Has anyone else read Mein Kampf?

[Pierre Menard]

Actually it does hold up. If you equate taunting and bullying to hate speech and murder then sure, the average person is evil. Not a whole lot of people commit acts of "indiscriminate violence" and go out of their ways to cause others "pain and suffering." Common sense excludes bar fights and petty insults from any definition of evil.

And you think its a "quality post" in which someone asks us to view Hitler as a "victim?" I'm already on my soap box, been up on it since this thread began, so I'll just continue in the same vein....

WHAT!? What is there to possibly be gained by viewing as a victim a man who wiped off the face of this earth millions upon millions of innocent souls? This is pansy-assed political correctness grown to horrendously abominable proportions. Yes, its all well and good to recognize our own capacity for evil. But to label the greatest tyrant and murderer in perhaps all human history a "victim" is just ridiculous and insulting to the memory of his victims, all six million plus of them.

I didn't equate murder and bullying directly, but those definitions you provided create a huge umbrella. It more goes to show the inability to find a proper concrete definition of 'evil'.

I don't think Hitler is a victim, and I don't necessarily agree with everything Alex said, but I feel understanding the history of such a person, what made them tick, can go along way to telling us why and how such atrocities occur. Saying 'because they're evil' doesn't actually get to the heart of 'why?'.


As for 'political correctness', you're talking to the wrong guy. I'm not arguing from a politically correct bent, I'm arguing more from my belief in the subjective nature of morality and the lack of an objective definition of 'evil'.
I think Hitler was 'evil' per se, on a purely personal level, but I certainly don't think my definition of evil is 'objective'.

[JuniperWoolf]

I think the word 'functioning' seems to indicate there is no objective definition of evil though.

Exactly. It's too vague. We need an operational definition just for the purposes of this thread. If "it" is not to be tolerated and can be punished with death and torture, then what is it? Destructive behaviour on a massive scale, but how massive?

Personally, I don't like the word. It doesn't tell me anything about motivation for, or prevention of, gross acts. It seems like just... emotion. An emotional response to injustice. That's understandable, but we shouldn't make decisions based only on emotion, and the law can't, ever. Wrath without logic is dangerous.

[kiki1982]

And you think its a "quality post" in which someone asks us to view Hitler as a "victim?" I'm already on my soap box, been up on it since this thread began, so I'll just continue in the same vein...

On that soap box you are no better than the people you are labelling evil. Alexander never said Hitler was a victim, he said he was a seemingly normal man and product of his time. You could say Himmler had an inferiority complex, Goebbels also went that way, but in slightly different terms. Himmler wanted power, Goebbels an inspiration. Sadly he found it in Hitler, although their initial road did not go over roses. Had he never come in contact with the NSDAP, been in another country, he would no doubt have faded in history or become a shining politician. Who will say?

WHAT!? What is there to possibly be gained by viewing as a victim a man who wiped off the face of this earth millions upon millions of innocent souls? This is pansy-assed political correctness grown to horrendously abominable proportions. Yes, its all well and good to recognize our own capacity for evil. But to label the greatest tyrant and murderer in perhaps all human history a "victim" is just ridiculous and insulting to the memory of his victims, all six million plus of them.

Again, we are not trying to view him or anyone else as a victim, but as a question. A mourning process goes through several stages: shock, denial, (bargaining,) guilt, anger, depression, resignation and acceptance. We have had all the shock, denial, bargaining in a certain way (we should never forget, that way we are somehow offering something in return for it), guilt, anger. But we have had no resignation nor acceptance. We keep on repeating that it happened, that it should never happen again, and as such, as I said, trying to compensate for those six million. Even the Jewish population has had the guilt phase (Eli Wiesel). Yet, in order to give this a place and learn from it or at least do something constructive with it, we should resign ourselves and accept that they were human and a deadly cocktail, brought together by circumstances with lethal effects.
It will make us understand how things like this happen and it will help us prevent other things like this for which we have been blind up till now.

Why pick on homosexuals? By your definition pedophiles are just like heterosexuals too. I specifically said its wrong for pedophiles to have sex with children, not for them to experience the actual urges and not act on them.

