Reddit reviews Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland

No, it isn't. If you would like to know more I suggest you read "Hitler's Willing Executioners" by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen and "Ordinary Men" by Christopher Browning

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https://www.amazon.com/Hitlers-Willing-Executioners-Ordinary-Holocaust/dp/0679772685/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3R1FH4PO6HEYJ&keywords=hitlers+willing+executioners+by+daniel+goldhagen&qid=1568991878&s=books&sprefix=hitlers+%2Cstripbooks%2C154&sr=1-1

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https://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Men-Reserve-Battalion-Solution/dp/0062303023/ref=asc_df_0062303023/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=312028586631&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=17934141838329272719&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9002445&hvtargid=aud-801381245258:pla-417307105818&psc=1

I know this isn't the time or place but if you guys are interested there's a great book about this Litteral exact thing.

It's called ordinary men and I suggest anyone interested in history have a read. It's super interesting

Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062303023/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_FhFUAb7SYTDE8

Wow! That was a fascinating read. Thanks for sharing. It really speaks to the same tribal behaviors we are seeing in current society.

I would also recommend the book “Ordinary Men” for a similar look at how an entire society became mass murderers.

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Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062303023/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_sEqHDbZNFPNYX

Yes, but it only goes so far. Browning's Ordinary Men were middle-aged, married men from the most communist, least nazified region of Germany and yet they killed along with the rest.

There IS work that shows, for example, that Austrians were overrepresented in the SS and in killing units as were individuals from border regions. Also, that the generation born before WWI but not old enough to participate were particularly active.

Those interested in this topic might like the book "Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland" ( https://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Men-Reserve-Battalion-Solution/dp/0062303023 ) about a group German police who started out as low level officers and slowly got corrupted into committing terrible acts on behalf of the Nazis.

From the amazon.com description:

>Ordinary Men is the true story of Reserve Police Battalion 101 of the German Order Police, which was responsible for mass shootings as well as round-ups of Jewish people for deportation to Nazi death camps in Poland in 1942. Browning argues that most of the men of RPB 101 were not fanatical Nazis but, rather, ordinary middle-aged, working-class men who committed these atrocities out of a mixture of motives, including the group dynamics of conformity, deference to authority, role adaptation, and the altering of moral norms to justify their actions. Very quickly three groups emerged within the battalion: a core of eager killers, a plurality who carried out their duties reliably but without initiative, and a small minority who evaded participation in the acts of killing without diminishing the murderous efficiency of the battalion whatsoever.
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>While this book discusses a specific Reserve Unit during WWII, the general argument Browning makes is that most people succumb to the pressures of a group setting and commit actions they would never do of their own volition.
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>Ordinary Men is a powerful, chilling, and important work with themes and arguments that continue to resonate today.
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>“A remarkable—and singularly chilling—glimpse of human behavior...This meticulously researched book...represents a major contribution to the literature of the Holocaust."—Newsweek

Found the book via google machine Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning

“Christopher Browning’s shocking account of how a unit of average middle-aged Germans became the cold-blooded murderers of tens of thousands of Jews.”

I’m actually glad you brought the topic back up as I just ordered the book myself! My wife and I have actually talked about this subject a lot lately, and just how powerful conditioning actual is in our lives. Whether it be for things like those German officers, self help affirmations or training for a marathon (which is what I am trying to do right now), it’s all different aspects of being conditioned into becoming something else, step by step. Gaining that sort of understanding has greatly improved my ability to empathize with others and has made me a much more centered and content person. Honestly.

Read up about Germany's Reserve Police Battalion 101 during WW2 - Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning is a great read into how normal everyday people can become monsters near-overnight. Not to say mainland isn't sending in the military too - just wanted to shed some light on human weaknesses in general.

Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062303023/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_x7RBDbRYQ7AGM

He’s actually referencing the book Ordinary Men. It’s an account of some of the horrors that went down in Poland during the final solution. It tells the story of a battalion of German police officers who basically would have to go in after the army had “captured a region” and do the dirty work of not only loading people on to trains to be sent to the death camps, but were also later slowly coerced into killing thousands of people by executing them in the forests and farm land surrounding the towns that had been captured. This is the book in case you’re interested.

