The origin of human cruelty--where does it come from??

makaha99

makaha99

Active Member
Everyone knows about the Holocaust, but there is something called the "forgotten holocaust" or the Rape of Nanjing (alternate spelling Nanking). The Nanjing massacre occurred during roughly the same time period (historically speaking) as the Holocaust (the Nanking massacre occurred in 1937). What the Japanese soldiers did to the civilian population was unbelievable, to me it was even worse than what the Nazis did to the Jews, Gypsies etc. I mean you had Japanese soldiers pouring sulfuric acid on a man's head to see what happens, raping 80 year old ladies and 1 year old babies, decapitation contests with a katana, slicing open pregnant women and putting the fetus on the tip of the bayonet and parading it around the street. And after the war, these soldiers had no remorse. I remember reading about a japanese lady who in the 1950s remembers overhearing in a bar a couple of former japanese soldiers bragging about killing chinese in Nanjing and talking about how far they could stick their arm inside a woman's genitals. Unbelievable....

Even Nazis themselves were appalled by the violence. There were a few Nazi officials residing in the diplomatic safe zone in Nanjing who witnessed what happened and chronicled it....

The Chinese population did nothing to provoke those japanese soldiers. Why was there so much hate against the chinese? It's not like how someone would hurt your wife or family member, and you want revenge. No....these civilians did nothing to the japanese soldiers.

And these kinds of behaviors continue today. A couple of months ago, I heard this on the radio on the BBC World Service: they were interviewing a lady from an African country, I forget which one, I think it might have been the Republic of Congo. But anyway, she survived an ordeal where some thugs beat her up, and cut off one of her feet, threw her foot in the fire, then took it out of the fire and told one of her kids to eat her dismembered foot, and when her child refused, they killed that child. I don't even know how a person would even think of doing something like that.....

So my question is: what is the nature of human cruelty?
Are we naturally evil?
Is it proof that we evolved from animals?
Because believe me, in war zones, humans, especially the males, can damn sure act like animals. It's still happening in this world today in war zones, and I think it's utterly disgusting.
What do you think about the nature of human cruelty?
 
K

Kodank Moment

Well-Known Member
It's inside all of us from birth. I strongly believe environment and beliefs are what cause this to happen inside of people. I could never think to do something like that, other people however....clearly can.
 
echelon1k1

echelon1k1

New Member
Probably one of the most fucked up stories I've heard re: African Mother.

And the Japanese thing rarely gets any mentions considering their experiments were beyond horrific...

Some would say nature, some nurture, but then again there are always exceptions to these rules, but I would say we all have it in us, maybe not a "dark passenger", but there's a different side to all of us - IMO some just find it easier keeping that side in check...
 
TheGanjaWhisperer

TheGanjaWhisperer

Member
Everyone you meet is different, there may be a person you meet who is just mean or cruel. They dont care and will do anything in their power to get ahead, personal gain doesnt need to be a factor. Theres many reasons why some people are cruel like: Personal issues, low self image, anger , thought process ( They may think they're acting in an acceptable manor when in actuallity they're not) Brain chemestry is what seperates the cruel from the sadistic. Some people dont have the mechanisims for empathy that most of us do. People with a lack of empathy for another makes them more cruel, when the person isnt capable of any empathy whats so ever they're clinically disgnosed by the DSM-IV as psychopaths.
 
makaha99

makaha99

Active Member
echelon1k1 said:
Some would say nature, some nurture, but then again there are always exceptions to these rules, but I would say we all have it in us, maybe not a "dark passenger", but there's a different side to all of us - IMO some just find it easier keeping that side in check...
Click to expand...
I remember Carl Sagan saying, I think it was either in his book 'Cosmos' or the TV series, that at the base of our brain is the R-complex (which is literally like a crocodile's brain), because the human brain evolved in layers. And that the R-complex is the seat of agression and territoriality. That contrasts with the upper layers of the brain like the cerebral cortex, which allows us to do reasoning--math, science, engineering, that part which gives us some civilized decency. So basically, we are always trying to hold back the tendencies of the R-complex in order to be civilized. Many times, we can't and have those disturbing behaviors seen in war....
 
makaha99

makaha99

Active Member
Kodank Moment said:
It's inside all of us from birth. I strongly believe environment and beliefs are what cause this to happen inside of people. I could never think to do something like that, other people however....clearly can.
Click to expand...

