pop morality

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Your introducing a red herring while moving the goal posts!

In my senerio I go to great lengths to explain science has given it's blessing stating their is no physical or mental harm that comes to certain children. Likewise their is a genetic predisposition for pedophilia. Just like science gave it's blessing on homosexuality clearing the way from physical and mental concerns and is hasn't yet but is still striving to find that gay gene. It took it a step further even and verified a pedo gene, so technically their is a more legitmate reason for pedophilia in this senerio than homosexuality. Now using the very same metric that got homosexuality in every single show now on tv (pop culture/morality) explain why you have a reservation on pedophilia? Obviously science and reason are not working for you, because they contradict your morality. so what then tells you that 'science' got it wrong with pedophilia and right with homosexuality?

If you can/won't put a lable on it I can and will if you like.

Re: Goalposts... I have done no such thing. Your own counter-analysis shows why this is so.

I'm not sure what you mean by "certain children" are not harmed by someone having sex with them despite their inability to consent to the acts being performed on them. If you're trying to argue that pedophilia is not harmful to children, you're going to have an uphill battle (to put it nicely) against the people I've known who were deeply harmed by their childhood molesters.

While it is true that there seem to be genetic factors that contribute to the emergence of pedophilia, it does not follow that "well, it's genetic, therefore it must be acceptable behavior". Thus my discussion of the harm factor, which you (seem to have) deemed goalpost-moving. There are also genetic factors which make a person prone to fits of rage and violence, yet because of the harm factor (inflicting the desires of the perpetrator on those who do not wish to be harmed) we still prosecute them for Assault/Battery in the same way as those who simply chose to become violent for other reasons. It's literally the difference between sparring and assault... if I consent to spar with you, then no matter how bloody I become in our bout, it's not a crime. Indeed, it's a career for people like Holyfield, Tyson, Ali, etc. But the moment I say stop, or if you do it to me when I cannot or did not give consent to be punched, then you have committed a felony.

I am also unaware of science having "given it's [sic] blessing" to homosexuality, and as far as I am aware the development of human sexual attraction is an epigenetic or developmental factor, rather than there existing such a thing as "a gay gene". That changes nothing; it's clearly not a choice for people who are homosexual (nor is it a choice for pedophiles; this factor just does not matter when it comes to whether or not it's acceptable for the State to prohibit the behavior of consenting adults, just as whether or not predispositions to enjoy violence does not make it acceptable or unacceptable for two people to spar).

Science may contribute to the future acceptance of hebephilia, as I stated above, if it is shown that it is not harmful despite our current (including my own) reservations on the question. Pedophilia, on the other hand, remains a separate question, and I don't see a future in which science ever will say, "It's okay now, go ahead and screw kids."

I understand that, in the minds of Christians who have been taught all their lives that only male-female, procreative sex is acceptable behavior, it may seem that freedom for homosexuals equates to freedom for any and all "perversions" from that "norm", as you see it... but it does not follow that A = B. For a secular thinker (including by definition, the Law under a secular government), the question is always "does this liberty do harm to others, such that it must be restricted?", and homosexuality is not a category that qualifies, as you would know if you had read Lawrence v. Texas, the SCotUS case in which that prohibition was forever lifted.

The case did not say "okay, now, all sexual behavior is permissible". It said, quote:

The Court began its substantive discussion in Bowers as follows: “The issue presented is whether the Federal Constitution confers a fundamental right upon homosexuals to engage in sodomy and hence invalidates the laws of the many States that still make such conduct illegal and have done so for a very long time.” That statement, we now conclude, discloses the Court’s own failure to appreciate the extent of the liberty at stake. To say that the issue in Bowers was simply the right to engage in certain sexual conduct demeans the claim the individual put forward, just as it would demean a married couple were it to be said marriage is simply about the right to have sexual intercourse. The laws involved in Bowers and here are, to be sure, statutes that purport to do no more than prohibit a particular sexual act. Their penalties and purposes, though, have more far-reaching consequences, touching upon the most private human conduct, sexual behavior, and in the most private of places, the home. The statutes do seek to control a personal relationship that, whether or not entitled to formal recognition in the law, is within the liberty of persons to choose without being punished as criminals.

This, as a general rule, should counsel against attempts by the State, or a court, to define the meaning of the relationship or to set its boundaries absent injury to a person or abuse of an institution the law protects. It suffices for us to acknowledge that adults may choose to enter upon this relationship in the confines of their homes and their own private lives and still retain their dignity as free persons. When sexuality finds overt expression in intimate conduct with another person, the conduct can be but one element in a personal bond that is more enduring. The liberty protected by the Constitution allows homosexual persons the right to make this choice. [...]

