Banality of Evil, Hannah Arendt:
- Can you do evil and not be evil?
- Arendt found Eichmann “terrifyingly normal”
- Eichmann was not an amoral monster.
- Disengaged from the reality of his evil acts.
- He was not inherently evil according to Arendt.
- She could not connect his evil deeds to deeper roots or motives.
- She was criticized for saying Eichmann had no evil intentions.
- Concentrated more on who Eichmann was than what he did.
- https://aeon.co/ideas/what-did-hannah-arendt-really-mean-by-the-banality-of-evil
The Origins of Totalitarianism:
- Written in three essays “Anti Semitism,” “Imperialism,” and “Totalitarianism.”
- Describes the rise of anti-semitism in Europe in the early-to-mid 1900s.
- Traces the emergence of racism as an ideology.
- Totalitarianism in Germany was about terror and consistency.
- Totalitarian movements are focused on Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.
- The role of propaganda was important.
- The use of terror was essential to this form of government.
- Isolation is a precondition for totalitarian domination.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origins_of_Totalitarianism
Adolf Eichmann:
- One of the major organizers of the Holocaust.
- Associated with “the final solution to the Jewish question.”
- Involved in the mass deportation of Jews into ghettos and extermination camps.
- Executed by hanging in 1962 for his war crimes.
- Made plans for extreme Jewish relocation in southeast Poland and also Madagascar.
- Jewish policy changed from emigration to extermination when the Nazis invaded the Soviet Union in 1941.
- Eichmann became responsible for Jewish deportations to extermination camps.
- When he was captured he did not deny his role in the Holocaust, but said he was simply following orders in his totalitarian system.
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Eichmann
