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Fascist Scenario

Bucklecroft Rudy

Bucklecroft Rudy

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If the average person born in Germany during WWII had the choice between cooperation or resistance which option do you think they would go for.Lets assume they have insight into the evil of the Nazi regime and the consequences of their actions. I see so many morally outraged folk around and find it quite ironic. I believe quite a few would rather death before dishonour but many would knuckle down and avert their eyes
 
You might find the Milgram Experiment is worth a look at. It's disturbingly insightful. It measured the willingness of random people, practically pulled off the street to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that conflicted with their personal conscience. Most of them were willing to administer potentially lethal electric shocks to other participants simply because they were told to. And they weren't even pressured into it any more than a man in a lab coat telling them to do it.

Imagine how many more people would do the same if they felt their lives were at stake if they didn't. Thus you have perfectly pleasant people performing horrific acts during the holocaust.


It will always be a minority who are able to say no.
 
^I just watched a documentary about that. It is quite disturbing how many people initially said that they couldn't continue after the subject wanted to stop, but after a little persuading from the person conducting the experiment, continued on.

There's really no need for hypothetical "what ifs", all you have to do is look at the historical data. AFAIK it was no secret that the jews were being openly persecuted, they were singled out and were disappearing from their neighborhoods. The German population almost had to have some sort of idea about what was going on, but if it wasn't happening to them it wasn't happening I suppose.
 
i think we are faced with less extreme, but similar problems, in our world today. for example there was a thread here recently putting forward the idea that all life deserves as much respect as human life, in which case any meat eater is committing as bad atrocities. we all know that what we buy every day is at the expense of others, and we have very little option but to consent, with our money rather than our lives, to this treatment. i don't know how a sweatshop compares to a concentration camp and its not as bad, but i think its a comparable situation: people are, basically by birth, forced into a life of servitude, deprived of basic freedoms and dignity, and few people either find truly ethical alternatives or choose to go without rather than support that treatment.

sorry, rant over. have unfortunately recently learned just how little we know about how little respect there is for human rights in regimes we barely even hear about as being bad, and it makes you think.

as for me: dishonour before death. just being realistic. even whilst painfully aware of the inequalities i support, i choose the easy path.
 
loulou reed said:
Ah la merde fasciste. Ça sent la merde fraîche.
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Actually the french are a good example. Francewas Nazi occupied during WWII and much of the population collaborated ie Vichy French gov et al but others resisted or did so privately. There were 2 massive "cells" communist and De Gaulle resistors both of which recruited from the population.
 
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For an initial decision I will always choose the more dominant side. After observing first hand of their morals, I'd then make a more confident and worthwhile decision to stay or rebel with a more developed perspective.

Had the consequences been too dire, I would surely save myself before another of no relation. Life sucks sometimes.
 
Sad that this thread has died without more discussion. One thing ive realised though is that our fascist scenario isnt simply a hypothetical scenario - were living it today albeit in a less obvious fashion. The western world's prosperity is made at the expense of the third world. 70-80 percent of global wealth is in the hands of 1-2 percent of the population. Craven greed man. Our economy has poverty and misery hardwired into it. But weve become pretty fat and lazy, glutted as we are on our creature comforts that we wont do anything.
The government has us wound round its fingers in this respect. The ultimate population control is to have a population so dependent on its politicians and the administration to survive on a day to day basis that we'll put up with anything just to keep our HD tv sets and keep our cars in gas. Im the same and 99 percent of folk are the same. Still doesn't make it right.
 
Bucklecroft Rudy said:
If the average person born in Germany during WWII had the choice between cooperation or resistance which option do you think they would go for.Lets assume they have insight into the evil of the Nazi regime and the consequences of their actions. I see so many morally outraged folk around and find it quite ironic. I believe quite a few would rather death before dishonour but many would knuckle down and avert their eyes
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you should read hitler's willing executioners.

i'm no academic or expert in this area but the author makes a compelling case that, not only did the holocaust happen but that it required the cooperation of the german population on a very large scale.

alasdair
 
The stanford experiment is legend - reminds me of the wave, the german film which follows a school military movement experiment . It all points to the freudian model of human behaviour - that there are repressed bestial desires in the human psyche that are expressed during periods of stress. Its ultimately quite pessimistic since it brings up the whole original sin debate. Whether
 
You seem to like alluding to tales biblical Bucklecroft Rudy.

