There is some formal evidence that difficult life conditions increase violence. In economically difficult times there were more lynchings in the South.32 Economic hardship (resulting from low cotton prices) was associated with lynchings of black people and to a slight degree with lynchings of white “ingroup” members. In addition, the degree of decline in economic well-being was associated with the frequency of lynchings.33 Economic problems are associated with an increased rate of murder and other violent crime or, in societies where social taboos against violence are strong, such as Japan, an increased rate of suicide.34 Associated with higher rates of unemployment are more reports of child abuse.
If difficult life conditions are to result in the mistreatment of groups, a substantial number of people, including a potentially dominant group, must be affected. The problems must be persistent, with cumulative psychological effects. Hitler’s rise to power was the result of difficult life conditions, and the Nazi genocide was perpetrated at a time when the fortunes of Germany on the battlefields of World War II took a turn for the worse. In Cambodia, the evacuation of cities and murder of millions of city dwellers occurred after years of civil war, hunger, and misery. Turkey suffered losses of territory, power, and status for many years before and during World War I before murdering the Armenians. In Argentina, severe economic problems and political terrorism preceded the disappearances.
The effect of stress and danger on psychological experience
Scott Peck’s account of the My Lai massacre shows how stress and distress, which are among the usual consequences of difficult conditions, affect human behavior.35
The life of a soldier in a combat zone is one of chronic stress.... The troops of Task Force Barker.. .were at the other end of the world from their homes. The food was poor, the insects thick, the heat enervating, the sleeping quarters uncomfortable. Then there was the danger, usually not as severe as in other wars, yet probably even more stressful in Vietnam because it was so unpredictable. It came in the form of mortar rounds in the night when the soldiers thought they were safe, booby traps tripped on the way to the latrine, mines that blew a solder’s legs off as he strolled down a pretty lane.... the enemy appeared when and where it was unexpected. (Pp. 220-1)
In the previous month they had achieved no military success. Unable to engage the enemy, they had themselves sustained a number of casualties from mines and booby traps. The province was considered to be a Vietcong stronghold, one in which the civilian population was largely controlled and influenced by the Communist guerrillas. It was generally felt that the civilians aided and abetted the guerillas to such a degree that it was often difficult to distinguish the combatants from the noncombatants. Hence the Americans tended to hate and distrust all Vietnamese in the area. (P. 213)
On the eve of the operation there seemed to be a mood of anticipation; finally they would engage the enemy and succeed in doing what they were there for. (P. 213) When “Charlie” Company moved into the hamlets of My Lai they discovered not a single combatant. None of the Vietnamese was armed. No one fired on them. They found only unarmed women, children, and old men.
Some of the things that then happened are unclear. What is clear, however, is that the troops of C Company killed at least somewhere between five and six hundred of those unarmed villagers.... These people were killed in a variety of ways. The most large-scale killings occurred in the particular hamlet of My Lai 4. There the first platoon of Charlie Company, under the command of Lieutenant William L. Calley, Jr., herded villagers into groups of twenty to forty or more, who were then slaughtered by rifle fire, machine gun fire, or grenades. (P. 214)
Peck suggested that humans regress under prolonged stress or discomfort; they become more primitive, childish. I believe this happens mainly when basic needs for safety, control, predictability, and self-respect are frustrated. Another response to stress is the mechanism of defense that Robert Jay Lifton called “psychic numbing.” When our emotions are overwhelmingly unpleasant or painful, we anesthetize ourselves; soldiers become able to tolerate mangled bodies, and the capacity for horror becomes blunted. While this diminishes suffering, it also makes us insensitive to the suffering of others, especially when the other is defined as different, the member of an outgroup, or an enemy bent on our destruction.
This analysis applies not only to the stress of soldiers in combat, but also to stress created by difficult life conditions. Starvation, homelessness, and even others’ deaths can become less worthy of notice as habituation and psychic numbing diminish our capacity for empathy.
Victims of mistreatment can reach a point where they welcome another’s death or misfortune if it contributes to their own survival or relative wellbeing. Eli Wiesel says in Night that when his own father died in Buchenwald of dysentery, his sorrow was mixed with relief over the lifting of a burden that made his own survival more difficult. Another dramatic example is described in the following statement by a survivor of the Treblinka concentration camp, quoted in Sereny’s book Into That Darkness. Jewish workers lived on supplies taken while sorting the belongings of incoming “transports,” the wagon loads of people brought to the camp to be killed in gas chambers. The survivor talks about a time when, for a while, no transports were arriving.
Things went from bad to worse that month of March... .There were no transports. .. .In the storehouses everything had been packed up and shipped – we had never before seen all the space because it had always been so full.... You can’t imaging what we felt when there was nothing there. You see, the things were our justification for being alive. If there were no things to administer, why would they let us stay alive? On top