I was not picking on homosexuals. Why is that picking? Surely you cannot deny that heterosexuality is the 'default' sexuality in our society. But, ok, then call pedophiles the same as heterosexuals. If you prefer that, that's fine by me.
However, urges like that, inevitably lead to action. You try to keep away from one you are madly in love with. I wish you a lot of luck.

It is still your contention that Hitler cannot be condemned as evil. I don't see how that position can have any solid basis and you've yet to demonstrate that it has.

If you had continued reading that article on wikipedia about evil, you would have come by the idea of 'the relativity of evil' which stated the genocides in the Third Reich and Rwanda/Burundi as examples of this relativity because they were not considered evil by the people who carried them out.

Words words words. Sounds good, means nothing. Do you truly and honestly see yourself mirrored in Hitler? Or in Pol Pot or in Stalin? Or for that matter in Jesus or Gandhi or Martin Luther King? The fact is that all these people are exceptional, and beyond a few uninteresting and unimportant things common to all human beings, they are nothing like you or me. That's why everyone knows their name, but has never heard of you or me.

This only shows that evil people can spring up in any society, even the most peaceful. Let's not put the blame on German society for creating a Hitler. He was not a product of his times. He was an evil genius who was able to see opportunities, manipulate and take advantage of the conditions of his society to seize power and carry out his own agenda with a cleverness and cunning that is beyond the comprehension of most human beings.

That does not make sense. Stalin is much more Russian than you would dare to imagine. Putin himself let the survivors in the Kursk submarine die depsite knowing they were still alive down there and paid their families money because he wanted to suppres a diplomatic scandal that the USA had accidentally torpedoed their submarine when it was doing a demonstration for China (I believe). The Russians do not know really what democracy is and condone the strong man in Putin. There seems to be coming some hesitating improvement in this psyche, but it is going to take a long time. Notwithstanding their great culture, they have not hesitated to kill in order to preserve their status. My husband spent 6 months on the streets in Moscow and met numerous people there. He calls them 'ruthless with a passion'.

Hitler took on board the ideas of his time or are you denying it? His great merit was that he had great oratory talent and it was also his great danger. In that, he is no more than a twisted man with a talent. Put him in the wrong company and there you go, put him in the right company and you come away with a good genius.

I agree that it probably doesn't help to call Hitler and his cohorts evil when everyone knows that already. I just don't understand how calling him "not evil" is going to help. Won't it be worse for German people if we were to say "Hey guys, it wasn't Hitler's fault. He wasn't evil. He was just a regular guy like you or me, who was conditioned by the society he grew up in. It was your evil society that made him do bad things"?

You think German society was independent from the rest of Western Europe? It is the very French who bear a big brunt for the shatters Germany was in and so for the ensuing war. Had they not been so despicably 19th century about everyting, Germany would not have ended up frustrated and angry and nothing much would have happened. Had the rest not appeased and appeased and appeased, nothing much would have happened. Had the academic world not have been obsessed with genetics and race, nothing would have happened. Had the Weimar Republik been a little bit more than decoration, nothing much would have happened.

There is no confusion here. All you are doing is regurgitating the mantra: "There are no bad people, only bad decisions and bad actions."

Regurgitating the other mantra is one-sided.

It's a bit rich to call someone "evil" who is responsible for the systematic genocide of 6 million Jews, God knows how many homosexuals, physically and mentally handicapped, mentally ill, and any number of other individuals who were deemed "inferior" and "less than human"? It's a bit rich to suggest that an individual responsible for a war that ravaged nearly the whole of Europe, killed untold millions, and resulted in the Götterdämmerung... the devastation and ruin of his own nation just might be considered "evil" is rich thinking on my part? I would suggest that your continued attempts to justify and validate the actions of Hitler and the Nazis call your own intentions and beliefs into question.