Original sin I think is pretty interesting, I used to dismiss it as rubbish, but now I have a different take on it which involved defintion of the word sin.

Could you define the original meaning of the word sin for me please ?
 
I've rediscovered christianity recently haha I used to be a pretty pious christian but left the fold. Im starting to see the wisdom in much of its teachings though i'll never call myself a christian.
Synn was O.E and it originally meant an offense against god/the gods. By that definition i'd say that if the gods in question were tyrannical or despotic that any offense against them wouldn't be an offense at all. Perhaps original sin is just code for human's intrinsic need to govern themselves and not be dictated to by a god. The concept was also pretty useful for the church which was as much a business as a spiritual institution. The church was in the business of saving souls so what did they do? Convince everyone that from birth their soul was in jeopardy and would be so until death - original sin.

Even governments stood to benefit from the concept (church and state used to be one and the same) since the church was a means of control. There was a BBC documentary posted up onn you tube - century of the self which looked at the way in which Freudian ideas/original sin had been used in advertising to manipulate people by appealing to base desire and how the propoganda moguls invested time in freudian research to accomplish this. Freud may not have been a theist but the whole repressed violence routine is very biblical.
 
The translation from the Greek word hamartia means "to miss the target" or "miss the mark" and is equated with sin.
It's posssible perhaps likely that this is the correct meaning or as near to it as Greek vocabulary could interpret a (presumably) oral tradition.
So if it is "to miss the mark" how would we translate that into English - "to make a mistake" seems to me a reasonable interpretation.
If I've "missed the mark" or if you feel I may have hit it I'd be interested to hear opinions - if it's a hit then it opens up the idea of original sin being "transmitted" quite logically.

Aside from that religions in general I think are fascinating, people often dismiss religion yet most religions have adherents that would fight for them much more fanatically than they would for your average corporeal king. As far as History goes one can learn much about the workings of humanity through reading about religions.
The use or rather misuse of religion by establishments is long and gloomy story, many people seem to wish that religion would go away or be banned because of that. I suppose that like technology religions can be used for ostensibly good or bad purposes.


Lets assume they have insight into the evil of the Nazi regime and the consequences of their actions.
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Sadly I believe most people would avert their eyes and would appease themselves with the belief that what was happening whilst unfortunate was ethically correct. I see a scenario where this could lead to a frenzy of destruction driven by a desire to get it over and done with as it's unlikely to sit easily with most people.
It's possible that if another act of widespread genocide does take place it will be carried out by biotechnological means in the form of man made disease. Obviously this would make it easier to placate your lily livered liberal thinkers.
What would I do personally ? I hope I never have to find out because I'm afraid I would not act according to conscience but in my own self interest. It's strange but somehow for me killing people in warfare seems much more palatable than simply slaughtering the defenceless.
 
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You are right. We delude ourselves today. I know and most people in their heart of hearts know that the state parts of africa are in today has alot to do with the corruption of the west. Slavery followed by exploitation at the hands of despots and tycoons has systematically destroyed many parts of africa. Few people knew that for a quarter of a century Congo was embroiled in a bloody war which was spin off from the Rwandan genocide. The reason for this is that there was very little news coverage and only a very modest UN peacekeeping force was stationed there. They were undermanned undergunned and werent even strategically placed. They were there to simply appease the conscience of the liberals as you say.
Compare with Iraq and Iran and Libya where the US were quick to jump to their aid. Its easy to blame africa's problems on its people and that is the attitude of most folk. Not overt of course but many people dont hold out much hope for Africas salvation. However ive written extensive reports on the subject so I know what im talking about when I say that Africa reeks of sabotage. Its resources are being tapped free of charge and its people provide dirt cheap labour.

We stand by and allow these things to occur. We see police brutality on our tv's and do nothing. We hear of wars and famines and genocides and are content to stare at the train wreck.Its quite scary how much humanity weve lost - its become common place. I dont think ive ever seen anyone shed genuine tears when they watch the news and hear and see the tragedies played out there- weve been desensitised by constant exposure and were at the point where to care would be to lose one's mind since there is so much depravity and sickness in the world - does that make our attitude right?
 
