The Obedience that Caused World War Two

730 Words2 Pages

The Atrocities committed by the Nazis, during the Second World War, was not done only by soulless leaders but by a nation of obedient everyday men and woman, who did nothing to stop them. Martin Gansberg's "Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police” is a great view to the way German civilians and other nations where when the Nazi came for the Jews knowing it was wrong they still sat by idly and did nothing. Also, Philip Zimbardo "The Stanford Prison Experiment" shows how the concentration camp soldiers became unusually cruel with those within it. Even in today’s modern time there are many cases that happen daily where men have crossed lines that we could never dream of. Solidarity of man can be either its greatest tool or destruction it just depends on if we allow the puppeteers to play us even in the worst times.
Martin Gansberg's "Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police" is about a case where a man stabbed a woman three time separated instances; in front of audience of 38 men and woman who did nothing to help the defenseless woman. They all had sorry excuses for apathy of the situation even when the woman yelled that she was dying. They said "’ I didn't want to get involved’" and "’We went to the window to see what was happening’" he said, "’but the light from our bedroom made it difficult to see the street.’" The wife, still apprehensive, added: "’I put out the light and we were able to see better.’" (Gansberg) But in Stanley Milgram and Paul Hollander's "Paralyzed Witnesses" they give reasons as to why these law abiding bystanders got paralyzed and watched as if it were a show of gladiators in the great Coliseum of Rome. As Stanley Milgram and Paul Hollander State “Modern societies are organized as t...

... middle of paper ...

...a swift hand in defending others: one day no one will be left to help defend us. We as a whole have to put our foot down to our leaders and do what it right by our own mind.

Works Cited

"Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation. 11 Nov. 2013 .
Gansberg, Martin. "Thirty-Eight Who Saw Murder Didn't Call the Police." New York Times 27 Mar. 1964.
Girard, Richard. "The Nuremberg Defense." OpEdNews. 07 July 2010. Permaink. 06 Nov. 2013 .
Speigel, Peter. "A Top Abu Ghraib Officer Is Charged." Los Angeles Times 29 Apr. 2006.
Zimbardo, Philip. "Stanford Prison Experiment." The : A Simulation Study of the Psychology of Imprisonment. 11 Nov. 2013 .

Show More
Related

  • Dr. Jeffrey MacDonald's Fight for Innocence

    1458 Words  | 3 Pages

    Briscoe, Daren, The Green Beret Murders Haven’t Given Up. Newsweek, August 30, 2004. Vol. 144, Issue 9, p6, 4/5p, 1c. Retrieved from EBSCO database on the World Wide Web: http://web3.epnet.com/

    Read More

  • Media's Take on The Beltway Sniper Attacks

    1233 Words  | 3 Pages

    Johnson, Peter. "Media Walk Careful Line in Sniper Case." USATODAY.com. N.p., 14 Oct. 2002. Web. 09 May 2013. .

    Read More

  • Twelve Angry Men and The Casey Anthony Trial

    1206 Words  | 3 Pages

    Tresniowski, AlexHelling, SteveTauber, Michelle. "Shocking Verdict!." People 77.2 (2011): 84. MAS Ultra - School Edition.

    Read More

  • The Stanford Prison Experiment: Taking a Deeper Look

    801 Words  | 2 Pages

    On August 14, 1971, the Stanford Prison Experiment had begun. The volunteers who had replied to the ad in the newspaper just weeks before were arrested for the claims of Armed Robbery and Burglary. The volunteers were unaware of the process of the experiment, let alone what they were getting themselves into. They were in shock about what was happening to them. Once taken into the facility, the experimenters had set up as their own private jail system; the twenty-four volunteered individuals were split up into two different groups (Stanford Prison Experiment).

    Read More

  • Integration of University of Mississippi

    1470 Words  | 3 Pages

    Smith, Hedrick. "Barnett Charges Marshalls: Says 'Trigger- Happy' U.S. Officers are Responsible for Campus Bloodshed." New York Times 1 Oct 1962: 2.

    Read More

  • Stanford Prison Experiment Zimbardo

    487 Words  | 1 Pages

    The Stanford Prison Experiment commenced in 1973 in pursuit of Zimbardo needed to study how if a person are given a certain role, will they change their whole personality in order to fit into that specific role that they were given to. Zambrano significantly believed that personality change was due to either dispositional, things that affect personal life and make them act differently. Or situational, when surrounded by prisoners, they can have the authority to do whatever they want without having to worry about the consequences. Furthermore, it created a group of twenty-four male participants, provided them their own social role. Twelve of them being a prisoners and the other twelve prison guards, all of which were in an examination to see if they will be able to handle the stress that can be caused based upon the experiment, as well as being analysis if their personality change due to the environment or their personal problems.

