The Unconscious Impulse to “Eat Babies Alive”: What Does It Mean?
Why do we say that and why doesn’t it freak us out?
Cannibals don’t eat people because they’re hungry.
Now yes, this happens when a flight of Brazilian soccer players goes down in the mountains of Medellín, but that isn’t the type of human consumption we’re talking about here, literally or symbolically.
We use the language of consumption quite commonly without thinking twice. A person can be consumed by their work or consumed by jealousy. Sitting at dinner with some friends, they remarked how weird it was that people talk about wanting to “eat up the cutest little chubby babies.” Sure, when you take it literally and step back trying to figure out why people say that, of course it would be weird to literally eat a toddler.
But that is not what anyone really means, and we all somehow know that. There is no epidemic of people killing and eating infants.
“Conscious realization is ‘acted out’ in the elementary scheme of nutritive assimilation, and the ritual act of concrete eating is the first form of assimilation known to man.” — Erich Neumann, The Origin and History of Consciousness
We’ve all been “hangry” at some point in our lives and have experienced the complete transformation of our personalities when satisfying that hunger. The consumption of food becomes a transformative process.
“The assimilation and ingestion of the ‘content,’ the eaten food, produces an inner change. Transformation of the body cells through food intake is the most elementary of animal changes experienced by man. How a weary, enfeebled, and famished man can turn into an alert, strong, and satisfied being, or a man perishing of thirst can be refreshed or even transformed by an intoxicating drink: this is, and must remain, a fundamental experience so long as man shall exist.” — Erich Neumann, The Origin and History of Consciousness
Now imagine being an ancient human. You can neither read nor write. Your consciousness is barely if at all developed. You have little ability for introspection and when you do, it is fleeting, as if you are awake and occasionally realize you exist. It takes a lot of effort and energy to maintain that ability, and it slips away as you are barely able to maintain it in contest with survival instincts.
However, there is a direct correlation between consuming food and drink and that ability to achieve and maintain consciousness. Food and drink consumption transforms you in the most fundamental way possible and that pattern creates a mental link between consumption and transformation. Hundreds and thousands of years of these patterns become engrained in our unconscious minds and are then expressed as soon as we have the language to do so.
Eating (consumption) becomes a transformative process that assimilates the characteristics of that which we consume into ourselves, transforming our very nature with each session of consumption. And this, if we’re lucky enough to have the resources, happens not only every day but several times a day.
From food all creatures are produced,
All creatures that dwell on earth.
By food they live
And into food they finally pass.
Food is the chief among beings,
Therefore they call it panacea.
Verily he obtains all food
Who worships Brahma as food.
For food is the chief among beings,
Therefore they call it panacea.
All creatures are born of food,
By food they continue to grow.
Creatures feed on it, it upon creatures,
Therefore is it called food.Brahma arises through tapas.
From Brahma comes food,
From food-breath, spirit, truth,
Worlds, and in works, immortality.
- Mundaka Upanishad 1.1.8
Ancient instincts are modern instincts. These all live in our unconscious minds and we use language to express and explain these instinctual drives which bounce back and forth over the line of the literal and figurative. Cannibalism comes not from a lack of food, but from the drive to consume the spirit and power of humanity in a literal and figurative sense. We say we want to “eat you alive” when confronted with the fundamental potential of human life — when faced with that which is the most powerful.
Yes, I know, you are a totally enlightened human that only gathers facts and information from the world you experience and everything you think, say and do is a consequence of your conscious mind. But none of that is true.
I think that’s why in our modern, secular, and literate world, so many people have trouble with a concept like this. But we’re still mostly controlled by those ancient instincts which manifest themselves as drives and are expressed in our everyday language, if you’re willing to pay attention.
No, nobody wants to literally eat infants and toddlers. But we do instinctually recognize their potential for humanity which is the fundamental strength of humanity. Making that force a part of ourselves is symbolically done through the act of consumption.
Instead of taking it literally and being pseudo-freaked out, it should be taken as evidence for the beauty we instinctually recognize when confronted with the glorious potential of human life.
So nibble a little bit. It’s totally natural.