Dead Birds

It’s an anthropological documentary from 1963. My then spouse had to see it for a college course in 1970, and I came along out of curiosity. Several year later, I saw it again.

Dead Birds documents ritual warfare between two indigenous groups in Papua, New Guinea. One group kills a member of the other, and the spirit of the fallen calls for revenge. The two groups meet once again on the field of battle armed with spears with the goal of satisfying the cries of the ghosts of the fallen. The two groups embrace in a cycle of injury and death. It’s a sad tale.

I think about this old documentary this evening because of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, but it could be any other conflict – the US and the Taliban in Afghanistan, the Russians and Ukrainians, and almost any other violent conflict. The ghosts of the fallen, if not the acts of violence themselves, cry out for justice. But justice in what form and at what cost? What is the price of silencing the ghosts of the dead?

By some reports, Israel has since suffered 1,400 dead and over 5,100 wounded in the current conflict that began with a violent Hamas attack on Saturday, October 7. Palestine has suffered 4,600 dead of which 1,750+ were children, and some 14,250 wounded. Israel has a population of about 9.6 million. Palestine has a population of about 2.3 million.

If the criterion for justice is “an eye for an eye,” then the Palestinians have already paid a price that balances the ledger. If the criterion for justice is proportional deaths and injuries, then the Palestinians have more than paid for the crimes of the Hamas attack of that Saturday.

But the Israeli government has chosen as its criterion for justice the Eradication of Hamas. Sadly, ideas do not die with the deaths of those who espouse them. So, the choice of the criterion for justice means that many more Palestinian civilians will die. Of course, the Israeli populace is unlikely to see this as a disproportionate response let alone a genocide. They will more likely rationalize the deaths of Palestinian civilians as collateral damage attributable to Hamas. Sigh.

I’m not writing here to defend one side or the other. I am simply observing that the people of the modern world are not so different from the indigenous people of Papua New Guinea – except for the fact that they can commit violence and inflict death and suffering on one another in a way that is more sterile, less accountable, more monstrous, and less justifiable.

I can only wonder what the price of compassion might be. 🙁