When I found out about the Nanjing massacare, at first I wanted to disown my own Japanese heritage (well I'm a quarter Japanese, half Chinese, and a quarter native Hawaiian), because I was so disgusted. For a while, I looked at my Japanese friends, and I briefly thought to myself "are they capable of doing those same things?" And also then I understood why until today, some Chinese still hate the Japanese. Currently there is a dispute over some islands off the japanese coast, but several years ago, there were widespread protests across China (and South Korea--comfort women etc. but that is a whole other story), because in Japan, in school text books, all references to the Rape of Nanking were removed, as if it never happened......

I believe that in some countries in Europe, Holocaust denial is a crime punishable by imprisonment. But there is nothing like that in Japan. Some japanese deny that the Nanjing massacre even happened. But if that were the case, why did Nazi officials and other foreign officials in Nanjing during the massacre see these things with their own eyes, and also photos from japanese soldiers were later confiscated which showed the atrocities? Why did people from all across the Pacific islands that were under Japanese occupation talk about the atrocities of the Imperial Japanese army?

And the sad part is that it gets worse from there , yes, worse.......

The Japanese experimented with biological weapons, dropping them on villages, they also had a medical unit that did vivisection (cutting open live human beings without anesthesia for medical study)--just incredibly disturbing stuff.

Only a tiny handful of the top japanese officers were punished, but everyone else went scot free, which brings me to my next point....

And this is the most disturbing thing of all.....is that supposed war hero General Douglas McCarthur brokered a deal with the japanese where the U.S. and it's allies would not seek prosecution of war crimes if the japanese would share information with the U.S. about scientific/medical information that was learned by the japanese when the japanese used biological weapons on chinese villages. At that point, when I found out about all of this, my heart sank and I felt like jumping off a bridge in disgust.

The U.S. and it's allies made a mockery of justice, just to glean info about biological weapons tests the japanese carried out on the chinese.....
 
match box

match box

Well-Known Member
I saw film footage of the Adolf Eichmann trial one of the witness when seeing Eichmann passed out and later said he's not the monster I saw before but a man just like me. I wish it wasn't true but it's in us all.
 
Granny weed

Granny weed

Well-Known Member
makaha99 said:
Everyone knows about the Holocaust, but there is something called the "forgotten holocaust" or the Rape of Nanjing (alternate spelling Nanking). The Nanjing massacre occurred during roughly the same time period (historically speaking) as the Holocaust (the Nanking massacre occurred in 1937). What the Japanese soldiers did to the civilian population was unbelievable, to me it was even worse than what the Nazis did to the Jews, Gypsies etc. I mean you had Japanese soldiers pouring sulfuric acid on a man's head to see what happens, raping 80 year old ladies and 1 year old babies, decapitation contests with a katana, slicing open pregnant women and putting the fetus on the tip of the bayonet and parading it around the street. And after the war, these soldiers had no remorse. I remember reading about a japanese lady who in the 1950s remembers overhearing in a bar a couple of former japanese soldiers bragging about killing chinese in Nanjing and talking about how far they could stick their arm inside a woman's genitals. Unbelievable....

Even Nazis themselves were appalled by the violence. There were a few Nazi officials residing in the diplomatic safe zone in Nanjing who witnessed what happened and chronicled it....

The Chinese population did nothing to provoke those japanese soldiers. Why was there so much hate against the chinese? It's not like how someone would hurt your wife or family member, and you want revenge. No....these civilians did nothing to the japanese soldiers.

And these kinds of behaviors continue today. A couple of months ago, I heard this on the radio on the BBC World Service: they were interviewing a lady from an African country, I forget which one, I think it might have been the Republic of Congo. But anyway, she survived an ordeal where some thugs beat her up, and cut off one of her feet, threw her foot in the fire, then took it out of the fire and told one of her kids to eat her dismembered foot, and when her child refused, they killed that child. I don't even know how a person would even think of doing something like that.....

So my question is: what is the nature of human cruelty?
Are we naturally evil?
Is it proof that we evolved from animals?
Because believe me, in war zones, humans, especially the males, can damn sure act like animals. It's still happening in this world today in war zones, and I think it's utterly disgusting.
What do you think about the nature of human cruelty?
Click to expand...
I think we are all capable of cruelty if pushed to far, when three men beat my son to a pulp I could have quite easily tortured and mutilated those people with no remorse,infact I still think about it today four years on what I would like to do to them and I don't think that feeling will ever go away and should I ever get the chance to see them suffer I would enjoy every moment of it. However could I do that to someone who had done me no wrong no I couldn't and I will never understand the minds of people that do, in my opinion these are evil people guided by evil,they say if you are cruel to an animal then you are capable of being cruel to a child both are defenseless beings. Even in war where your target is the enemy woman and children always suffer if not from bombs and guns from the soldiers who hurt them for the hell of it, if I thought my husband sons or brothers were capable of such cruelty I would be heart broken and afraid, to have the same blood running through your veins as the people who commit such cruelty would be sickening
 
