[Jews being deported from the Warsaw Ghetto. 1942. Leopold Page Photographic Collection.] From July to September 1942, 300,000 Jews were deported from the Warsaw Ghetto to Treblinka II.Essential Question: How do people get turned into objects?
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They are first dehumanized by society through stereotypes and ignorance by the general population. Then they are scapegoated for some "problem" in society, and people are made to believe that the discriminated group in a sense deserves to be treated unfairly, because they brought it on themselves.
ReplyDeleteThe process of de-humanizing people often begins at a very young age when the mind is more maliable. In every society there is often a cultural characteristic that wants its people to believe that they are better than everyone else. In a society that is especially reverential towards its nation and leaders (e.g., Japan before WWII), the government established a cult of national identity. It taught that those who were not Japanese were no better than pigs. This was especially reinforced among members of the military as Japan marched ruthlessly up the Yangtze toward Nanjing in 1937. The slaughter of Chinese was horrific, so much so that the Nanjing (Nanking) massacre even moved Adolf Hitler to react to it after it was reported to him.
ReplyDeleteOnce a human is conditioned to become an automaton who will obey orders and follow the party/national line "others" are no longer important. In the U.S. our own history shows many similarities when one examines relations between races, or ethnic groups (immigrants), or religions. The slaughter of the Cheyenne at Sand Creek in 1864 by Colorado militia is very characteristic of such de-humanizing. Major John Chivington, a Methodist minister, ordered all Indians to be killed regardless of age and was quoted as saying, "...nits make lice."
After reviewing multiple earlier accounts of this effective hatred of others just because they are different, one can better understand how the holocaust developed from removing the Jews to extermination.
It begins by treating a person or a group of people with disdain or disrespect. Once the person has been marginalized to appear less, then it's a slippery slope from there. That then becomes the rationalization or justification for mistreatment. The treatment can spiral out of control and has its roots in the initial depersonalization.
ReplyDeleteBy taking the stance of being indifferent or talking ourselves into blaming society as a whole, it helps us to cope with our own conscience, thereby diminishing our guilt. The Nazis, of course, took this way of thinking to the complete extreme. If those in charge can cause the emotions of those following to run cold, then less courage is required to carry out such outrageous orders and the mind can actually find solace in a job well done. Likened to refuse discarded out the back door of a factory, this process of de-humanizing a person consisted of stripping them of all of their humanness; their hair, their personal belongings, their clothes, their voice (not allowed to be heard), their hygiene (left to stink like an animal in a cage), their name (replaced with a number, separated from family and later grouped into packs to increase the feeling of anonymity, their eating habits (rationed out) were all very effective ways of tranforming otherwise caring individuals into mindless objects. No government is really immune from using de-humanizing tactics in times of war, however a select few can be seen crossing well over the borders of inhumane and entering the territory of evil; the Nazi regime being the most obvious. Their actions took de-humanization to the level of sadism. Acting like an ornery group of adolescents looking to pick a fight simply for the fun of it, the Nazis treated people in a cruel manner because they seemed to gain satisfaction from it. This goes beyond the realm of de-humanization.
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