I am not justifying anything here, nor have I ever said they were not responsible, nor that their actions were not evil, that is a big misconception of what I wrote. The only thing I have been trying to say but which a few do not wish to contemplate (note most of them do not come from Europe) is that this was not the idea of one man, but of all of them together. Kristallnacht, set up by Goebbels, plaid a big part in the end of foreign appeasement policy and in blatant persecution of Jews. At the moment they were fighting on two fronts and the war was lost, what should they have done, pray? Bearing in mind that he did not want to be made a spectacle of like Musolini after his death (which was quite despicable). Bearing in mind he was afraid (like all others in Berlin) of the Russians and bearing in mind he was in denial? What should he have done, pray? Should he have run to the Russian lines and offered himself?
As with the start of the persecution process of Jews, it was inevitable that they would all be (attempted to be) killed, it was inevitable that a war, if it was lost, was going to end in total annihilation. The Third Reich was too firmly established and too deluded to ever be able to return from it without annihilation.
As this thing was no-one's and everyone's intention at the same time (the German population and the rest of the world decided to turn away from any concern, Hitler and all his officials together decided to take fully on board every bit of ideology), none of them cannot be called evil as that would mean the German population itself was evil at the same time which it is clearly not.

Yes... of course. Those responsible for sadistically killing innocent women and children and the mentally and physically handicapped should never have been so ill treated. They should have instead been treated to an all expense paid vacation to the south of France, and while there we might have suggested that they think about participating in some group therapy. After a few sessions they undoubtedly would have been fully fit to re-enter polite society.

I never said they should not go to prison for it. If you consider killing people evil, then what does that make a state which kills people because they have killed others? Fair?

What you miss is that the goal of execution is multifold: it is to provide some sense of justice or retribution and closure for the victims; it is to act as a warning to others; and it is a means of eradicating such evil persons from society. The notion that by taking such vengeance we become no different than our enemy is but one more weak-minded platitude. The difference between the Nazis and those who executed them is that the Nazis actions were undeniably "evil"... the killing of innocent human beings. This is the point you repeatedly ignore.

A victim does not get closure by killing his enemy or his dead relative's killer, a victim gets closure by accepting the issue. That is what Europe has since long understood. I do not suppose that any person who has faced his relative or friend's killer in the assisen court and has seen him put in prison for 25 years or lifelong sentence has not obtained closure. Revenge is a savage thing. Dumas already knew that.
I am not ignoring the point that they killed millions (it would be very hard indeed), yet I do not wish to call the people who thought about it evil, but only their actions. That is the point you ignore.

And yet how deep is the "stain" on Germany? How profoundly have they been brought low by history? Germany is now one of the most powerful nations in Europe... probably the most powerful in economic terms. German culture is still among the most influential in the world: German composers account for more of the music performed by symphonic orchestras than those of any other country. German literature is broadly studied at the universities, while Kafka, Mann, Hesse, Grass, and Rilke remain among the most read writers in the world. German film-makers had a profound impact upon American film industry... and especially the film noir... an influence that continues to be felt. German painting has only grown in influence until painters such as Paul Klee and Max Beckmann are seen as standing shoulder to shoulder with Matisse and Picasso, while perhaps the greatest (certainly the highest paid) living painter, Anselm Kiefer, is a German artist who has repeatedly confronted Germnay's history and the Holocaust. Most intelligent human beings recognize that Germany is more than Nazis just as japan is more than Pearl Harbor and the Batan Death March.

Oh, I know all that, but I was talking of the general German fear of being proud of their nation, artists, or anything to do with themselves. Of course most intelligent people recognise that, but Germans are afraid to try how far they can go. They never speak out against a country as the first out of fear they will be reminded.

Part of it might be that Stalin was our (most of us) ally. But then Russia became the villain, so you'd think Stalin would have been demonized as much as Hitler in the years since world war 2. I think just the sheer ugliness and inhumanity of the gas chamber presents so grotesque a thing that many of us feel greater outrage over the crimes of Hitler than those of Stalin.

I mean we fought Hitler, my grandfather and three of my great uncles actually fought him and his armies. It makes sense his infamy would exceed that of Stalin's, however unfair that is.

Meh, probably that is because Stalin never 'invaded' anything per se. Before anyone starts about Hungary and Czechslovakia, yes their tanks rolled into Budapest and Prague, but frankly that was no surprise. All those Warsaw Pact countries were satellite governments anyway. And Afghanistan, well, no-one really cared about that. The difference with Hitler is that he did not keep himself to himself.

