Social Psychology: Perpetrators Of Genocide

In Rwanda during 1994 Genocide happened between the Hutus and Tutsis. Hutus and Tutsis had disagreements on who will have power which effected the whole population of Rwanda. This leads to the question why there is Genocide in Rwanda? Genocide happened by two clans who caused mass causalities. Others did little to help which caused Genocide to happen in Rwanda.

The Jews were considered to be less than. “The Aryan race was the best and strongest race. Jews were another inferior race. In fact so inferior that they were not considered to be people by the Nazis.” (Anne Frank Stichting) Another source, written by Michael W. Kramer, reads “According to Nazis, the Jews were engaged in a conspiracy for world domination. Behind the scenes it was them who controlled society and made Germans suffer.” For Instance, the Germans thought that the Jews had killed Christ and were responsible for large unfortunate events in Germany. These accusations had always been floating around, and the Nazi Party had only increased Jewish hate, however, Jewish antisemitism and their use as scapegoats had always been around. For example, during the Black Death, the Jews were blamed for poisoned the wells and being immune to the Black Death; unfortunately, the scapegoating of Jews continued, changing people's ideas about the religion of Judaism. In the analysis, Jews were blamed for several tragic events for Germany, changing the way people viewed

Simultaneously, Uving (1998) mentions “violent tendencies exist in all people, and they ‘break through’ when the social norms that keep group hostility in check break down… the problem with these explanations is that they are very general and do not explain why genocide occurs at a specific time” (p. 213). This section from Uvin’s writing explains that aggressive tendencies exist in everyone, often used by psychologist, is general and does not explain why genocides occured. Subsequently, Uving (1998) writes “ Another important physiological explanation of people’s participation in violence states that, with the right justification, nearly all people would be willing to obey orders to severely harm other people… it is said that monarchist, unquestioning, obedience, or conformist nature of the Rwandan traditional mentality made Rwandans inclined to follow orders” (p. 213,214). This illustrates how psychologist believe that people are obedient and will kill if there is justification, but Uvin argues that they are not obedient but instated they have a tradition of monarchy which influenced them to follow orders to kill.

During the holocaust, the germans saw the jews as a “tainted race”, and saw them inferior to themselves. They also sought to kill off the jewish bloodline completely.

Genocide has long had gendered effects, but those effects have long gone relatively understudied as with many other issues relating to feminism in academic scholarship. By gendering our understanding of power and violence, genocide must be rethought and even perhaps redefined, as the reality of genocide often finds itself in conflict with the genocidal realities women have faced throughout time. Through gendering our understanding of genocide in this analysis, the feminist viewpoint provides important acknowledgements for the effects of these human rights abuses on both men and women. Moreover, we will better understand how the

The Nazi government identified many groups to persecute. The most well known is the Jewish people. However, the Nazis did not stop there. Another group victimized by Hitler was the disabled.

The four concepts of obedience, normative influence, communal reinforcement, and self-serving bias all contributed to the mass murders committed by the perpetrators of the Holocaust. While they are all interconnected and one can lead to the other, they all have strong and individual consequences. As shown by Eichmann and Himmler, it is dangerous when people are so obedient towards others that they can't stop to think about their morals or beliefs. When people don’t stand up for their values and what they think is right, they can transform into a perpetrator instead of an upstander. The men and women that followed the beliefs of the Nazi leaders during Holocaust and conformed to Hitler’s ideas were a huge contributor in the deaths of millions of innocent people. Unfortunately, being manipulated by these psychological tendencies led to one of most atrocious mass killings in the history of the world. Still, these concepts occur every day in a variety of ways. When students go along with what teachers, parents, or other authority figures suggest, they are giving up their rights to a certain extent by going along with what they tell them. In a classroom environment, kids can become “teacher’s pets” if they want to be accepted or acknowledged by their teachers in a very positive way. This is an example of a lesser degree of normative influence. Although it doesn’t

Atrocities happen, because society has managed to normalize conformity, through influence and authority. For example, genocides happen sporadically throughout the history of civilization because murder is justified by high-ranking members of society, like political and religious icons. It’s comparable to racism, whereas dominant society normalize hatred, in order to deep division possible. For example, when those figures of society who are suppose to protect us, but rather support hate: “Hey, Boy, you could get us into real trouble if you keep that up. You’ve had your fun, now you gotta move on,’ the Guardsman said with a twisted smile, his cold eyes looking at me as though he would much rather have let Andy have his way with me” (Beals 211).

Jewish and Hebrew peoples are best known as the targets of the Nazis and Adolf Hitler, though many other groups were persecuted. Details of those persecuted were shared in PBS Inside The Nazi State (“Inside the Nazi State”) PBS. 2006; as well as Jewish people, Christians, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Roma Gypsies, homosexuals, and the disabled were said to be housed in Auschwitz or killed on cite.

The German dictator Adolf Hitler said the Jews were to blame for this. The Nazis believed Germans were racially superior and that the Jews were secondary in regard to what they believed in. Although they mostly addressed Jews, they also targeted Roma Gypsies, the disabled and the Slavic community which included Poles and Russians. By 1945, millions of Jews were exterminated as part of what they called the Final Solution. In the early years of the Nazi regime, they established concentration camps originally used to imprison prisoners of war.

INTRODUCTION: The purpose of obedience is when a person view himself as an instrument for carrying out another person’s command, and therefore, no longer views himself responsible for his actions. Excessive obedience can lead to a harmful situation that can result to the Nazi’s atrocities. Stanley Milgram wrote an article “Obedience to Authority” with a reference to Nazi Germany and how transferring the responsibility played a role during holocaust.

After the Germans lost World WarⅠthey put all the blame on the Jews, other religions, and minority groups. When Hitler came into power he started using propaganda to put blame on these different groups. During World WarⅡHitler and the Nazis’ targeted 7 different groups of people. They targeted Gypsies, homosexual men, Jehovah's Witness, handicapped Germans, Jews, Poles, and political protesters. Nazis would force Jews out of their homes and into neighborhoods called Ghettos.

With intense difficult life conditions, they give rise to powerful motives and lead to ways of fulfilling them, in which that group can go against a subgroup. They go against other weaker groups, diminish that group and then join new strong groups, like Nazis under Hitler and his ideology. “People will do anything to satisfy their own interests (pg26).” People will do whatever it takes, even if it involves killing others. Eventually this will lead the society to change and have a continuum of destruction that will end in genocide. In the end it is shown that difficult life conditions and certain cultural characteristics allows a society to become vulnerable, which makes it easy to be taken over.

Another major reason for genocide is revenge. Groups have long memories. Stories are sometimes passed down for generations about real or imagined embarrassments and defeats. The hate is real between groups, and the loathing can be carried down from generation to generation. These group memories may lie behind genocidal actions when the wounded group gains enough power and ambition. Another motivation for revenge is when a group feels it’s pride is hurt through actions by the other group. When one group feels that its honor is at stake, it may commit mass murder to the other group. These genocidal actions because of revenge would generally be considered unreasonable, and would be quite hard to understand from a utilitarian perspective. The attacking

As told by Robert Melson, the perpetrators of the Armenian Genocide were motivated by nationalist ideology. (Melson, 1996) The victims within the Armenian Genocide were territorial ethnic groups