Word: lethally
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...word when it is spoken with kindness must listen to the headsman when he comes with his ax." Religion can provide a warmth of certitude and belonging. When its energy is turned outward, it may express itself in acts of mercy and even saintliness. But piety can also be lethal when directed against strangers and infidels. William James, writing 75 years ago, defined the problem: "Piety is the mask, the inner force is tribal instinct...
...furious. When people fight over territory for economic advantage, they reach the point where the battle isn't worth the cost and so compromise. When the cause is religious, compromise and conciliation seem to be evil." Possibly the transcendent nature of both religion and war encourages an especially lethal kind of fanaticism. As Shinn says, "War is one of the few occasions when people are asked to give of themselves in a cause that is greater than self. People are asked to forget self - and human nature rises and falls to the occasion...
Each time, the level of violence rose, frighteningly, demoralizingly. In the long fighting, barely 2 sq. mi. of Beirut real estate changed hands. And the weaponry grew ever more lethal: finally even surface-to-surface missiles were used. Residential sections once considered safe were shelled by both sides. Guns of every description, every caliber were everywhere. In a country with no police force, no army, no government, the streets belonged to the gunmen and their visions of macho reinforced by Kalashnikov automatic rifles...
When more than a dozen apparently unexplainable deaths occurred among patients at tiny Riverdell Hospital in suburban Oradell, N.J., in 1965-66, a young doctor finally decided to act on his suspicions. Opening the chief surgeon's locker, he found 18 mostly empty vials of curare-a highly lethal drug sometimes used in small doses to relax muscles during surgery. No charges were ever brought against the surgeon -who explained he was merely using the relaxant for experiments on dogs...
...changed the entire flavor of his character-a bounty hunter called Robert E. Lee Clayton-inventing a deadly hand weapon resembling both a harpoon and a mace that he uses to kill. "I always wondered why in the history of lethal weapons no one invented that particular one. It appealed to me because I used to be very expert at knife throwing...