The present case does not involve minors. It does not involve persons who might be injured or coerced or who are situated in relationships where consent might not easily be refused. It does not involve public conduct or prostitution. It does not involve whether the government must give formal recognition to any relationship that homosexual persons seek to enter. The case does involve two adults who, with full and mutual consent from each other, engaged in sexual practices common to a homosexual lifestyle. The petitioners are entitled to respect for their private lives. The State cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime. Their right to liberty under the Due Process Clause gives them the full right to engage in their conduct without intervention of the government. “It is a promise of the Constitution that there is a realm of personal liberty which the government may not enter.” The Texas statute furthers no legitimate state interest which can justify its intrusion into the personal and private life of the individual.

Protection from harm is a "legitimate state interest", the occurrence of which may be legislated to prohibit, as I stated above. The same applies to this moral question. That's why I won't say these things are "forever wrong", even though I express strong reservations about even the possibility of later acceptance of pedophilia. I'll leave you with the closing statement (bold emphasis my own) by Justice Kennedy, who wrote the Majority Opinion in the case:

"Had those who drew and ratified the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth Amendment or the Fourteenth Amendment known the components of liberty in its manifold possibilities, they might have been more specific. They did not presume to have this insight. They knew times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress. As the Constitution endures, persons in every generation can invoke its principles in their own search for greater freedom."

[Drich]

Sub species:



A taxonomist decides whether to recognize a subspecies or not. A common way to decide is that organisms belonging to different subspecies of the same species are capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring, but they do not usually interbreed in nature due to geographic isolation, sexual selection, or other factors. The differences between subspecies are usually less distinct than the differences between species.





So even though the Jews were scattered throughout the world, they generally did not interbreed with gentiles (sexual selection criteria of subspecies met); and also Africans were originally geographically isolated.  Therefore Hitler, presumably being a self-proclaimed taxonomist, made the necessary determination that Jews and Africans were indeed of a different subspecies than the Nazis.



So I didn't read it carefully before, but now yes, it's clear that Hitler perverted science to further his agenda.  As you note, the scientific community does not divide humanity into different subspecies.

the word is exploit not pervert. Hitler used and legitimately so, the fact that humanity was originally subdivided into a sub species. What wasn't 'science' was to say one race was better/the ultimate evolution of man while the others were genetic casts offs, what evolution was leaving behind.
This is the ultimate end of science/evolution, eventually this question will come around again. we dance around it in movies and in comics with the advent of 'mutants/super heroes/"homo sapeian- superior" but it all originated with the idea that the aryan race was the genetic stock needed to breed the homosapeian- superior (Hitler's supermen) that all other races were genetically inferior/Neanderthal type sub species.

Now the real perversion of science comes in the way of removing our sub species classification in an effort to pretend we are all the same. Now if we are all under God we can claim this unity, unless God puts us in a rank in file order, but if we are all sentient monkeys as Darwin suggests, then the logical conclusion/the truth is closer to what Hitler taught than what we tell ourselves now. So if their is a perversion, it is in the lie/non scientific way we classify ourselves now, and not what Hitler based his deceitful propaganda on.

I find it regrettable, though, that you won't take a firm stance on your moral absolutes.  Please respond to this:

1. The Jews made 600+ Do and Don't laws

So? Jesus Himself said they were a perversion of what God intended. He even took acouple apart to show the wickness found in their 'morality.'

2. These laws were very specific (don't cook a goat in its mother's milk?!)

You are confusing the laws of the Jews with the law of God. The Jews added to the laws of God and as a result had over 600 does and don't.

3. These laws covered minor and major offenses (and punishments were applied accordingly)

as were the law of God.

4. The Jews were aware of what rape is (there was the rape of Dinah, the rape of Tamar, and the dusk-till-dawn-rape-to-death of the levite's concubine in Judges 19)

5. There is no law against rape

As i pointed out, Rape was apart of the survival of the species then.
As distastful as it is now, then it ensured a proper genetic diversity. Don't like rape? know somewhere down your genetic line, one of your grandmothers was indeed raped, and you are here because of it.

