ITT I post my response to a TikToker who asked "has there ever been a time without war?"

Most of these replies are surface level misanthropy at best or conspiracy theory at worst. No, it isnt about "population control", neither is it "human nature".

There WAS a time before war, but not a time before violence. The reason war exists is not unlike why there are earthquakes: tension builds up between two opposing sides due to forces that act on both of them, until that tension is released. If we want to imagine the world in which there is no war, we have to imagine the world in which both the tension AND the causes for that tension are done away with.

The majority of our modern wars are over material conditions: needing to seize control over resources or land that can bring opportunity for resources. For our last few generations, it has been the US using war to maintain its stranglehold over economic resources like oil, shipping lanes, and denying them to its rivals. The previous superpowers, like Nazi Germany, Britain, France, etc. fought wars over the same thing. That's what shapes history, moreso than our ideas or individual actions: we are driven to maintain material conditions that keep us comfortable and alive: most forms of petty or even violent crimes are driven by material conditions.

For the capitalist class, though, it is not enough to simply be comfortable, because to be comfortable in their system means that they must command (and suppress) the working class. Therefore, they amass greater wealth and power to protect their positions, but in doing so make all of us poorer, hungrier, unhealthier. We are driven into war between our classes.

At the international level, the capitalist classes compete for this same control over eachother and the working classes of other countries, leading to the same result: war.