Ordinary Men

https://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Men-Reserve-Battalion-Solution/dp/0062303023/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1523719680&sr=8-2&keywords=ordinary+men&dpID=51LEkLnM3RL&preST=_SY291_BO1,204,203,200_QL40_&dpSrc=srch

Required reading

There is a great book about German Police Battalion 101 called Ordinary Men... it demonstrates how pre-war these citizen police officers were simple, ordinary people (just like you and me); but during the war, 85% of these citizens became monsters. After the war, most had no problem resuming civilian lifestyles.

There are many detailed comparisons / conclusions made with the Milgram Prison Experiments, as well as an updated chapter at the end in response to some of the criticisms towards his original text.

As other users have said it wasn't just gas chambers, the nazi's used guns, herding people into building and starting them on fire, gas trucks and of course gas chambers. I would suggest yourself reading Ordinary Men it is a short book that explains the people behind the mass shooting deaths of millions in the East and the reason the nazi's changed to other forms. It is dark, it is depressing but it isn't technical, if you think your friend can handle it pass it on to him.

That does! Thank you:) I think it is too! I know most people realy only focus on the Nazi part of it all, but there’s so much to German history! (Like the Barbaric Tribes).


World Wars are super interesting! Have tou ever read All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque? There’s “sequel” to that book called The Road Back. It looks at what happens to a (German) soldier after World War I ended. That’s supposed to be an accurate representation of soldier’s sentiments at the time. Storm of Steel by Ernst Junger is a (German) soldier’s experience during WWI. Holocaust by Bullets, Ordinary Men, Sleepwalkers, Europe’s Last Summer, and A Woman In Berlin are some pretty incredible books about these wars. Don’t know of you’ve heard of them or have read them, but thought I’d made the suggestion! Movie wise I’d say Generation War if you haven’t see it yet:) The Darkest Hour movie was great if you haven’t seen that! I’m planning to watch Babylon Berlin soon. Don’t know if you were looking for suggestions but I thought I’d make some!

Human nature is so much more complicated than that.

>Ordinary Men is the true story of Reserve Police Battalion 101 of the German Order Police, which was responsible for mass shootings as well as round-ups of Jewish people for deportation to Nazi death camps in Poland in 1942. Browning argues that most of the men of  RPB 101 were not fanatical Nazis but, rather, ordinary middle-aged, working-class men who committed these atrocities out of a mixture of motives, including the group dynamics of conformity, deference to authority, role adaptation, and the altering of moral norms to justify their actions. Very quickly three groups emerged within the battalion: a core of eager killers, a plurality who carried out their duties reliably but without initiative, and a small minority who evaded participation in the acts of killing without diminishing the murderous efficiency of the battalion whatsoever.

Ordinary Men

I would suggest Ordinary Men for much more information about this very subject.

>To be fair, a lot of Nazi soldiers were just following orders out of fear.

Okay, I need to see anything you have to support that. I have never read anything about Nazi Germany that suggests that. Not in "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" or anywhere else.

I did read a comprehensive analysis of non-Nazis in Poland in "Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland". The conclusion the authors made were that nearly all of these people were not doing out of fear, but because it was their task/job/duty/pick your definition. Like a Bell Curve, there were fervent believers, and those who resisted but fear was a small portion of the motivation of them.

This analysis has its critics, but they don't state anything like what you've stated. So if you have anything that has looked at primary documents (And cites them) and comes to the conclusion you've stated I'd love to read it. Because it does not mesh with anything I've seen or read before, either as an analysis/historical accounting or the criticisms of those works.

> How do you think the citizens are convinced to stand by and let evil happen?

I don't think they need convincing in the first place, honestly. I think so long as it doesn't effect them directly they'll just watch it happen, perfectly content. The only time they'll react is if they are worried they will be next. If they can benefit, or be convinced they'll benefit, they'll willingly take part.

> Because they agree to follow the "social contract"

I don't think there is such as thing. If its a contract, then it can be violated by either party. Since there are no consequences if the gov't breaks it, its really just imposed rules from the elites. Whatever the origins of the idea of the social contract, I think ultimately its meaningless. Those in power have power, those that aren't, don't, and that's all there ever was and will be.

> It was true in Nazi Germany and it's true in many countries today.

Right, we seem to agree here, basically, if someone says "Sure, its fine to kill Jews." then pretty much everyone goes, "Oh, well I guess there isn't a moral problem here at all, lets take their stuff."

