Politics and aggression

Wrote this for an NVQ thingy at work, it was based on the following articles;

University of Chiago Press Journals (2011 March 18th) Cranky? On a Diet? How Self-control leads to anger, Science Daily Retrieved January 10 2006 http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/03/110317131045.htm

Aggression in the streets of London (and elsewhere): Caused by the economic crisis? Or caused by the same mechanisms that caused the economic crisis?! Published: 9th August 2011 http://blogs.minyanville.com/ernst-labruyere/2011/08/09/aggression-in-the-streets-of-london-and-elsewhere-caused-by-the-economic-crisis-or-caused-by-the-same-mechanisms-that-caused-the-economic-crisis/

It was a bit inspired by Geoff Beattie, but don’t quote me on that it might be all wrong :I

Okay here we go:

Politics often touches people as a system for controlling anger, because this is what we remember, we remember the bad. This is just it though, people have this limited exposure to politics, as we relate politics to the understanding of the bad. However aggression is something that is within us all, and present in our daily lives. In any sport we see elements of aggression, combined with skill, and this becomes something that looks good. So how does politics and aggression compare with our own ability to control aggression?

We essentially have lower centers of the brain that are responsible for aggression, that are part of our early evolution. We then have upper centers that are part of our later evolution, these work as controlling mechanisms. These are very different centers of the brain , and work independently of each other. More specifically the limbic system is responsible for aggression. The pink wrinkled area is the cerebrum which works independently and, as a controller.

We can tell these parts of the brain best work independently as if we were on a diet, and we try and become very strict about it, we’d get very cranky, and often break all the good intentions of eating well.

It could be suggested to think about ‘control’ as; ideas, words, skills and talents. Aggression could hence be thought as; Anger, focus, rage, bad memories, emotions, fear, and change. So in a diet, the control could be thinking about the recipe, how the food is made, how we are going to cook it.

In politics this is different, politics is just the ‘controller’. It is good in conjunction with controlling our emotions, when we individually wish them to be uncontrolled. Such as to keep life simpler we give away this control, like the boss that employs us, or to the doctor that treats us. Likewise politics can be bad if don’t wish to have our emotions controlled, like red-tape on the self-employed, or if just don’t like being told what to do.

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This post was written by colin