title: The development of the norm against the use of poison: what literature tells us.
abstract: The use of chemical and biological weapons on the battlefield is considered by most commentators--and by international law--as more abhorrent than the use of nearly all other weapons, including ones meant either to kill secretly or to kill terribly, as do fire or burial alive. I ask why this is so. I explore this question through the study of imagery patterns in Western literature and campaigns against food contamination and environmental pollution. I find that the norm against chemical and biological weapons builds upon a taboo against poisons, a prohibition widely accepted in military manuals as distinguishing soldierly conduct from criminal conduct, especially those forms of conduct made criminal by the employment of treachery, invisibility, and transformation.
authors.affiliation: Fitchburg State College, 160 Pearl Street, Fitchburg, Massachussetts 01420-2697, USA. jevcm@comcast.net
authors.forename: John Ellis van Courtland
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Moon
mesh_terms: D054045:Biological Warfare Agents; D002619:Chemical Warfare Agents; D004787:Environmental Pollution; D006801:Humans; D008091:Literature; D011042:Poisons; D011057:Politics; D014857:Warfare
chemical_list: D054045:Biological Warfare Agents; D002619:Chemical Warfare Agents; D011042:Poisons