How someone becomes a torturer

I am aware of Christopher Browning, "Ordinary Men".

I am not convinced by Christopher Browning frankly unproven assumption.

Are we truly being led to believe that ordinary men where metamorphosed from family oriented individuals into psychotic mass murderers?

Certainly Christopher Browning research is noteworthy but the result his conclusions is a mismatch of a belief that "Ordinary Men", 500 plus to be precise committed acts of genocide, torture of men women, children, the massacre of 30,000 Jews. 

This theory is incoherent mostly because of the belief that the perpetrators must have been passive recipients of indoctrination to require these men, and yes women to actively participate in acts of extreme mutilation, murder and extermination.

You may be aware of the book, but its clear you haven't read it.

Browning's research is clear in that the participants were not indoctrinated nazis in the least.

Drawing on psychology, sociology, and lots of direct testimony, Browning explains how the need of individuals to conform to group expectations can result in horrendous acts of evil. The overwhelming urge to obey the collective, to be thought of as part of the collective, and do their "duty" was the point of the author.

It is every bit as relevant today in 2021 as it was last century. Just listen to the language being used today.

Unfortunately I know a few people personally who I believe could go down that path based on their behavior during this pandemic.

Maybe you have to have your own country occupied and your people brutally tortured to realize, A) Torture only elicits greater resistance, & B) It is likely to get the recipient to agree with anything you suggest, i.e. you are none the wiser, but now have to deal with greater resistance. Torturers are invariably the most psychotic sadistic cowards in any group. An honorable soldier wouldn't have anything to do with it. And I believe there are honorable soldiers.

The US has used torture routinely in "the war on terror". Has it rejected the rule of law out of hand?

I think the US learned a very hard lesson from that experience and it will not be repeated.

You will also find that a lot of active duty members were horrified by what became public. Without reciting our code of conduct training here military members are taught torture is not permitted and members have an obligation under law to refuse any order to engage in torture, or anything else that is illegal for that matter. We were told to run, not walk, to the JAG office if anyone ever ordered us to break any of the Geneva Conventions. This was before GWOT and our training was conducted by none other than Jeremiah Denton and Doug Hegdahl. When someone like Doug Hegdahl tells you we don't torture our prisoners because Americans are better than that you take it to heart. It is a great shame to the US that some of our Army comrades either didn't know this or didn't take it to heart. It grieves me greatly and my WWII veteran parents were deeply ashamed, especially my father who was particularly proud that at the close of the war German soldiers sought out their division to surrender to and not nearby British and Soviet divisions knowing the Americans would not mistreat them.

Two words, Milgram Experiment.

https://www.imarcresearch.com/blog/the-milgram-experiment

I am aware of Christopher Browning, "Ordinary Men".

I am not convinced by Christopher Browning frankly unproven assumption.

Are we truly being led to believe that ordinary men where metamorphosed from family oriented individuals into psychotic mass murderers?

Certainly Christopher Browning research is noteworthy but the result his conclusions is a mismatch of a belief that "Ordinary Men", 500 plus to be precise committed acts of genocide, torture of men women, children, the massacre of 30,000 Jews.

This theory is incoherent mostly because of the belief that the perpetrators must have been passive recipients of indoctrination to require these men, and yes women to actively participate in acts of extreme mutilation, murder and extermination.

Read "Ordinary Men" by Christopher Browning.

A group of German men, family men all, committed unspeakable crimes against humanity in Poland during the Second World War. Reading the book, I almost became physically unwell.

Its also a cautionary tale that many among us today could be made to commit those very same crimes.

The past 18 months has made that quite clear.

Thank you, that is a interesting point, mikeylikesit, I will check out  Coetzee‘s Waiting for the Barbarians

Mikey

The US has used torture routinely in "the war on terror". Has it rejected the rule of law out of hand?

itsonlyrocknroll,

Try reading Coetzee‘s Waiting for the Barbarians. One of the salient points in that novel is that torture isn’t ever about getting the truth. It is only about exercising power and inducing fear. Coetzee wrote in the context of South African apartheid. A torture victim could confess to anything, true or untrue, but the point is that the person broke, the person confessed to something against his will, the person bent to the power held over him.

Or think of Picard in Star Trek. How many lights are there? The point of torture was to provoke a confession to a lie.

One can prattle all day about rule of law from a Western liberal perspective, but that concept is already rejected out of hand by a regime that tortures. Undermining a concept that they already reject might be seen as a plus.

Torture and the tools or methods for it, that’s the only field human beings are unlimited creative and sophisticated, have maximum expertise and made the most ever inventions through all history. That tells you the real and whole story. You don’t believe it? You will be more than astonished and maximum shocked when visiting museums, old castles, war memorial places, former prisons and all such, having older and newer torture instruments and procedures at display. On top of that all the torture phantasies in the movies, most successful series as a guaranteed cash cow, because we all love it in our deepest inner, almost without exception. Even mother Theresa is said to have had some darker sides too…lol Humans are in fact perfectly skilled psycho beasts and torturers, if not somehow delimited by rules, laws, traditional taboos , religious constraints and other such strong restrictions. It’s therefore sheer impossible to stop that nature and perfection completely.

Torture will never procure trustable/meaningful intelligence.

The victim will just recant the interrogators requirement, so totally unproductive.

Worst of all torture undermines the legal principle and practical implementation of a fundament trust in the rule of law.