6. There is no law against pedophilia

Not true. Their were commands detailing the minimum age one could be to be married. (which wasn't until they were considered to be adults.) to have sex with someone before they were confirmed to be an adult was punishable by death. (God's law) which if you or your source material just did a 'thou shalt not be a pedophile' google search I could see how one would assume that.
Which subsequently how we know marry to be a virgin. Joseph took her to be his wife, but they were not married. This means he took responsibility (provided for her fed her) till she was old enough to be married. back then that was the only reason to wait to get married.

7. There is no law against fornication (unless one of the parties is married/engaged, in which case it is adultery)

Again not true.
The command is no one is to have sex outside the confines of a sanctified marriage. or rather a Marriage is the only place to have sanctified sex. which means all other sexual encounters are forbidden. Deu 22 backs into this command by saying a man can marry a woman for the purpose of having sex. This is the only command that sanctifies it in the OT all other examples are forbidden.

The problem here is the same as your 'thou shalt not be a pedophile' claim.. You were looking for an expressed command using the terminology of today. while the terms were not formlized in the OT the principles were indeed spelled out.

So I find a remarkable coincidence here.  We savage atheists have no morality, absolute or otherwise, and therefore our favorite pastime is of course raping babies.  Yet your absolute morality does not outlaw this behavior, so you have no actual way of knowing that it is wrong.  You can't admit that you know raping babies is wrong, because if you do then you admit that the atheist and the Christian both invent their own morality.

maybe if you read a bible you could actually speak intelligently about it, that way you would not have to rely on anti God web sites and bloggers who hate the bible and God to give you a wrong slanted view of it. So that when you get up on your high horse/soap box and begin to arrogantly bestow all the injustices of God, someone who has book chapter and verse won't make you look like a 'stupid head' by contradicting all of the moral points you were so eager to make.

[Drich]

but again according to whom?
We already have the vechicals in placed in our society that would allow us mass genocide, not only that we have the tools they didnt  have. Again look at abortion, for all but well placed marketing campaign and a supreme court ruling bottom line we are a soceity who kills babies inurtro by pulling them apart with power vacuum tools, or we induce labor give partial birth, insert scissors into the base of the skull and suck out the brains.. (i can post youtube videos again if you like) Now the debate has turned to the elderly, and although it's not completely on the books Hospice is little more than assisted suicide. despite how you feel about hospices current role do you think it will remain content 'killing off' those with in it's current mission statement? What if soceity can justify lumping another group in with the 'dying?'

What I am point to is the fact that if we simply dress up the acts of the nazi's and use the right marketing, nothing the Nazis did would be out of bounds. All a soceity need do is go slow and errode our value systems slowly and over large amounts of time.
Instead of the jews, look at what we are doing with Muslims, or rather radical muslims.. (do you see how you perception changed?) for most people what you say radicalized the gloves come off. and everything is fair game, and it can be strongly argued rightfully so.. But bottom line we are sanctioning the wholesale slaughter of millions, which at it's core is what the Nazis did.. Remember they like us were 'under attack' by monsters and more so 10's of thousands of germans were starving to death because of a direct result of thier actions. or so they were told.

With out an absolute to guide you how do you know/how can you say the bottom line action of one country is justifiable and the bottom line actions of another are not?

No, I'am saying morals do not define my actions nor do they make me a good or bad person.
I know I am a sinner, and I sin all the time (again has nothing to do with immorality) therefore in order to obtain righteousness I sought atonement. Per our romans study We know that being redeemed frees us from the law as a means to righteousness. meaning I am not a good person because of what I do. I will be judge good, because I taken the righteousness of Christ, and now His righteousness/Morality is what is being judged. So then why follow the law? Again we can completely. we live in line with the law not as a means to being 'moral' but as a result of being saved. it is a effect of salvation not a cause. so what happens if we 'back slide' we are and always will be 'back slid-en' as our best will never be good enough. So we simply repent and move on.

So what happens if the life we live resembles nothing of the life of Christ? It's a good indication that we are not saved. Again the direct result of salvation is what most of you would identify as a 'christian moral life.' But again it is not this life we live or code we live by that defines our righteousness.

You didn't actually answer either point.  Care to try again, this time reading what I actually wrote?

Actually alpo I did answer what you wrote. I just did not yield to your terminology. I am trying to drag you from a morality "A" or Morality "B" POV to seeing a third option. The reason it doesn't seem like I havn't answered your question is because you think the world is only chocolate or vanilla. I answered your question with strawberry

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Geezus, Drich... what part of "Hitler did not use science; he perverted and misrepresented the findings of science for his own ideological and political purposes" is difficult to understand, here?

