The human condition has always been underpinned by aggressive individualism, usually dormant and constrained by civilisation. Marry that to digital technology, argues Carlo Bordoni, and we reawaken our inner Neanderthal – a violence that emerges in the very online phenomenon of passive aggression. This work is based on Carlo’s new book Ethical Violence published by Polity Press UK.

This piece was originally published in "7", Il Corriere della Sera, 12 January 2024 and was translated by Margherita Volpato.

From physical abuse to verbal abuse and passive aggression, we are constantly surrounded by violence. Violence has always been integral to human evolution, as though inscribed in our DNA, and we depend on it to defend ourselves, overpower others, and to ensure our survival. Perhaps violence is best viewed as a mark of human incompleteness and imperfection. Nietzsche defined man as “the still undetermined animal”, one whose perfection is still in the distant future. The online phenomenon of passive aggression, of seething keyboard warriors using principled opposition to veil their inner violent drives, cast today’s humans as little more than technologized Neanderthals, or pithecanthropus technologicus.