    Read More

  • The Stanford Prison Experiment Review

    1090 Words  | 3 Pages

    Before commencing the study all participants were briefed on the roles pertaining to the experiment without actually being assigned roles. Once roles were determined and assigned each participant was given specific instruction to their roles whether it be the role of the Guard or Prisoner. The group assigned to the prisoner role were greater in number and were instructed to be available at a predetermined time, this was done to maintain the reality of the simulation. The prisoners were arrested and escorted by real-life law enforcement officials and processed as any detainee would be in a real situation. Upon completing the processing part of the experiment the students were then transferred to the simulated prison, which was housed in the basement of the university, and assigned identifying numbers, given demeaning clothing as uniform and placed in barren cells with no personalized

    Read More

  • Totalitarian Government: Hitler and Stalin

    1102 Words  | 3 Pages

    Following the beginning of the Second World War, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany and Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union would start what would become two of the worst genocides in world history. These totalitarian governments would “welcome” people all across Europe into a new domain. A domain in which they would learn, in the utmost tragic manner, the astonishing capabilities that mankind possesses. Nazis and Soviets gradually acquired the ability to wipe millions of people from the face of the Earth. Throughout the war they would continue to kill millions of people, from both their home country and Europe. This was an effort to rid the Earth of people seen as unfit to live in their ideal society. These atrocities often went unacknowledged and forgotten by the rest of the world, leaving little hope for those who suffered. Yet optimism was not completely dead in the hearts of the few and the strong. Reading Man is Wolf to Man: Surviving the Gulag by Janusz Bardach and Survival in Auschwitz by Primo Levi help one capture this vivid sense of resistance toward the brutality of the German concentration and Soviet work camps. Both Bardach and Levi provide a commendable account of their long nightmarish experience including the impact it had on their lives and the lives of others. The willingness to survive was what drove these two men to achieve their goals and prevent their oppressors from achieving theirs. Even after surviving the camps, their mission continued on in hopes of spreading their story and preventing any future occurrence of such tragic events. “To have endurance to survive what left millions dead and millions more shattered in spirit is heroic enough. To gather the strength from that experience for a life devoted to caring for oth...

    Read More

  • Social Psychology and the Stanford Prison Experiment by Philip Zimbardo

    2259 Words  | 5 Pages

    The Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted in 1971 by Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University. The purpose of the experiment was a landmark study of the human response to captivity, in particular, to the real world circumstances of prison life. In social psychology, this idea is known as “mundane realism”. Mundane realism refers to the ability to mirror the real world as much as possible, which is just what this study did. Twenty-four subjects were randomly assigned to play the role of "prisoner" or "guard" and they were made to conform to these roles.

    Read More

  • The Stanford Prison Experiment by Philip Zimbardo

    1885 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Stanford Prison Experiment was conducted in 1971 by Philip Zimbardo of Stanford University. The experiment was a landmark study of the human response to captivity, in particular, to the real world circumstances of prison life. In social psychology, this idea is known as “mundane realism”. Mundane realism refers to the ability to mirror the real world as much as possible, which is just what this study did. Twenty-four subjects were randomly assigned to play the role of "prisoner" or "guard" and they were made to conform to these roles.

    Read More

  • The Mendez Brothers Trial

    1323 Words  | 3 Pages

    Berns, Walter. "Getting Away With Murder." Commentary 97.4 (1994): 25. MAS Ultra - School Edition. Web. 14

    Read More

  • Police Brutality: Black Lives Matter

    2041 Words  | 5 Pages

    ...vidge, A. (2013). Hundreds rally statewide against police brutality in wake of Lopez death. Available at: http://www.ktvu.com/news/news/local-govt-politics/hundreds-rally-statewide-against-police-brutality-/nbnmT/

    Read More

  • The Pros And Cons Of Criminals

    817 Words  | 2 Pages

    In 1989 there was an appalling(or shocking) case where a man and a woman had both been killed. The man had been shot in the back of the head, and in several other places, including the kneecap, the woman was shot in the leg, the arm several times and the kneecaps as well to make it seem as if it were an organized crime. Later the

    Read More

  • The Dangers of Fear

    948 Words  | 2 Pages

    Irish Playwright, George Bernard Shaw, once said, “The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity.” Inhumanity is mankind’s worse attribute. Every so often, ordinary humans are driven to the point were they have no choice but to think of themselves. One of the most famous example used today is the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night demonstrates how fear is a debilitating force that causes people to lose sight of who they once were. After being forced into concentration camps, Elie was rudely awakened into reality. Traumatizing incidents such as Nazi persecution or even the mistreatment among fellow prisoners pushed Elie to realize the cruelty around him; Or even the wickedness Elie himself is capable of doing. This resulted in the loss of faith, innocence, and the close bonds with others.

    Read More

  • Proprietary Estoppel Case Study

    3253 Words  | 7 Pages

    It has been generally acknowledged that the doctrine of proprietary estoppel has much in common with common intention constructive trusts, i.e. those that concern the acquisition of an equitable interest in another person’s land. In effect, the general aim is the recognition of real property rights informally created. The similarity between the two doctrines become clear in a variety of cases where the court rely on either of the two doctrines. To show the distinction between the doctrines, this essay will analyse the principles, roots and rationale of both doctrines. With reference to the relevant case law it will be possible to highlight the subtle differences between the doctrines in the cases where there seems to be some overlap. Three key cases where this issue surfaced were the following: Lloyds Bank Plc v. Rosset (1991), Yaxley v. Gotts (1999) and Stack v. Dowden (2007). This essay will describe the relevant judgements in these cases in order to show the differences between the two doctrines.

    Read More

More about The Obedience that Caused World War Two

Open Document