[Angrboda]

You didn't actually answer either point.  Care to try again, this time reading what I actually wrote?

Actually alpo I did answer what you wrote. I just did not yield to your terminology. I am trying to drag you from a morality "A" or Morality "B" POV to seeing a third option. The reason it doesn't seem like I havn't answered your question is because you think the world is only chocolate or vanilla. I answered your question with strawberry

No, I showed how your world view fits into my terminology. You didn't answer a third option, you just ignored the points I made and returned to your semantic argument. Settling moral debts through atonement is every bit as much a system of arbitrary morals as settling moral debts through payback. Just as arbitrary and just as relative. You haven't escaped pop morality, you've just adopted a specific one, one based on atonement.

[GrandizerII]

So cognitive empathy you have. More importantly, how good is your affective empathy?

under cognitive control. (most of the time.)

That doesn't sound right.

[Nihilist Virus]

Sub species:



A taxonomist decides whether to recognize a subspecies or not. A common way to decide is that organisms belonging to different subspecies of the same species are capable of interbreeding and producing fertile offspring, but they do not usually interbreed in nature due to geographic isolation, sexual selection, or other factors. The differences between subspecies are usually less distinct than the differences between species.





So even though the Jews were scattered throughout the world, they generally did not interbreed with gentiles (sexual selection criteria of subspecies met); and also Africans were originally geographically isolated.  Therefore Hitler, presumably being a self-proclaimed taxonomist, made the necessary determination that Jews and Africans were indeed of a different subspecies than the Nazis.



So I didn't read it carefully before, but now yes, it's clear that Hitler perverted science to further his agenda.  As you note, the scientific community does not divide humanity into different subspecies.

the word is exploit not pervert. Hitler used and legitimately so, the fact that humanity was originally subdivided into a sub species. What wasn't 'science' was to say one race was better/the ultimate evolution of man while the others were genetic casts offs, what evolution was leaving behind.
This is the ultimate end of science/evolution, eventually this question will come around again. we dance around it in movies and in comics with the advent of 'mutants/super heroes/"homo sapeian- superior" but it all originated with the idea that the aryan race was the genetic stock needed to breed the homosapeian- superior (Hitler's supermen) that all other races were genetically inferior/Neanderthal type sub species.

Now the real perversion of science comes in the way of removing our sub species classification in an effort to pretend we are all the same. Now if we are all under God we can claim this unity, unless God puts us in a rank in file order, but if we are all sentient monkeys as Darwin suggests, then the logical conclusion/the truth is closer to what Hitler taught than what we tell ourselves now. So if their is a perversion, it is in the lie/non scientific way we classify ourselves now, and not what Hitler based his deceitful propaganda on.

I hate to break it to you, but skin color and booty size is not a large amount of variance.  I mean, yes, 99% of running backs and wide receivers are black.  Where do you want to go from there?

I find it regrettable, though, that you won't take a firm stance on your moral absolutes.  Please respond to this:

1. The Jews made 600+ Do and Don't laws

So? Jesus Himself said they were a perversion of what God intended. He even took acouple apart to show the wickness found in their 'morality.'

2. These laws were very specific (don't cook a goat in its mother's milk?!)

You are confusing the laws of the Jews with the law of God. The Jews added to the laws of God and as a result had over 600 does and don't.

3. These laws covered minor and major offenses (and punishments were applied accordingly)

as were the law of God.

4. The Jews were aware of what rape is (there was the rape of Dinah, the rape of Tamar, and the dusk-till-dawn-rape-to-death of the levite's concubine in Judges 19)

5. There is no law against rape

As i pointed out, Rape was apart of the survival of the species then.
As distastful as it is now, then it ensured a proper genetic diversity. Don't like rape? know somewhere down your genetic line, one of your grandmothers was indeed raped, and you are here because of it.

6. There is no law against pedophilia

Not true. Their were commands detailing the minimum age one could be to be married. (which wasn't until they were considered to be adults.) to have sex with someone before they were confirmed to be an adult was punishable by death. (God's law) which if you or your source material just did a 'thou shalt not be a pedophile' google search I could see how one would assume that.
Which subsequently how we know marry to be a virgin. Joseph took her to be his wife, but they were not married. This means he took responsibility (provided for her fed her) till she was old enough to be married. back then that was the only reason to wait to get married.

