Evil in Browning's Ordinary Men

The thesis of Christopher Browning’s Ordinary Men is that men anywhere can become killers/mass murderers in an extreme circumstance(s) as Reserve Police Battalion 101 did. But it is also about the fact that we all have a choice, responsibility as humans as to how we act, our decisions.

A strength of Browning’s thesis is that it can be tested. In his book, Browning shows and tells us this when he explains the numerous tests performed by psychologists on participants, specifically Stanley Milgram’s electric shock experiment (171-172). Not only does Browning show and tell us, but this has happened before – there has been more than one account of genocide and atrocities performed by humans onto other humans because of their race. Humans are able to repeat a behavior likes this and that says something about human nature and the conditioning of them. Again, as we read from Browning about the different testing’s and studies of people like Theodor Adorno, Zygmunt Bauman, John Steiner and his “ ‘ . . . sleeper . . . ’ ” theory, and Ervin Staub (165-167). In these certain situations, when humans are suddenly “tested” in a personal and authoritive way, it seems atrocities will happen or are highly possible.

However, a weakness is the behavior of humans, like the behavior of Reserve Police Battalion 101, is circumstantial. Not all is clear and/or precise. The testimony of the men is not conclusive as Browning kept referring to the idea that the men did not know they participated in the killings, but only knew that they happened (40, 59). As Browning even states himself; after reading Ordinary Men it should make the reader feel uneasy since nothing about these men is certain or absolute (188). Browning also states “Human resp...

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...men” of their nature. But as the killings proceeded and the pressure and need to perform to their higher authority, brutalization was an effect and does coexist with killing – as there is nothing “pretty” about killing innocent people (Browning 184). Just as Browning’s theses coexist in this situation, killing and the idea of brutalization coexist. Being brutalized like the men were led them to an in-difference and killing became the routine.

We cannot say what any one of us would do in these men’s positions, as Browning makes it perfectly clear, but this book provides insight into how people do lose their humanity as well as their rationality and embodiment in a situation like this (188). One thing we can conclude from Ordinary Men that is certain is, humans are capable of the destruction of other humans and anyone can do it – although, we always have a choice.