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I think it's a compelling critique of Arendt that she basically just bought this characterisation wholesale - the Nazis had every reason to present their action

I think it's a compelling critique of Arendt that she basically just bought this characterisation wholesale - the Nazis had every reason to present their actions as 'banal' both in limiting the damages selfishly at an individual level and also limiting the damage to their ideology ('anyone could do it'). Eichmann was probably not the nazi-punchcard, mindlessly executing horrible plans, that she states.

toyg 5y ago
The counter to that theory is the sheer amount of Nazi members in Germany - or really rank & file members in any fascist-like regime. That amount of people don't just go insanely evil on a whim, in most cases they are simply dragged there by mechanisms like Arendt describes.
- bigDinosaur 5y ago
  Arendt was very specific though, her book was called Eichmann in Jerusalem. It wasn't 'mid-level German bureaucrat in Jerusalem'. After all, the railway workers (well, the unforced ones, since the Nazis did not have any compunction about slavery) who kept the trains running were fairly banal participants in the Holocaust, but we don't focus on them as the architects of it for a reason. Eichmann had every reason to present himself as a boring- somewhat clueless - bureaucrat as opposed to an architect of horrors of which he understood the full and gruesome extent. The right person in the wrong place can make all the difference. I'd have to read her responses to the criticism she got again, I believe she did walk back the extent of her claims, but could be wrong (and in saying this, I'm sure someone will correct me if I am misremembering ;))
  - toyg 5y ago
    Of course, Arendt was a journalist so her work starts from an event. Not every Nazi member was trialled, Eichmann wad just one of the high-profile ones. The point is that from the particular situation we get a more generalised theory of the development of "evil" at the mass level, that works better than "people just like to abuse others, because the devil or something".
    - bigDinosaur 5y ago
      The problem really comes down to this: is Nazism something which we are all capable of quickly becoming, i.e. inherent to human nature, or do we only become this horrible when small groups of intelligent elites cynically exploit our psychology and concretely plan for us to become brainwashed slaves (the opposite of banality)? Perhaps a bit of both, but at some point someone definitely isn't a banal and clueless bureaucrat. You can probably see how option A is a propaganda win for Nazism (and fascism in general). 'See, you're not so different to us!'. Was it the German people who became Nazis overnight, or did the Nazi elites (such as Eichmann) instigate what amounted to major social engineering campaigns?
      - toyg 5y ago
        The point is that in most cases you don't need any major social-engineering. The elements of efficiency and obedience to the hierarchy are already there, built-in in most orderly societies. You just need to veer the actual aims a little bit, and you are effectively in a regime not very different from the nazi one. That's why seemingly democratic societies can turn into regimes almost overnight.
        bigDinosaur 5y ago
        This is discounting all the times people fight back against fascism though. Lots and lots of people absolutely do not accept some natural link between orderly conduct and fascism, and so that goes back to my original point about Eichmann making Nazism seem banal as a goal for the Nazi ideology - if we're basically one step away from becoming Nazis at any point, is what they did really so bad? Well, yes it was, because it was engineered. The Nazis never won a majority in any election, but once they were in power they were famous for their social engineering and propaganda. They're a classic example of how a minority of people in a population can absolutely gain control over everyone else and bend the majority to their will using highly cynical but intelligent tactics.
        toyg 5y ago
        > This is discounting all the times people fight back against fascism though. That's a personal interpretation. In fact, in many ways it doesn't discount it but actually inspires them, asserting that without such efforts society is likely to backslide into fascism fairly easily. Which tbh, if you've lived in the US from 2001 to 2005, or today in Russia or Hungary, you've basically experienced already.

toyg 5y ago

The counter to that theory is the sheer amount of Nazi members in Germany - or really rank & file members in any fascist-like regime. That amount of people don't just go insanely evil on a whim, in most cases they are simply dragged there by mechanisms like Arendt describes.

bigDinosaur 5y ago
Arendt was very specific though, her book was called Eichmann in Jerusalem. It wasn't 'mid-level German bureaucrat in Jerusalem'. After all, the railway workers (well, the unforced ones, since the Nazis did not have any compunction about slavery) who kept the trains running were fairly banal participants in the Holocaust, but we don't focus on them as the architects of it for a reason. Eichmann had every reason to present himself as a boring- somewhat clueless - bureaucrat as opposed to an architect of horrors of which he understood the full and gruesome extent. The right person in the wrong place can make all the difference. I'd have to read her responses to the criticism she got again, I believe she did walk back the extent of her claims, but could be wrong (and in saying this, I'm sure someone will correct me if I am misremembering ;))
- toyg 5y ago
  Of course, Arendt was a journalist so her work starts from an event. Not every Nazi member was trialled, Eichmann wad just one of the high-profile ones. The point is that from the particular situation we get a more generalised theory of the development of "evil" at the mass level, that works better than "people just like to abuse others, because the devil or something".
  - bigDinosaur 5y ago
    The problem really comes down to this: is Nazism something which we are all capable of quickly becoming, i.e. inherent to human nature, or do we only become this horrible when small groups of intelligent elites cynically exploit our psychology and concretely plan for us to become brainwashed slaves (the opposite of banality)? Perhaps a bit of both, but at some point someone definitely isn't a banal and clueless bureaucrat. You can probably see how option A is a propaganda win for Nazism (and fascism in general). 'See, you're not so different to us!'. Was it the German people who became Nazis overnight, or did the Nazi elites (such as Eichmann) instigate what amounted to major social engineering campaigns?
    - toyg 5y ago
      The point is that in most cases you don't need any major social-engineering. The elements of efficiency and obedience to the hierarchy are already there, built-in in most orderly societies. You just need to veer the actual aims a little bit, and you are effectively in a regime not very different from the nazi one. That's why seemingly democratic societies can turn into regimes almost overnight.
      - bigDinosaur 5y ago
        This is discounting all the times people fight back against fascism though. Lots and lots of people absolutely do not accept some natural link between orderly conduct and fascism, and so that goes back to my original point about Eichmann making Nazism seem banal as a goal for the Nazi ideology - if we're basically one step away from becoming Nazis at any point, is what they did really so bad? Well, yes it was, because it was engineered. The Nazis never won a majority in any election, but once they were in power they were famous for their social engineering and propaganda. They're a classic example of how a minority of people in a population can absolutely gain control over everyone else and bend the majority to their will using highly cynical but intelligent tactics.
        toyg 5y ago
        > This is discounting all the times people fight back against fascism though. That's a personal interpretation. In fact, in many ways it doesn't discount it but actually inspires them, asserting that without such efforts society is likely to backslide into fascism fairly easily. Which tbh, if you've lived in the US from 2001 to 2005, or today in Russia or Hungary, you've basically experienced already.