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Against the Indifference Hypothesis: The Holocaust and the Enthusiasts for Murder
Author(s) -
Glass James M.
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
political psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.419
H-Index - 95
eISSN - 1467-9221
pISSN - 0162-895X
DOI - 10.1111/0162-895x.00049
Subject(s) - the holocaust , ideology , legitimation , psychology , perception , psychoanalysis , criminology , state (computer science) , poison control , social psychology , sociology , law , political science , politics , medicine , algorithm , neuroscience , computer science , environmental health
This essay takes issue with what is known as the “indifference” hypothesis regarding the murder of Jews during the Holocaust. The Germans' fear of typhus, their perception of the Jew as poisonous, biological matter, “life unworthy of life,” created a group state of mind in which many individual Germans, particularly those in the professions, enthusiastically participated in the logistics, machinery, ideology and legitimation of mass murder.