I'm not sure we have lost our humanity, so far as I can see acts of horrendous violence cruelty and oppression have been perpetrated by humans since written history began. I caught a snippet of a tv programme about Congo - Belgian Congo going back the best part of 100 years ago or so I'm not sure of the exact date. The locals were eslaved to work rubber plantations/exploit natural resources. If the blacks didn't work hard enough they were incentivised by the colonists by amputating the limbs of their wives & children. They had photographs of these amputees & said it was estimated several millions of people were affected by this tactic. How accurate their figures are I don't know but it may shed some light upon how the tribes in that area are capable of the acts of violent cruelty which so shocked the world during the Rwandan civil war.
Our peaceful & well ordered lives are a luxury afforded few people on the planet. This peace & order comes through wealth a sizeable proportion of this wealth is & was created by exploitation. However it has always been this way so we haven't lost our humanity, more like we're still failing to outgrow it.
 
Bucklecroft Rudy said:
Its quite scary how much humanity weve lost - its become common place. I dont think ive ever seen anyone shed genuine tears when they watch the news and hear and see the tragedies played out there
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i think its the other way around, people have never being so humane
they didnt watch tv back in the days but you could go to the coliseum see people getting tortured all day and people would ask for more
slavery has gone down, human rights have gone up
people didnt care to fight for others right like they do now
it aint because we learn to desensitize ourself from whats on tv that people are completely desensitize to whats happening in the street
if there is discrimination in front of you people do react against it
people are more and more conscious of the idea that if you dont stand up for others they wont stand up for you

how many people would have "made a donation" back in the days ? no one, the concept made no sense, people didn't have enough to make a donation

the usa landed 2 atomic bomb on japan and no one seemed to care if most victim were civilian and now a day there is war in the middle east and most people are really outraged when they ear about civilian casualties

things have changed for the better, its evolution, we become more and more peace centered because there is less and less of a impression that there isnt enough for everyone
there is enough for everyone and everyone could win, we could all work together and people are getting more and more conscious of that
 
Yeh I think in many ways you are both spot on. Im far too misanthropic and jaded. My personal experience of people is by and large negative. People arent better or worse. All the research thats been done shows that we're just as barbaric as we were back in the days of the Colosseum. Human nature doesnt change but superficially it does. We have become repressed i'd say. Our instincts and inner neuroses have been pushed to the backs of our mind - but it takes very little to make it emerge.

We are far more enlightened but when any physical privation strikes we most often revert to type. Think of the desperate broke long time junky and what he'll do for a fix. The problem we have is that we refer to humanity as one entity when its really not. On average most people on the street are morally neutral, capable of great good and great evil. I think that your average man could commit terrible acts in a heartbeat with the right circumstances.

Im not sure that the fact that we no longer have the collosseum or that we donate to charity really means too much. Most of us object morally to certain things, but its a surface outrage. Most people do nothing with their objection because in reality they care very very little. Apathy is the evil of this generation. What happened with Roman Polanski was a fine example of how our moral outrage means jack shit. Paedophillia and rape are 2 of the worst crimes a man can committ. Polanski drugged and raped a teenage girl and was supported by millions . Any other man would have been pilloried and publicly abused. If our revulsion for paedophillia was genuine and not just our reacting to popular opinion Polanski would be a ruined man now.
 
well 2000 year of human evolution isnt much and things could all go back to where we started from if something bad would happen
its like how over here people dont use plastic bag anymore to do groceries, if you do you like someone whos doing something wrong, most people really dont care about the ecology part of it, they just follow everybody else like sheep
and scenario like what happen in germany still could happen and still does happen to some lesser extend but as we evolve its always less likely to happen specially in the days of the internet where our lives stays on forever on the internet, "pics or it didnt happen" we do take pics, we do take videos, and write things down and all of that stays on and can stay on forever
so people becomes a lot more conscious about what they are doing because there is more possible repercussion in the long run, people need to think ahead more than they use to, and they need to think on a broader level because what might be right in some context wont be right in another context and on the internet you deal with different people with different values from different culture, age group, religion, sexual preference....
and internet isnt only on the internet, its in the street, everybody has its smartphone twitting and taking pics and video and all that
we end up with lots of video of police brutality but it aint because there is more police brutality its simply that we now hear about stuff we would never have heard before

and that doesnt change some parts of ourself, people not doing things because they get scared of repercussion isnt the same as people become better human being more able of understanding and compassion
most people are still easily brought into hypnosis and can revert back to doing absolutely horrible acts
but as a whole we are slowly moving away from that
 
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