beaks.

Two - The losing side can fly away with no harm done.

That changes with caged doves, with their back’s against the bars, flight is impossible. That leaves only fight. Sometimes, both doves bleed to death.

Doves, like most prey animals are poorly armed. Forced fights between poorly-armed animals often ends in death. Fights between heavily-armed animals usually don’t.

Heavily-armed animals rarely kill each other, poorly-armed animals often do.

What explains this?

I don’t think it’s a DNA directive toward either mildness or aggression. I think it’s the natural consequence of two fundamental realities: weakness encourages aggression. strength discourages aggression.

The famous Old West, expression, ”Smile when you say that stranger”, says it all.

Being faced with equal force tends to temper aggression. Being faced with timidity emboldens bullet assisted dancing. That’s oversimplified but true.

Caged doves fight to the death because they think they can fly away if the going gets tough. They don’t know how to surrender. Tigers do. When tigers fight, one of them, at some point realizes he’s been beat. He signals surrender, the fight stops, and the losing tiger walks away licking his wounds and damaged pride.

The winning tiger isn’t being merciful, he’s being practical. He knows that continued fighting might leave him wounded, to the point of being unable to hunt, perhaps even killed.

Risk outweighs the joy of to-the-death victory. The tiger lets it go. All other predators do the same, for the same reason – it’s just good business.

Yes, it is counter-intuitive to think equally destructive firepower promotes peace.

Yet it’s true.

Weakness encourages aggression. Strength discourages aggression. Strength also encourages courtesy, as weakness does not.

“Smile when you say that stranger” covers the courtesy part of strength/weakness

as well as the aggression/timidity part.

Few are rude to those who can hurt them.

In the days of old, prior to the end of WWII, a man who insulted another man risked a punch in the mouth. The women rarely punched anyone, but, if a woman were insulted, her husband would punch her insulter, on her behalf. The near certainty of this response produced a much higher level of polite comportment than we see now.

Many factors since the 1960’s have contributed to the feminization of America culture - all of which have contributed to ever-increasing levels of rudeness.

“Sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me”, therefore, insult whomever you please. All you’ll risk is insulting words in return, accompanied by omnipresent vulgarities.

As civility decreases so does civilization.

When Jesus admonished us to turn the other cheek he was talking about not taking personal revenge, which should be left to God.

Fighting back against immediate aggression does not conflict with his teaching. He also admonishes us to do onto others as we would have others do onto us. If we followed these words of Jesus there would be no reason for aggression - neither verbal, nor physical.

As it is, the phrase “Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition”, comes to mind.

How long can the doves of an effeminate culture assault each other with verbal

slings and arrows before the tiny drops of virtual blood become real blood?

We’ll see.

By K. L. Shipley