Bomber boys - bbc one

[kendo65]

'how many people like Heydrich, Hitler does it take to pull a whole society along behind them? Obviously not everyone is complicit. How many then need to keep quiet and just follow orders? What happens to those who oppose but feel powerless to intervene?'

Originally Posted by RCAF_FB_Orville

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What it did unfortunately illustrate is what Humanity is capable of, and particularly the insidious and all pervasive effect of a Fascist states propaganda machine upon a populace.

The psychological phenomena of 'herding' has been posited as a possible explanation, and experiments like the 'Stanford prison experiment' *and the 'Milgram experiment' clearly illustrate how otherwise 'normal' people can behave when told to do unspeakable things by what they perceive to be an 'authority' figure.
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I had thought of those experiments and what they say about the pliability of the 'ordinary' person when I was writing the above. Establishing the 'right' conditions of deference to authority and unquestioning obedience was obviously a key facet of the Nazi regime.

Nonetheless there were those in the Milgram / Stanford experiments who refused to comply, just as there were those in Germany. For those individuals is it a deeper commitment to an inner moral sense that leads them to refuse to comply even in the face of threats and possible danger? And at any time in any country are the greater mass of the population always just 'following orders' from their perceived superiors? Just that in most cases the orders are comparatively mundane and benign.

(Personally I don't like Graham Norton. I used to like him for his role in Father Ted. I changed my mind when I realised that it wasn't great acting, but that he actually was as annoying as that in real life too!)