[Drkshadow03]

Agreed. I think the word 'functioning' seems to indicate there is no objective definition of evil though, especially when a tiny amount of people on an internet forum can't even decide. :P

Oh, I don't know. It seems to me Darcy offered one already:

evil is commonly associated with conscious and deliberate wrongdoing, discrimination designed to harm others, humiliation of people designed to diminish their psychological well-being and dignity, destructiveness, motives of causing "unnecessary" pain or suffering and acts of unnecessary or indiscriminate violence.

I dunno, Darcy, those parts in bold can accurately describe many, many day to day common people...I'm not really sure if the definition holds up.

You do realize simply pointing out his definition could describe many everyday people is not an actual rebuttal.

[Pierre Menard]

Oh, I don't know. It seems to me Darcy offered one already:

evil is commonly associated with conscious and deliberate wrongdoing, discrimination designed to harm others, humiliation of people designed to diminish their psychological well-being and dignity, destructiveness, motives of causing "unnecessary" pain or suffering and acts of unnecessary or indiscriminate violence.

Wikipedia's definition of evil is an objective definition of evil? What? I mean, the very same paragraph on wikipedia also mentions the words 'definitions vary' and 'commonly accepted'. I mean, that's hardly objective, even if we were just using wikipedia.

You do realize simply pointing out his definition could describe many everyday people is not an actual rebuttal.

No, maybe not. But it seems that 'evil' has been used to describe a particular, specific sort of person by some people on this thread...I mean, if it applies to many everyday people, then that again casts doubt on the definition of what 'evil' it is.

[Drkshadow03]

Wikipedia's definition of evil is an objective definition of evil? What? I mean, the very same paragraph on wikipedia also mentions the words 'definitions vary' and 'commonly accepted'. I mean, that's hardly objective, even if we were just using wikipedia.

It might not be an absolutely objective definition, but it certainly works as a "functioning" one. Also, just because there are varying definitions of evil doesn't mean that we can't select one that we deem to be the most objective.

There are tons of variant definitions for complex social phenomenon like "religion" or even "racism." Does that mean we can never discuss them in a conversation because no one will ever agree on the exact definition?

No, maybe not. But it seems that 'evil' has been used to describe a particular, specific sort of person by some people on this thread...I mean, if it applies to many everyday people, then that again casts doubt on the definition of what 'evil' it is.

Or it could just mean that evil is more common than we give credit.

[Alexander III]

Or it could just mean that evil is more common than we give credit.

This is what we have been saying the whole time, but the otherside is positing the view of Hitler as beyond the average human, as not human, as if he were truley very different from us, isntead of being simillar and just having more power at his disposition than most of us could dream of. Just because various men achieve various degrees of succes in making their dreams come true, does not mean that their dreams do not burn with the same level of passion and desire.

[Pierre Menard]

It might not be an absolutely objective definition, but it certainly works as a "functioning" one. Also, just because there are varying definitions of evil doesn't mean that we can't select one that we deem to be the most objective.

There are tons of variant definitions for complex social phenomenon like "religion" or even "racism." Does that mean we can never discuss them in a conversation because no one will ever agree on the exact definition?

Sure, I'm not saying we can't find a 'functioning' one, or that we can't discuss the topic, I mean, we're discussing it right now, my posts were more about the objective nature of a definition, and the fact that we have to rely on a 'functioning' one, or, a subjective one, rather than an objective one.

Or it could just mean that evil is more common than we give credit.

Which gives a bit of credence to what Alex, Juniper and the like have been saying to some degree. It's something that fascinates me to be honest; the idea of how cruel or what lengths we are all capable of in the 'right' circumstances.

[Darcy88]

I didn't equate murder and bullying directly, but those definitions you provided create a huge umbrella. It more goes to show the inability to find a proper concrete definition of 'evil'.

I don't think Hitler is a victim, and I don't necessarily agree with everything Alex said, but I feel understanding the history of such a person, what made them tick, can go along way to telling us why and how such atrocities occur. Saying 'because they're evil' doesn't actually get to the heart of 'why?'.


As for 'political correctness', you're talking to the wrong guy. I'm not arguing from a politically correct bent, I'm arguing more from my belief in the subjective nature of morality and the lack of an objective definition of 'evil'.
I think Hitler was 'evil' per se, on a purely personal level, but I certainly don't think my definition of evil is 'objective'.