> That's why it's so important not to be a sheeple, and to stand up against corruption, evil, wars, and the demonization of "the others" as scapegoats for the powerful in corrupt/evil countries, among other things.

I don't disagree, exactly, but I don't think humans are capable of this. There is an incredible amount of research that shows that people are pretty crappy. The Milgram Experiment is a good example of what we have to work with here. Even if people resist initially (The book "Ordinary Men" goes into detail about this, I admit I have not read it, for it would be a very depressing read I'm not convinced I want to know the details of.) they eventually conform to whatever they are told too, no matter how terrible it is.

From the link, "Very quickly three groups emerged within the battalion: a core of eager killers, a plurality who carried out their duties reliably but without initiative, and a small minority who evaded participation in the acts of killing without diminishing the murderous efficiency of the battalion whatsoever." Emphasis mine. Everyone wants to think that they'd be in that small (and ultimately pointless, sadly) minority, but the truth is we'd never know unless actually faced with the situation. (Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness" is another good book with a rather depressing message, although a fictional story I think its unfortunately bang-on).

Given all this (some of which is well researched, some of it is just my opinion), I find talk of standing up to corruption and evil, etc, to be well intentioned, but ultimately hopeless. I think humans are essentially self-serving and evil, and that fear of consequences is usually the only thing preventing them from running wild.

> Sorry to slap your lightheartedness with some realism, lol. :D

Nah, we are just flappin the gums after all :) But seriously, I find humanity to be terrifying and extremely depressing.

If you haven’t, I HIGHLY recommend reading a book called Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland. It is the true story written from documents, interviews, and eye witness statements about how a simple Polish reserve police force became a death squad, murdering their own people. At the end it goes into social experiments on people conforming to authority figures such as The Milgram Experiment and The Stanford Prison Experiment.

It is extremely powerful and I actually had to put the book down and stop reading a few times because the descriptions of events were so heartbreaking. I cannot recommend this book enough.

The Milgram Experiment by Prof. Stanley Milgram. Read this if you'd like to learn the psychological reasons that allow and convince ordinary people to do inhumane actions against one another. The professor sought to find out how places like Auschwitz could staff such large camps without the workers and guards rebeling. Easy to read and well explained. This would help you understand how and why the next two books accounts were possible.

Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland by Christopher Browning. The Milgram Experiment explains how this process can happen by demonstrating it in a lab setting but Ordinary Men shows you a close up view of a real life event of regular men becoming monsters.

Unit 731 Testimony: Japan’s Wartime Human Experimentation Program by Hal Gold. Some of the most disturbing human experimentation I've ever heard of.

As you should, you think you would have been part of the solution and not the problem if you were a member of Nazi Germany? No, you’d contribute to the problem.

Edit: This is a great book that explains this in depth.

The book Ordinary Men by Christopher R. Browning might provide you with some answers, blew my mind.

Breif Description:
While this book discusses a specific Reserve Unit during WWII, the general argument Browning makes is that most people succumb to the pressures of a group setting and commit actions they would never do of their own volition.

https://www.amazon.ca/Ordinary-Men-Reserve-Battalion-Solution/dp/0062303023/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1543123973&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=ordinary+men&dpPl=1&dpID=51LEkLnM3RL&ref=plSrch

Might I suggest adding https://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Men-Reserve-Battalion-Solution/dp/0062303023 to your reading list?

Ordinary men

> But no. Soldiers are people -and can be good or bad, but I've seen so much good, and looked for and found so little bad.

https://www.amazon.com/Ordinary-Men-Reserve-Battalion-Solution/dp/0062303023

>Ordinary Men is the true story of Reserve Police Battalion 101 of the German Order Police, which was responsible for mass shootings as well as roundups of Jewish people for deportation to Nazi death camps in Poland in 1942.

You obviously didnt watch the video.

"you dont want to think about what you'll have to do, shoot an american on these streets".

It has little to do with your appeal to emotion arguments, and more to do with what actually occurs in groups or tribes, especially when a strict hierarchy and training to obey orders comes into the equation.

> What sucks is that these poor bastards are just doing their jobs, and they likely feel awful about it.

uh hu

People like you enable horrors. I'd recommend reading about how badly your attitude can go.

Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland

On my December reading list!