M

minnesmoker

Well-Known Member
echelon1k1 said:
Some would say nature, some nurture, but then again there are always exceptions to these rules, but I would say we all have it in us, maybe not a "dark passenger", but there's a different side to all of us - IMO some just find it easier keeping that side in check...
Click to expand...
Antisocial Personality disorder is mostly genetic. (not borderline, aka learned behavior, mostly signified by irrational anger and bouts of excessive guilt) The cruelty is learned, and there's no such thing as a dark passenger. It's more like a truly empty vessel that gets filled with everything they're exposed to. Make that violence, and it may spark curiosity and "exploration." I agree that all people have the ability to commit especially violent crimes on each other -- but, that is NOT a psychopath! We don't love and revere life necessarily, but we don't set out to destroy it.

TheGanjaWhisperer said:
Everyone you meet is different, there may be a person you meet who is just mean or cruel. They dont care and will do anything in their power to get ahead, personal gain doesnt need to be a factor. Theres many reasons why some people are cruel like: Personal issues, low self image, anger , thought process ( They may think they're acting in an acceptable manor when in actuallity they're not) Brain chemestry is what seperates the cruel from the sadistic. Some people dont have the mechanisims for empathy that most of us do. People with a lack of empathy for another makes them more cruel, when the person isnt capable of any empathy whats so ever they're clinically disgnosed by the DSM-IV as psychopaths.
Click to expand...
You mean Anti-social personality disorder. Psychopath/sociopath are no longer recognized terms in the DSM. The cruelty and bloodlust are normally a learned behavior, but the underlying psychopathology is mostly a genetic trait. My MRI looks totally different than a normal persons, or a person with Borderline Antisocial Personality Disorder. Being a psychopath doesn't make me violent -- I've never gotten off on violence. I can and will use any amount of force/violence to protect what's "mine" but, even in a group setting I've always found gratuitous violence to be a sign of weakness.

Mass psychopathology is a myth. This was (much like the raping and murdering of ancestors here in the U.S.) a jingoistic attempt to destroy a dynasty that had been at war with Japan on and off for over 500 years. That's a lot of national hate, a lot of programming of the soldiers and people to fear and hate the Chinese.

All soldiers MUST learn to become a bit "psychopathic" ... However they justify it, dehumanizing the enemy is required, unless you want suicide attempts in the 80% range. Take that dehumanization, add to it 500+ years of nationalistic hate for the Chinese, and you have massacres. Dehumanizing is the secret to most massacres through history (First Nations/Native Americans, Africans, Jews/Gypsies, Japanese, etc.)
 
BDBandit

BDBandit

Well-Known Member
Some people are fucked up man. That's how it has always been and that's how it will always be unfortunately.
 
makaha99

makaha99

Active Member
Granny weed said:
I think we are all capable of cruelty if pushed to far, when three men beat my son to a pulp I could have quite easily tortured and mutilated those people with no remorse,infact I still think about it today four years on what I would like to do to them and I don't think that feeling will ever go away and should I ever get the chance to see them suffer I would enjoy every moment of it. However could I do that to someone who had done me no wrong no I couldn't and I will never understand the minds of people that do, in my opinion these are evil people guided by evil,they say if you are cruel to an animal then you are capable of being cruel to a child both are defenseless beings. Even in war where your target is the enemy woman and children always suffer if not from bombs and guns from the soldiers who hurt them for the hell of it, if I thought my husband sons or brothers were capable of such cruelty I would be heart broken and afraid, to have the same blood running through your veins as the people who commit such cruelty would be sickening
Click to expand...
I'm sorry to hear that, but yeah, of course if someone hurt someone you love, it is natural to want to get back at them. I mentioned that point in the original post--that the attacks against the chinese civilians were unprovoked attacks, so yeah, it's a different situation. But yeah, I agree with what you said.....
 
mamakush

mamakush

Active Member
I don't think it's proof that we've evolved from animals. Ants and humans are considered the only two species on the planet that war with their own species to such an egregious extent.

I think there are a lot of factors that go into it. Technology (read Jared Diamond), fear, chemical imbalances, break down of community... who knows? It is very interesting how one truly loose cannon (ie Hitler) can convince so many people to follow along with their madness.
 
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