(no subject)

http://so-very-doomed.livejournal.com/853275.html

The great scapegoating of the poor and needy which is happening in Britain today bears many similarities to the ancient Greek ritual of pharmakos, a form of human sacrifice performed at times of great crisis in which a poor or disabled person was exiled or murdered by the entire community.

This was a purification ritual which in turn evolved from animal sacrifices. Hunters, feeling guilt at killing animals for food, would rope the entire village into killing an ox - a valuable working animal which it had previously been prohibited to kill. Thus, the entire community comes to share the guilt of killing, so now everyone is equally culpable. When everyone is equally guilty, nobody is especially guilty, and the hunters can carry on killing and the tribe can be fed, just as our rulers have decided to continue with the project of killing the planet to keep our civilisation going.

I wonder. Interesting theory.