Asa Boldman

Western Civilization II
4/23/2018

Discussion Question #11

1). This persecution of the Jews started out less severe, “In front of our temple, on every
square and corner, billboards were scoffing at us.” But as time progressed, friends of the Jews
turned their backs on them and persecution became more degrading. “And in the presence of
Jewish children the teachers denounced all the Jews, without exception, as scoundrels and as the
most destructive force in every country where they were living.” Again, as time moved on, the
persecution of Jews quickly became more violent. “In one o the Jewish sections, an eighteen-
year-old boy was hurled from a three story window to land with both legs broken on a street
littered with burning beds and other household furniture and effects from his family’s and other
apartments.”

2a). Browning explains that the process which took place inside of these ordinary men wasn’t
a natural hatred or justified enjoyment of killing, rather, he said they “became increasingly
efficient and calloused executioners.” He says, “War, and especially race war, leads to
brutalization, which leads to atrocity.” This brutalization was one of many explanations of what
caused these ordinary German men to become killers. This process of turning these ordinary men
into killers is further explained, Browning says, was seen in Philip Zimbardo’s Stanford prison
experiment. Zimbardo says, “the prison situation alone was a sufficient condition to produce
aberrant, anti-social behavior.” When humans are exposed to behaviors that are directly
divergent from their natural state, they quickly become conformed to these behaviors and turn
into drastically different people.