The path to evil | Jonny Thomson #Philosophy

In 1961, Adolf Ikeman found himself in

court. Ikeman was one of the

orchestrators of the Holocaust. And in

the court was the philosopher Hannah

Arent looking in. And what she noticed

was something peculiar. But this was not

a Disney villain. This was not somebody

who looked monstrous. This was a boring

bureaucrat. And she asked herself, how

is it that a whole nation of people just

like Ikeman could turn themselves to do

something so horrendous as the

Holocaust? A lot of Aren's work is

discussing what are the ingredients

necessary for a society to turn towards

totalitarianism. And she comes up with

two answers. The first answer is that a

society has to feel disconnected and

fragmented. People don't form any

communities and any sense of community

has to be decided by the powers that be.

The second factor is that all of the

problems and fears of your society are

because of some external force. It might

be Jews, but it might be communists. It

might be any foreigners. It's some

shadowy other who's causing you to feel

this way. From there, Hannah Arent asked

a question, how is it that someone like

Ikeman could become part of the

Holocaust? And in her book, The Human

Condition, Hannah Arent believes that a

human needs three things to flourish and

to thrive. She says we need action,

labor, and work. Labor is what we might

call the everyday drudgery of just

getting by. It's washing yourself in the

shower. It's cleaning dishes. It's

getting the kids to school. It's just

ending the day as you started. The

second is work. And this is where we

feel we're giving back to society. It

might be that we're producing something

in a factory or we're providing a

service to someone as a banker or an

accountant. But the third and arguably

most important is action. And this is

where we feel as though we're part of

the political forum. We feel as though

that we have a voice and our voice is

heard. That we can discuss with other

people our political opinions and they

can discuss theirs with us. What Hannah

Arent argued is that totalitarianism and

Nazi Germany denies people action. It

denies them a sense of meaning and a

sense of joining something bigger and

being part of the discussion. So when

Hannah Arent watched Adolf Ikeman in

court, she wasn't watching a fully

realized human being. She was watching a

drone. He never questioned himself

because he was denied access to himself.

He only had targets to meet and

promotions to get.