7. There is no law against fornication (unless one of the parties is married/engaged, in which case it is adultery)

Again not true.
The command is no one is to have sex outside the confines of a sanctified marriage. or rather a Marriage is the only place to have sanctified sex. which means all other sexual encounters are forbidden. Deu 22 backs into this command by saying a man can marry a woman for the purpose of having sex. This is the only command that sanctifies it in the OT all other examples are forbidden.

The problem here is the same as your 'thou shalt not be a pedophile' claim.. You were looking for an expressed command using the terminology of today. while the terms were not formlized in the OT the principles were indeed spelled out.

So I find a remarkable coincidence here.  We savage atheists have no morality, absolute or otherwise, and therefore our favorite pastime is of course raping babies.  Yet your absolute morality does not outlaw this behavior, so you have no actual way of knowing that it is wrong.  You can't admit that you know raping babies is wrong, because if you do then you admit that the atheist and the Christian both invent their own morality.

maybe if you read a bible you could actually speak intelligently about it, that way you would not have to rely on anti God web sites and bloggers who hate the bible and God to give you a wrong slanted view of it. So that when you get up on your high horse/soap box and begin to arrogantly bestow all the injustices of God, someone who has book chapter and verse won't make you look like a 'stupid head' by contradicting all of the moral points you were so eager to make.

So? Jesus Himself said they were a perversion of what God intended. He even took acouple apart to show the wickness found in their 'morality.'

You are confusing the laws of the Jews with the law of God. The Jews added to the laws of God and as a result had over 600 does and don't.

If I don't find the absolute morality of God in the Bible, then where do I find it?

In the OP you said this:

"Meaning if you have no absolutes standards in your life (like the bible,)"

So which is it?  Is the Bible the standard of absolute morality or not?  If not, where do you get your morality?




As i pointed out, Rape was apart of the survival of the species then.

As distastful as it is now, then it ensured a proper genetic diversity. Don't like rape? know somewhere down your genetic line, one of your grandmothers was indeed raped, and you are here because of it.

Humans are among the few animals where the female can be sexually open while not being fertile, so your comments don't add up.



Not true. Their were commands detailing the minimum age one could be to be married. (which wasn't until they were considered to be adults.) to have sex with someone before they were confirmed to be an adult was punishable by death. (God's law) which if you or your source material just did a 'thou shalt not be a pedophile' google search I could see how one would assume that.

Which subsequently how we know marry to be a virgin. Joseph took her to be his wife, but they were not married. This means he took responsibility (provided for her fed her) till she was old enough to be married. back then that was the only reason to wait to get married. 

Firstly, I want you to show me chapter and verse where these laws are laid out.  Secondly, if the laws in the Torah are "a perversion of what God intended" then it is irrelevant whether or not "Thou shalt not ___" is included because we can't know if it's what God intended or not.



Again not true.

The command is no one is to have sex outside the confines of a sanctified marriage. or rather a Marriage is the only place to have sanctified sex. which means all other sexual encounters are forbidden. Deu 22 backs into this command by saying a man can marry a woman for the purpose of having sex. This is the only command that sanctifies it in the OT all other examples are forbidden.

The problem here is the same as your 'thou shalt not be a pedophile' claim.. You were looking for an expressed command using the terminology of today. while the terms were not formlized in the OT the principles were indeed spelled out.

Do you have something more specific than "Deu 22"?  Deuteronomy is a pretty dry read.  I don't want to read a whole chapter.




maybe if you read a bible you could actually speak intelligently about it, that way you would not have to rely on anti God web sites and bloggers who hate the bible and God to give you a wrong slanted view of it. So that when you get up on your high horse/soap box and begin to arrogantly bestow all the injustices of God, someone who has book chapter and verse won't make you look like a 'stupid head' by contradicting all of the moral points you were so eager to make.


I have read the entire Bible - that's why I'm an atheist.  Duh.

[loganonekenobi]

"1 thess 5:21
Question ALL Things and Hold on to what is Good!
This does not mean question only the questionable, it means question the foundational.. How is it do you think I can answer your questions if I first did not ask them myself?"

So i'm suppose to just take your version of things because you did all the asking for me? We are humans and so naturally will think at least somewhat differently on most subjects. Also what is the difference between the "questionable" and the "foundational"? Anything that can be imagined, like God, can be questioned (gasp!).

your version of "it our fault and not God's" sounds a lot like being a victim in an abusive relationship. I question the "morality" of living in guilt.

