The discussion in the Bad things happen to good people thread reminds me of a book I read last year (Kings, Conquerors, Psychopaths by Joseph Abraham) – parts of it were very bleak, but it made me think a lot, and part of its purpose was to dispel the myth of the “good king” and posit that most leaders in the history of the world were bullies of one kind or another. Anyway, @Mervin_Bitikofer’s points about how we forget how easy it is to become the oppressor reminded me of this quote:
The ancient Romans terrorized children with their version of the boogieman, 'Hannibal ad portas!" – ‘Hannibal is at the gates!’ Today we must constantly terrorize ourselves by repeating ‘Hitler ad portas.’ That, perhaps, is the highest purpose of Holocaust studies: to teach us that Hitler and a long line of would-be Hitlers are always at the gates. We are always one demagogue away, we are always one angry, jaded electorate away, from letting Hitler slip back inside the walls of civilization, assemble his brutalizers, and resume his slaughter.
To these concerns, we must also add the worry that just as we all are potential Jews, we are all potential Nazis as well. … To protect ourselves and each other, we must become aware that we are all recovering alcoholics, we all have the potential to relapse into Nazism. The solution is that we recognize and constantly guard against the pitiless and the evil within ourselves as well as in others.