I love war

I'm so conflicted.

Maybe this has something to do with it:

As we showed, early man started to cooperate with each other to be able to hunt bigger game, and division of labour with regards to gender roles led to the nuclear family, as men provided meat and women agriculture, and close bonds became necessary to take care of human children who, because of their big brains, have extraordinarily long child-rearing times. However:

"All this interconnectedness and getting along came with a downside. With the concept of “us” comes “them.” To define who is part of our group worth fighting and dying for, we need to determine who is not.

"Very few species demonstrate this much specialization. In this respect, humans have more in common with ants than primates. Ants have a queen, workers, farmers and soldiers. That capacity for war is only found in these highly social animals because only a society that interdependent is capable of having a devoted class willing to die for the greater good."

According to Matt Ridley in The Origins of Virtue, groups put aside selfishness of individuals to form group cohesion. Once the external threat is eradicated, individuals return to their selfish ways. This would explain the unity after 9/11. In WW II:

"German bombs achieved a monolithic loyalty among the British (and vice versa). When the war was over, society fragmented once more and the triumphant greater-goodism of the war years disintigrated into the bickering selfishness of peace, gradually spoiling the promise of socialism."

These strong bonds made us devoted to each other, and look out for one another, but it also made us ferocious towards "others" for the betterment of our "own":

"As we expanded our definition of family outward to include cousins, neighbors and state, we also bred nepotism, tribalism and nationalism. From love came hate, our camaraderie bred prejudice, the capacity to choose good requires an option for evil."

[Taken verbatim from here.]