No i didn't study theology for 15 years since i had to put my learning pursuits to something more practical and real so that i could earn a living. However, it does not mean that i can't think for myself and see clearly that morality is something you choose everyday. We are human and that limitation is to be reckoned with. It is by far better than making up a fiction about sin, guilt, blood sacrifice, and punishment. It is also far better to learn from the past by not repeating the mistakes instead of going back to the same way of thinking that has caused suffering in this world.

Don't give me that "chapter and verse" song and dance. You know very well that the one thing that all christian teaching has in common is that we are damned to hell due to Eve's choice of knowledge over obedience and the only way out is to cow tow to Christ. From what i have seen the Christian "morality" starts and ends with that.

[downbeatplumb]

Which is it, Drich? Are we just following the current "pop morality" by accepting homosexuality, or are we challenging the morality of past generations by accepting it?

Pop morality is what a given region or generation thinks is moral... So the morality in 1940 germany is one form like the morality in 1940 america is another verse 2016 america.

My question asks which one is right, and how do we know we haven't slipped past the evil of 1940's Germany

Well if I direct my inate empathy at to this question I find that the treatment of the jews and others would make me feel uncomfortable. Empathy is a part of most people without mental disorders. It can be subverted by propaganda. Equating the jews to lesser beings such as "rats" was common in the Third Reich to try and separate them from deserving of empathy. you can see the same propaganda today being used by the right against migrants and muslims. the migrants are a "swarm" (a term usually used for insects) etc.
I would say that it is easy to see that my morals and the morals of the majority here are better than the 1940s NAZI regime. I can't say the same for the religious right, who seem to be right there with the old guard, clinging to their prejudices and hate.
I say again the early part of this century is looking a lot like the early part of the last century. only this time the evil demagogue looks like it might be a US thing, Trump scares me.

[TheRocketSurgeon]

Pop morality is what a given region or generation thinks is moral... So the morality in 1940 germany is one form like the morality in 1940 america is another verse 2016 america.

My question asks which one is right, and how do we know we haven't slipped past the evil of 1940's Germany

Well if I direct my inate empathy at to this question I find that the treatment of the jews and others would make me feel uncomfortable. Empathy is a part of most people without mental disorders. It can be subverted by propaganda. Equating the jews to lesser beings such as "rats" was common in the Third Reich to try and separate them from deserving of empathy. you can see the same propaganda today being used by the right against migrants and muslims. the migrants are a "swarm" (a term usually used for insects) etc.
I would say that it is easy to see that my morals and the morals of the majority here are better than the 1940s NAZI regime. I can't say the same for the religious right, who seem to be right there with the old guard, clinging to their prejudices and hate.
I say again the early part of this century is looking a lot like the early part of the last century. only this time the evil demagogue looks like it might be a US thing, Trump scares me.

QFT!

For a famous example of how  morals are subverted by propaganda (and our chimanzee-tribe evolved psychology), look at the "deference to authority" studies done by Stanley Milgram, et al.

http://www.amazon.com/Obedience-Authorit...006176521X

http://www.apa.org/monitor/oct04/goodbad.aspx

"In fact, the classic electric shock experiment by social psychologist Stanley Milgram, PhD, showed that when given an order by someone in authority, people would deliver what they believed to be extreme levels of electrical shock to other study participants who answered questions incorrectly.
Zimbardo said the experiment provides several lessons about how situations can foster evil:
Provide people with an ideology to justify beliefs for actions. Make people take a small first step toward a harmful act with a minor, trivial action and then gradually increase those small actions. Make those in charge seem like a "just authority." Transform a once compassionate leader into a dictatorial figure. Provide people with vague and ever-changing rules. Relabel the situation's actors and their actions to legitimize the ideology. Provide people with social models of compliance. Allow dissent, but only if people continue to comply with orders. Make exiting the situation difficult.
Particularly notable, Zimbardo said, is that people are seduced into evil by dehumanizing and labeling others.
"They semantically change their perception of victims, of the evil act, and change the relationship of the aggressor to their aggression--so 'killing' or 'hurting' becomes the same as 'helping,'" he said.
For example, in a 1975 experiment by psychologist Albert Bandura, PhD, college students were told they'd work with students from another school on a group task. In one condition, they overheard an assistant calling the other students "animals" and in another condition, "nice." Bandura found students were more apt to deliver what they believed were increased levels of electrical shock to the other students if they had heard them called "animals."

Sound like religion to anyone else? Label your enemies "sinners", "apostates", "infidels", "perverts", etc.

It angers me to see atheists compared to Hitler, since as far as I can tell, Hitler and Lenin simply took their cues for building a social power structure directly from religious methodology.