The number one cause of death in the world today...

...is the fear of death.

Point to what you will, that is what stands behind it. Fear of death is the root of all insecurity, and insecurity is what makes men kill.

Denial

Even self-destructive acts stem from it. The Great Nameless Fear wears many masks. One of these is Denial. People simply will not allow awareness of their mortality to come out into the light. Therefore, behaving as if there were no consequences to their actions, they drive like fools, eat like pigs, and foul their environment. The other side of the coin is Despair. Death is so overwhelming that life seems not to be worth the effort.

Projection

One of the most frequently used tools of Denial is Projection. It is much easier to handle a lot of smaller fears. I am not trying to say here that persons with severe phobic conditions are merely guilty of transferring fear to certain objects or environments. However, it is certain that the everyday squeamishness of "normal" folk about spiders-snakes-bugs-slime-icky serves well to distract their (shallow) minds from darker and deeper things.

A mouse (rodent, not computer) is much "safer" to fear, and more socially acceptable. Yet if you look behind the mask, there's Death again. The victims of projection all have some association with death. There are poisonous spiders and snakes. Mice and rats may carry deadly diseases. But no one kills a harmless garter snake in self-defense.

Religion

A much more serious problem is that which I call "security-blanket religion". When the Great Fear wears the mask of God, it may be deadly indeed. Religions give people a sense of community and security. Nothing wrong with that in itself. But too often the security is bound to poorly understood dogma. Anything that seems to contradict that dogma, then, is striking at the very life of the believer. His God is whatever he clings to in order to maintain his belief in his own immortality, and he will kill to defend it.

Greed

Why do men want so much more than they need, and accumulate vast wealth that gives them no more enjoyment than a small garden might? They are building walls against that which knows no barriers.

Patriotism

This hideous creature is the offspring of Greed and Religion. It usually involves Projection as a form of mass hysteria. Its blindness is near total. Terrorism is its twin brother.