Fear of the Dead: The Role of Social Ritual in Neutralizing Fantasies from Combat

Abstract

Traumatic neuroses have been part of the human condition since the beginning of time. The horrors of war have always left their mark on its combatants. Civilizations in the past have respected the psychic crisis that combat inflicts on its soldiers. The fears, fantasies and guilts of battle have been integrated into cultural mythology that acts as a collective secondary process for the overwhelmed soldier. Through this mechanism of community ritual, the veteran is helped to progress from his regressive acting out of aggression to his more mature precombat ego functioning.

Blood hath been shed ere now, i’ th’ olden time, Ere human statute purged the gentle weal; Ay, and since too, murders have been performed Too terrible for the ear. The times has been That, when the brains were out, the man would Die, and there an end; but now they rise again, With twenty mortal murders on their crowns, and Push us from our stools. This is more strange Than such a murder is.

Shakespeare Macbeth III, iv