Dear Editor,
Following years of tracking by the Israeli foreign intelligence service, Mossad, Adolf Eichmann, the logistical brain, architect and one of the major organisers of the Holocaust, was captured in Argentina on May 11th,1960. Eichman was thereafter flown to Israel where he was made to stand trial and subsequently convicted for the gruesome murders of millions of Jews killed in the extermination camps during the operationalisation of Nazi Germany’s final solution. It was during Hannah Arendt’s coverage of the Eichman’s trials that she coined the phrase, banality of evil. Incidentally, Arendt was a German-American novelist who at one point in her illustrious and celebrated career became stateless.
Arendt’s conceptualisation of the term, Banality of evil, popularised in her book, “Eichman in Jerusalem”, provided scathing insights and depth of understanding into the psyche and moral world of Adolf Eichman. Arendt concluded from her analysis of the testimonies and actions of Eichman that he wasn’t necessarily an inherently charismatic murderous villain, but instead was blindly following orders, executing his duties without questioning the moral implications of his actions - the essence of the term banality of evil.
Eichman for his part, on all occasions when he was asked to plead during his trial, promptly pleaded not guilty to the crimes he was being accused of committing against humanity: he confidently maintained his innocence by merely proffering he was simply following orders and so wasn’t personally responsible for his morally complicit behaviour. Adolf Eichman’s desecration and attempted annihilation of the Jewish people was reportedly a deep source of pride and joy to him since as it is documented that he on occasion exclaimed that he would happily leap to his grave knowing he had six million Jews on his conscience.
It is horrifying if not nauseating to entertain the thought, even cursorily, that us humans possess such horrendous and diabolical capacities to commit such atrocities on scales that boggles the very mind that does the conceiving. If we were to survey the current global political landscape seeking to examine the moral turpitude of potential candidates vying for political office and those too who have already attained and dangerously consolidated political power we might very well unearth albeit frighteningly potential Eichmans in our midst.
If true, meaning, there are Frankenstein the likes of Eichman already in our presence, how do we vigilantly guard against the repetition of one of history’s darkest hours? How many likely Eichmans may be lurking silently in the shadows awaiting the battle call in service of their enablers, sinister political agendas and dystopias? Adolf Hitler’s orchestrated plan to exterminate the Jews and repopulate the territories of Europe with the purity of the “Aryan race” was for the most part aided and abetted by Adolf Eichman - the once average student who eventually found his “calling” in the industry of efficient mass killings.
Fascist and totalitarian regimes are enabled and perpetuated by those who, according to Hannah Arendt, refuse to critically examine the moral correctness of dictates emanating from authoritative figures. Blindly conforming to commands without self-reflection and robust interrogation requires the voluntary suspension or refusal to employ a critical aspect of what essentially makes us human - our capacities for agency and moral reckoning.
Eichman’s moral failure wasn’t necessarily an unprecedented low point in the brief history of enlightened and civilised man, as daily we continue to witness - albeit on a smaller scale - and at times are affected by the actions of those whose sole role in existence it seems is to unquestionably execute what they are instructed to do.
The banality of evil interpreted in the context of Eichman’s horrors highlighted the bureaucratic, routine thinking devoid of independent thought which made possible the misery of the holocaust. As a theoretically useful conceptual frame for examining the actions of Adolf Eichman the term banality of evil in my considered view doesn’t provide an absolute explanation of Eichman’s and his peers behaviour. As since it is quite plausible to conjecture that Eichman could have indeed critically examined and found wanting the orders he received to exterminate the Jews but was nevertheless motivated by a greater cause, namely: to aid in the realisation of a world ruled and populated by a “superior Aryan race”.
So, while some among us may find laudable Hannah Arendt’s mental labours to coin a theoretical construct to explain Eichman’s actions, does this in itself make the outcome or product of critical thinking as advocated by Hannah Arendt adequate enough to dissuade us from exhibiting incorrect moral behaviour? Or are we, despite our critical efforts, continuing to remain at the discretion of other yet unknown factors or forces deluding us into thinking we are agents morally responsible for our conduct?
As Fyodor Dostoevsky said, “don’t let us forget that the causes of human actions are usually immeasurably more complex and varied than our subsequent explanations of them” logical reasoning or critical thinking is just one mode of apprehending and examining ourselves and the world we inhabit. There are those among us who don't employ critical thinking for reasons known and unknown to us as a basis for ethical and moral guidance.
Orlando Patterson
