The denial of one's neighbor
Albert Camus once said that from the moment a wronged person takes up arms, they are already one foot into the realm of injustice. There is no such thing as righteous violence. There are no types of violence. There are no more or less pitiable victims of violence. Violence is singular, abhorrent, and unacceptable in its entirety. And violence is always perpetrated by the strong against the weak. The usual victims are children, women, the poor, and the sensitive.
However, violence does not first originate in the mind of the strong. More often, it is incubated or nurtured during childhood. Therefore, the pedagogical responsibility of schools and families is significant. The excessively permissive upbringing prevalent in recent years, an upbringing without obligations and rules, fosters violence. The child grows up self-centered, armed with supposedly inalienable rights granted by an overprotective environment.
In its elementary form, violence is nothing but one's inability to tolerate their neighbor with respect for the other's individuality. Yet, tolerance (like any value) is not inherent. It is taught through stable rules, fair limits, and positive examples, so that innate childhood selfishness can be curbed through the acceptance of values and principles of coexistence and respect. If childhood selfishness is left unchecked, once it combines with any power life and maturity offer, it is very likely to manifest as violence and rejection of the neighbor.
The simplest indicator of an underlying support for violence (so simple that it goes unnoticed) is the prevailing disdain for so-called "good manners" nowadays. Yet, this is where one must start, because these manners are a demonstration of respect for others. The much-despised "thank you" and "please," holding a door, respecting the elderly, observing priority, or dressing appropriately—all these, often considered outdated in upbringing and overlooked by the baby boomer generation—enhance social behavior and the sense of coexistence, because they signify the importance of the other. Once this significance is diminished as a value, the presence of the other becomes nothing but an obstacle to the development of our egoism, hence a potential field for the exercise of violence. The Christian discourse about the other cheek, or about the neighbor who is ourself, or about Peter's sword follows far behind and is much harder. But if we disdain these simple rules, we are unlikely to reach the higher values that constitute the essential barrier against violence.