Wednesday, 21 April 2010
Fear
How can a political ideology warrant such heinous ignorance of basic human compassion. The thought and link between politics and genocide seems surreal, maybe its not that at all, maybe its the link between power and genocide that is the real issue. To what lengths will a human of blood flesh and spirit go to reach more and more power. Saddam went far enough to attempt to completely wipe out an entire protected race, Pol Pot wiped out 10% of the Cambodian population, the question that needs to be asked is where does emotion come into play. The death of an innocent being is not something the average Joe wants on their conscience, but in so many cases it seems throughout history that this is not the case. Have these savage leaders a mental state of mind that represents that of a serial killer? When there is mention of fascism and communism and advancements of parties that represent these ideologies there seems to be an instilled fear want to shut them down before they grow because of the negative connotations associated with the actions of leaders that have used death as a power tool... should people be scared?
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In my opinion, the threat of death for non compliance with what is expected in the public sphere (which really includes every aspect of life since the private sphere is completely extinguished) in totalitarian regimes is the primary and only significant tool of control. Short of this fear, people would be willing to risk their financial and physical welfare. This has been evidenced time and time again by journalists, politicians, businessman and judges in many non-democratic states throughout the 20th century. However, short of the threat of death (and the belief the threat will be carried out), in openly opposing the ideological foundation, competence or legitimacy of the government/dictator, a totalitarian state would not be able to maintain its supreme power and authority. The widespread killing of citizens sends a message to everyone: do, act and believe what I say or die. For the Cambodian and Iraqi states to operate as their totalitarian dictators wished them to, very public and very real mass killings were necessary to drive the debilitating threat of death into the hearts and minds of every man, woman and child within their sovereign territory. What does that say about the personality of totalitarian dictators? In my opinion, they either need to be natural born psychopaths or stark raving mad.
ReplyDeleteI don't think emotion is that much of an issue for someone where they are not personally killing the people. Also I think that the mentality of the likes of Stalin - you have to break a few eggs to make an omelette - means that killing thousands of people can just be rationalized, removing emotion from the equation. If creating fear of death and killing people is the primary and only significant tool of control (as Braeden says), then the use of such methods can just be rationalized as a necessary action required for the stability of the regime.
ReplyDeleteI think the potential for a leader to be able to distance themselves emotionally in such a way means that whilst they may be delusional in their rationalizations and power hungry, they need not necessarily be mad psychopaths.