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Banality of evil

As usual after our usual hard run on Sunday, during the breakfast of thosai, we got involved in our usual banter about events around the country.
This time around the subject was rather morbid, in particular about the death of an detainee by assault and the killing and unceremonial cremation of a millionairess recently. What makes a man do all these violent things to a fellow human being without flinching. Being a doctor, one of the group members could not stomach the idea of landing punches after punches and the coup de grace that tips the living daylights of the victim whilst looking straight into his eyes.
Unfortunately, I do not think that people of the medical profession are immune of this charge. Scores of heinous crimes against patients and even loved ones are testimony of this charge.
In fact, philosophers and psychologists have pondered upon this topic since the end of WW2. Hannah Arendt introduced the concept of banality of evil where people just did evil things that they were assigned to do without questioning and thinking of its consequence as if it was just banal (trivial) thing to do.
The abandoned 1971 Stanford prison experiment by Prof Philip Zimbaldo suggested that probably we all try to perform our roles too well. The prison guards, probably because of the absolute power given to them, act beyond the scope of their job with the aid of testesterone and ego. The prisoners go into submission because of their disadvantaged state and the stress hormones.
There must be some truth in Sigmund Freud's theory that man's needs are governed by their primodial primitive animalistic desires of food, violence and sexual gratification. Modernization and culture managed to rein these unsavoury traits which are not appropriate for living in a structured society. However, when the atmosphere is conducive or desperate, when they are amongst people of similar wavelength, these unabated evil behaviour may just be unleashed to its full glory.
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