ignoring the baby was a passive stance, so the baby responded in frustration. i fail to see how if some one acts neutral that it causes violence
It's all about what was in the boundaries of communication. Being neutral towards someone is not cause for violence on its own. But suddenly turning neutral, when the communication did not include neutrality, is a violent act. It's the reason why the OFCOM regulator here in the UK has made it illegal for companies to use computers to make calls to unsuspecting citizens. What was happening is, the computer placed the calls, and if the person answered the call, then a sales agent would take over from the computer and pretend to have been the one who placed the call. But sometimes there were not enough agents to take over from the computer, so the unsuspecting citizen who picked up their phone would be met with just silence. This frightened a lot of the elderly, mothers, people living alone etc. You make call this a passive stance, but these people felt violated, because calling someone and being silent is not in the boundaries of a tele-communication.
violence is unfortunately necessary in specific problems. if Russia nuked America, America would have to go to respond in violence in order to save its self
Don't you love these hypothetical circumstances in which America is always the victim of some big bad wolf? :o)
Russia would never nuke America out of the blue now would they?
Which is why America should never stop talking to Russia.
It's hard to describe the reaction of the baby in that test without some degree of interpretation. What I saw was a baby that went from playful, to curious, to shocked, and then to a very moving terrified state. That baby looked psychologically wounded. I don't remember the analyst mentioning the word "violence", but if we use the definition you proposed on the other side (Violence = The intentional breaching of rightful boundaries) then I am inclined to conclude that the baby was indeed violated. The scientist intentionally turned her head away, thus breaching the boundaries of communication which, to that point, did not include ignoring each other.
Violence can take many shapes and forms, and it can be a profound noticeable action or something that goes undetected.
My first inclination is to say that violence is anything that violates a channel of communication.
I'll share with you a scene I watched in a documentary about the non-verbal language of babies. The test went as follows. A female scientist picks up a baby and holds it at eye level. While maintaining eye contact, she proceeds to make cute baby sounds and silly faces. Very soon, the baby starts giggling. As the baby finds this more and more entertaining, it starts to make sounds and reaches to touch the face of the scientist. With the communication and eye contact established, this game goes on for a few more seconds. Then suddenly, the scientist, while still holding the baby in the same position, turns her face away (sideways) from the baby and becomes neutral. She no longer faces the baby, and she does not respond to anything the baby does. As this happens, the baby first thinks this is part of the game. So it keeps staring at the scientist waiting for her to turn around and play. But she doesn't. Then the baby makes louder noises and touches the scientist's head. But she gets no response. Soon the baby starts crying, and you can see from the body language that the baby is hurt. The baby has been violated.
It took no "dangerous force" nor any form of physical aggression. Just a breakdown in communication. And it seems to me that every time humans resort to profound physical violence, it is because there has been a breakdown in communication.
But if we were to take this further, to include living beings that may not be able to communicate with us, then I would argue that violence is anything that interrupts the natural flow of energy. Cutting a tree for example, is a violent action, because it violates the tree's natural flow of energy.
