Though these numbers present an implicit call to action, the government is only just taking steps now to address the problems veterans face when they return home. Drawing from history, psychology, and anthropology, bestselling author Sebastian Junger shows us just how at odds the structure of modern society is with our tribal instincts, arguing that the difficulties many veterans face upon returning home from war do not stem entirely from the trauma they’ve suffered, but also from the individualist societies they must reintegrate into.Ī 2011 study by the Canadian Forces and Statistics Canada reveals that 78 percent of military suicides from 1972 to the end of 2006 involved veterans. These are the very same behaviors that typify good soldiering and foster a sense of belonging among troops, whether they’re fighting on the front lines or engaged in non-combat activities away from the action. There are ancient tribal human behaviors-loyalty, inter-reliance, cooperation-that flare up in communities during times of turmoil and suffering. First, war is not exclusively toxic it also ennobles and empowers “ancient human virtues” that can be “utterly intoxicating” to the people who experience them as well as instrumental to the well-being of human societies (77).Sebastian Junger, the bestselling author of War and The Perfect Storm, takes a critical look at post-traumatic stress disorder and the many challenges today’s returning veterans face in modern society. He came to understand these powerful conscious and subconscious experiences in two ways.

The human concern for others would seem to be the one story that, adequately told, no person can fully bear to hear (75-76). It was far too much to acknowledge when I was awake. And yet when I went to sleep, it was like I became part of some larger human experience that was utterly heartbreaking. I wasn’t a soldier-though I’d spent plenty of time with soldiers-and at that point I hadn’t lost any close friends in combat. He would wake up trying to figure out: why feelings that seemed to belong to other people kept spilling out of me. This experience was followed by dreams that were not scary but nonetheless triggered “a catastrophic outpouring of sorrow” (75). He describes having panic attacks when in confined spaces when they passed, he would experience outpourings of emotion at things that would otherwise have been innocuous. Junger opens Chapter 3 with an account of his discovery that he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after returning from covering the war in Afghanistan.

Tribe by Sebastian Junger