Cog in the machine
What turns anyone into a ‘cog in the machine’ of repressive state violence, and how does this happen? The philosopher Hannah Arendt investigated this after the Holocaust. How does a person become a weapon of the state, executing actions and inflicting violence (ostensibly legitimately) on behalf of the state, particularly when they know that the victims are innocent (for want of a better word) fellow citizens who have come together to fight for justice. I know that a lot of people would like to claim that they would be immune to the process if they found themselves in that position; that they would resist the state’s demands and injunctions, and not become a tool of repressive violence. But can one really choose to resist at the crucial moment? Can we suddenly break free from the conceptual, physical and economic bonds that tether us to everything that we know as good, true and worthy of obedience? Sure, maybe there were people - in many different historical contexts - who fully belie...