What It Means To Surrender

What It Means To Surrender
As suggested by Christopher Bailey

Surrender, from the Old French surrendre: sur (on, over, above, additional, super) + render (make, give, deliver, cause, become, transform, remove). Although for our purposes: sur (super) + render (give). A super-delivery. Whereby you don't just give something to someone, you super-deliver it, you capitulate it, you surrender it.

Surrender has many meanings. It means many things. Most loosely, it is used commonly in a spiritual, religious or motivational capacity. David Robert Ord of the Compassionate Eye suggests that we often feel out of control in life as if decision are made for us or as if we are stuck in our ruts. In this case, so it goes, we have undergone the wrong kind of surrender. We have rendered ourselves powerless. and what holds us back is our own resistance to the right kind of surrendering: whereby you just don't worry about it, you let things go, let go of the worry and stop being anxious about the outcome of our lives. Thus we reach a state of alert stillness. Eckhart Tolle (who wrote The Power of Now) claims this is needed for a clear look at our lives.

Eckhart Tolle
Knows much about surrender. He was depressed and suicidal for much of his young life. Until he reaches the age of 29. At this point he reaches and epiphany and "surrenders" everything he had: both possessions and emotions to live on a park bench in Russell Square, Bloomsbury, London. To get him out of homelessness and poverty he pens The Power of Now (this is in 1997) and three years later it's on the New York Times bestseller list, since making over 100 bestseller lists to this day and has been translated into 34 languages.

So surrender is to stop worrying and give everything up. It cured Eckhart of his depression. But, in many spiritual philosophies, it's also about realising how you're part of the Universe at large. Uma, part of the basicindia Alternative Living Collective, talks about having enough intelligence to realise that because the universe is so big and you such a tiny cog - there's noneed to worry. Instead let your decisions be influenced by the knowledge that you're just part of a big infinity machine.

Finally, in Christian dialectic, many discuss the concept of surrendering to Christ - whereby you attempt to strip away your self, divest yourself of worries, sins, and even personality and let all your decisions be made instinctually, but instinctually by God's word - He being so powerful that He will fill you with this power and guide you.

Eckhart Tolle

War. Nngh.

Of course, most people think of surrender in the military sense. In unconditional surrender - say - there's no guarantees given to the surrendering party except for those provided by international law.

Two of the biggest unconditional surrenders have been in the American Civil War (what's civil about war?) and WW2.

Union vs Confederacy

In the US Civil War, the Confederacy - 11 slave states (that is where slavery was legal) decided to join forces and attempt to seceed from America. They want to keep slavery and thought that the abolistionists - at the time gaining severe political power - would undermine their way of life and prevent them from owning the slaves that they not only needed but also deserved.

Though, it's easy, with hindsight, to look at these people as evil. Slavery was big business back in the day and it's important to bear in mind that, repugnant, oppresive and universally revilled and condemned though it should be - it was a livelihood to many people of the day. Slaveholders earned their bread and butter, put a roof over their heads through it. Many, both directly and indirectly lived off and relied on the slave trade. Surrendering it meant surrendering their homes and wellbeing.

Also, in such an epoch they believed with almost a religious fervour that the subordination of the black people to the superior race of caucasians was the natural and true order of things. It was God's order, God's word to have slaves. And more: it was mutually beneficial, according to the slave owners, to both owner and slave to recognise this natural order. Although, I don't think the slaves ever got a say in the matter.

1861
There's bitter civil war on the horizon. Soon we'll break into four years of fighting. Lincoln comes to presidency and the Confederacy of Slave States told him to shove his country where the sun don't shine. They're leaving the United States and forming their own country. To spark it all off they attacked Fort Sumter. They surround it and prevent all supplies from getting through. They claim that allowing even food and water in would leave them open to attack. Eventually all it took for the confederacy to secure a surrender is to fire shots at the walls and over the top of the fort. Nobody was killed. That is, until a barrel exploded during the surrender ceremony and killed two Union Soldiers.

1862
At the Battle of Fort Donelson, a Confederate Fort, the Union army surround the fort. On the 12th February (a Wednesday - also birthday of Charles Darwin and pornstar Silvia Saint), the Union army attacks. 

 Charles Darwin

Silvia Saint

Ahem. In only four days General Floyd of the Confederacy knew he'd lost. So he lumps the responsibility on General Pillow and escapes across the river. General Pillow has a look around and decides he doesn't like it much either and gave his power to General Buckner and escapes across the river. Lieutenant General Nathan Bedford Forrest is so disgusted at this show of cowardice that he ups sticks and takes off, again over the river, with 700 of his men. He later becomes a the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. 

This left Buckner feeling rather abandoned and sad. So he decides he's the one to start the surrender process. He sends a note to his enemy, General Ulysses S. Grant and asks what their terms of surrender are. Grant and General Smith put their heads together and send a letter back. It reads:

"Sir,

...No terms except unconditional and immediate surrender can be accepted. I propose to move immediately on your works. I am, Sir: very respectfully, your obediant servant,

Ulysses S. Grant

Brigidier General"

One of my favourite letters. Such a good letter, it convinces Buckner and coins the term "unconditional surrender" for all time. U.S. Grant  is promoted to Major General and the newspaper give him the nickname U.S. Grant: Unconditional Surrender Grant. 

World War II

Although Japan eventually offered an unconditional surrender of their own after they were bombed in Nagasaki and Hiroshima - it wasn't always a plan. In fact many of the Allies were a bit dubious about asking for an unconditional surrender. Asking for an unconditional surrender may have extended WW2 and causes more suffering than neccessary. 

