The idea of cannibalism has been featured in various social beliefs, mythologies, and historical stories. In the human history, cannibalism had been intermittently practiced as a last resort by people suffering from food crisis. Historically, cannibalism by shipwrecked victims has been phrased as ‘Customs of Sea’ and by war soldiers as ‘Starving Time’. Explorers from various regions brought home many stories of cannibalism during shipwrecked periods and many instances was also recorded during war time when soldiers resorted to cannibalism. However it was sternly condemned in several wars - especially world war-II. But, allegations of cannibalism were used by the colonial powers to justify the habit of primitive populace amongst the tribal segments.
Anthropologists preview, cannibalism as the bounds of human civilization metamorphosis and cultural relativism to define acceptable human behavior. Neanderthals, an ancient human species, now they are extinct are believed to have practiced cannibalism but now it seems they have been eaten by modern humans.
Cannibalism has been noticed in the modern times too. A famous example is the ‘Andes flight disaster’ on October 13, 1972 (crash of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571)- after which some survivors ate the bodies of dead passengers and extended their lives for another 72 days. Also, some mentally ill individuals possess about eating others and actually do so, such as ‘Nithari Kand’ on 2005 – Wherein Surender Koli was seized for murdering and eating human body parts at Moninder’s house in Nithari, NOIDA (India). Some superstitious rituals of practicing cannibalism in the pursuit of immortality and supernatural powers were noticed even in modern age; like Aghoris in India do eat dead human in the belief that eating human flesh confer their spiritual and physical superiority over ordinary human.
A related word, "cannibalize" (derived from “cannibalism”) is metaphorically referred in the business world. It is referred to reuse of salvageable parts in manufacturing settings and the loss of a product's market share to another product from the same company in marketing contexts.
On a serious note, expressing - corporate world practicing politics as office cannibalism will not be hyperbole. Office cannibalism has become customary regime in the so called competitive corporate milieu, where cutthroat strategies are being practiced to stand in the self-centric fixtures. Business owners and business managers always judge the business progress based on statistics available - most of them derive from quantitative assessments and expert judgments (all biased approach).
There are world of differences between human and animals in habit and character adoption. It has been researched that human is very agile in adopting habits context to circumstances however animals might take ages to reform their conducts. Having said this – human value chain is the trigger to philosophy of present office cannibalism in the corporate world, which can’t be ignored to avoid sticking out ones’ neck in the professional endeavor.
Survival is the basic human instinct, be it in physiological world or in corporate world – so continuation of cannibalism in all forms of human saga will exist till human do!
On a lighter note- Isn't office cannibalism to be a required subject in college course? It can be better framed in beautiful titles like "corporate attitude" or "real keys to corporate success" or so on... for effective POS!– Education evangelists to give it a thought!
Submissive Note - Lets not put label of ‘Explorer’ or ‘Soldier’ or ‘Aghori’ on ‘office cannibalism/ politics’ experts in corporate land :)