Evil is objective. Any mentally well individual is going to have the same conception of evil as every other mentally well individual. You go back to ancient Rome and yeah, the morals were different. But they were not entirely different. Cruelty was still cruelty, compassion was still compassion, and these things were as chided or as commended as they are today.

The definition of evil from wikipedia which I posted is not that bad. Deliberately causing others suffering or harm in a severe and significant manner works pretty well. You just exclude the petty manifestations of cruelty that many of us experience and perform.

[stlukesguild]

One frightening thing about Hitler was that he probably wasn't a sociopath.

A Sociopath or Psychopath (the preferred term) is an individual who may be characterized by a pervasive pattern of disregard for, or violation of, the rights of others. Their behavior often includes a lack of empathy or remorse, false emotions, selfishness, grandiosity or deceptiveness. Other behaviors include superficiality; Ego-centrism and grandiosity; Lack of remorse or guilt; Lack of empathy; Deceitfulness and argumentativeness; Impulsive; Poor behavior controls; Lack of responsibility. The individual lacks the very qualities that allow a human being to live in social harmony" Some psychologists and sociologists in the eraly 20th century defined such individuals as "morally retarded", "moral imbeciles" or "morally insane".

This would seem to be a perfect description of Adolf Hitler.

[Darcy88]

He sent out young child soldiers to fight with inadequate arms the rampaging Russian tanks during the Battle of Berlin, after the reich had lost any hope of emerging victorious. He walks along a line of them smiling in that pic I posted. Seems pretty sociopathic to me.

[Darcy88]

On that soap box you are no better than the people you are labelling evil.

If you had continued reading that article on wikipedia about evil, you would have come by the idea of 'the relativity of evil' which stated the genocides in the Third Reich and Rwanda/Burundi as examples of this relativity because they were not considered evil by the people who carried them out.

Oh I don't know about that. I am not essentially any different from Hitler. But in every other way, every way that really matters, the difference between he and I is no less plain than that of black and white, of night and day. Give me his upbringing and his experiences and his genetics and yeah, I might have gone on to wage horrific war and genocide. But the point is that I was not dealt the same hand as fate dealt that evil man. Hitler was like a dangerous dog with a long history of attacks that had to be put down. A dog is not to be blamed for what it is, but it is nonetheless dangerous. Hitler was evil, and like a virus or like winter cold evil must be treated as a bad thing and measures be taken to deal with it.

And I don't buy the relativity of evil bull. Every non sociopathic individual knows what evil is. The human conscience is hard-wired in the human brain. You have exceptions in various cultures around the world now and throughout the past, but as a general truth the existence and the quality of evil has been and is known. What percentage of the entire world's population would regard the senseless hacking to death with machetes of one million Rwandans a good moral thing?

[JuniperWoolf]

And "evil" must be punished, right? For the good of the victim. You've mentioned killing and torture. How evil does their act have to be to warrent that? Also, what if it's a misconception that the death of the perpetrator makes the family of the victim feel better?

[Darcy88]

And "evil" must be punished, right? For the good of the victim. You've mentioned killing and torture. How evil does their act have to be to warrent that? Also, what if it's a misconception that the death of the perpetrator makes the family of the victim feel better?

I'll leave that in the hands of the judge. I said before I'm actually against the death penalty. There can be no chance that an innocent man be put to death, and there have been instances in America recently where the guilt of the men executed was greatly in doubt.

But you kill in cold blood a number of people, or you do as someone not far from here did a few months back and rape and strangle to death an innocent sixteen year old girl, stuff like that, you do that and you forfeit any claim you have to the mercy of society.

[Alexander III]

He sent out young child soldiers to fight with inadequate arms the rampaging Russian tanks during the Battle of Berlin, after the reich had lost any hope of emerging victorious. He walks along a line of them smiling in that pic I posted. Seems pretty sociopathic to me.

And the old generals in WWI sent out the 17-18 year old kids (Including Hitler) to fight with inadequate arms, over the top in suicide missions for a 1% chance of capturing the russian or french trenches, when it was knows that the war was lost for Germany.

I don't see your point...

The more we are cultured in History the less exeptional Hitler appears.