Play It Again, Sam

In January 1943, the Allies decided they would only accept an Unconditional Surrender from the Axis at the SYMBOL conference in Casablanca, Morocco. But this creates a problem for the resistance. There are plenty of people in Germany and Nazi-Occupied France and Italy fighting against the fascists, but to what end? Even if they win, the Nazis are overthrown, Hitler and Mussolini killed, in an unconditional surrender they will be as worse off as those they despise - the whole country whether good or bad will be punished, there are no conditions for providing for the "good" guys behind enemy lines, because it is an unconditional surrender. The Nazis capitalised on this, using it in their propaganda and strengthening their cause of fighting to the very last. 

In the end, they did surrender. Mussolini is killed, strung up in the streets and then has his body trampled into the gutter, Hitler talks to his SS doctors and comes up with a plan for him and his fiancee. They marry in the Fuhrerbunker, spent two days hidden away and then simultaneously take cyanide and shoot themselves in the head. Those close to the Fuhrer take the bodies outside, douse them in petrol and set them on fire, eventually burying them in a blast crater. 

The other option is to not surrender and fight until there's no one left to fight. The act of Debellatio (or engaging in a debellation). Usually states surrender before they get to this point, but sometimes (as expressly forbidden by the Geneva Convention and other laws of war) the victor gives what is technically known as No Quarter. Very illegal and morally reprehensible, you slaughter a surrendering party, giving a true unconditional surrender: not even the condition to stay alive. 

Thank goodness that doesn't happen in the modern day. Or does it? In 1958 the United States passed a law forbidding the government to spent any money on researching strategic surrender, whereby surrendering avoids a final battle. Bear that in mind when declaring war on the States, won't you?

If I've ascetic once I've ascetic a thousand times...

There are other forms of surrender too. Asceticism (which means a practice or training) is an abstinence from things in order to prepare for a better life. Just to be clear, ascetics don't do it HAVE a better life, but to prepare for one. They don't consider the practice virtuous in and of itself, but in order to make them ready. Yogi might prepare for enlightenment in this way, or those in monastic life (monks, nuns...) prepare for the afterlife in this way.

Max Weber classified two forms of asceticism. Ausserweltliche - monks and hermits that live in an other world to separate themselves from society. And Innerweltliche - an inner world life - whereby ascetics live in this world and try to make changes for the better of everyone. Jesus Christ, Mahatma Gandhi and St Anthony of the Desert are all mendicants and ascestics to this end.

While we mention St Anthony of the Desert, his life is pretty interesting. He decides to prove himself by striking out into the desert and living as a hermit, but the  pesky devil takes an instant dislike to this goody two-shoes and send images of women and other temptations. Old Tony ignores them all and Satan is sent into such a rage his lays an almighty smack down on the poor bloke, beating him to a pulp in a fistfight. Anthony's friends find him an drag him back home, and patch him up. But not to be deterred, St Ant storms back out further into the desert and holes up in an old Roman fort. Communicating only through a crack in the wall and surviving only on scraps of bread. The Devil tries to flush him out with scary images again, but 'Tone once again resists and Lucifer is finally beaten.

Jubilant, his friends break down the door of the fort and drag him out, expecting him to be wasting away and completely insane - but no, he's fine and St Anthony goes out and starts his own cult. Quite a contender for Dragon's Den. 

The Best 'Til Last

 The final type of surrender I'd like to cover is that of sexual surrender. The D/s (that's Dominant/submissive) lifestyle is not about brutality - although it does involve a lot of hitting people with sticks - but that of a consensual power exchange. In this underworld there are many parallels with how "normal people" (whatever that means) conduct their life. They are built on relationships but also casual encounters, and some making a longer term committment through "collaring" ceremonies, whereby the submissive party recieves a collar and becomes linked to their dominant partner in a form of wedding.

Some people even surrender their humanity in this style of relationship: in Furniphilia, someone enjoys becoming practically an object such as a piece of human-shaped living furniture like a chair or coffee table. 

I am told that the concept of the safe word - much parodied in popular culture - is a much more serious matter than many consider. The use of a safe word is to signify that a dominant party has gone too far without considering the submissive's needs and the relationship has turned into abuse. 

Sado-Cataclysm

This has historical parallels, not only for the Marquis de Sade and Leopold von Sacher Masoch (the roots of Sadism and Masochism in Sado-Masochism) but that of medieval Courtly Love. Whereby a knight would demonstrate his love for his betrothed princess by publically humiliating and flagellating himself, cross dressing, beating himself, putting himself in stocks or a pillary - just to show how much he loves her. Aww. 

Finally, I'd like to finish, as usual with a mention of popular culture. Many songs and albums have been written about the concept of surrender and they include:

ALBUMS by Chemical Brothers, Diana Ross, Delby Boone, Sarah Brightman, Jeff Deyo, Javine, Kut Klose, Moonlighters, Camille Jones, Jane Monheit, Hans Christian 

and

SONGS by Ashlee Simpson, Billy Talent, Cheap Trick, the Electric Light Orchestra, Elvis Presley, Diana Ross, Debbie Harry, Paul Haig, Evanescence, Kasey Chambers, Kut Klose, k.d.lang, Laura Pusini, Perry Como, Roxette, Swing Out Sister, Tom Petty and the Hearbreakers, Trixter, U2, Depeche Mode, Alanis Morisette, the Dropkick Murphys and Rainbow.