Hi Wilf & Ken,

My problem with your answers is the implicit breadth of your concept of what the word "instrumental" means in this context, which seems to be all violent actions north of an epileptic seizure.

Taken to that grand extent, sure, most violence can be defined as purposeful toward an end but when all things are something, then nothing is. Common sense and five minutes observation at a busy intersection in a bad neigborhood at around 11:00 o'clock in the evening will disabuse anyone of the idea that all violence has rational root causes. Sometimes the pretext for violence is a nominal excuse.

Too broad a definition to be useful analytically, in my view. Perhaps WM's suggestion of reframing the debate is more productive