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| Dr Robert Jay Lifton |
THE NAZI DOCTORS:
Medical
Killing and
the
Psychology
of Genocide © |
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113 |
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“unscientific” and therefore a professional and
personal threat. A distinguished German psychiatrist I discussed these matters
with characterized that mentality as “the doctrine of the absence of
empathy”* To be sure, this mentality in itself does not inevitably lead to
killing in the name of “euthanasia”; there were psychiatrists
who expressed empathy for their patients and yet became leaders in the
“euthanasia” project: Carl Schneider, with his compassionate
work-therapy program, is a case in point. Yet the general principle
characterizes the psychiatric atmosphere within which medical killing could be
readily embraced.†
If, at the heart of one’s professional
identity, one becomes easily susceptible to the idea that mental patients
— and possibly other groups as well — lack ordinary human qualities,
and hence to the idea of eliminating that group in favor of the ostensible
health of all others, one might also be more amenable to embracing a new
“therapy” that shows itself to be in accord with one’s
organic-genetic perceptions. In that way (as described in the epigraph to this
chapter), many psychiatrists could harmonize with, even epitomize, the larger
Nazi vision of curing by killing.
The second influential factor in
German psychiatry was the traditional relationship of the profession to the
state. Individual German psychiatrists had always identified themselves as
servants of the state, rather than as independent practitioners. Mental
institutions especially were part of the administrative structure of the state,
and the same could even be said of university medical departments. The
long-standing arrangement, when internalized and buttressed by German cultural
stress on authority and obedience, made it difficult for individual
psychiatrists to consider — or even imagine — defying the state when
summoned to participate in virtually any kind of project. |
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* Walter Ritter von Baeyer,
personal communication.
†One may carry the argument still further.
During the period from the First World War (and before) to the Nazi epoch,
there had been fierce battles in German psychiatry concerning the emerging
school of psychoanalysis. While Freud had doubts about the efficacy of
psychoanalytic treatment for schizophrenia, psychoanalysis in general stood for
the principle of empathy: the psychoanalyst or psychiatrist is to enter the
mind of the patient, to try to feel as the patient feels. Most German
psychiatrists strongly opposed psychoanalysis. Among the most vehement of all
was Alfred Hoche, the coiner of the concept of “life unworthy of
life.” At a medical congress, Hoche went so far as to read a paper on
psychoanalysis called “A Psychical Epidemic among Doctors. ”³
Psychiatrists like Hoche clearly felt their identity as physicians and
scientists to be threatened by the spread of psychoanalysis. That sense of
threat could well have intensified their commitment to their own credo —
that of the doctrine of the absence of empathy. That credo contributed to the
development of violent somatic treatment procedures (whatever their efficacy),
such as insulin and metrazol shock therapy, electroshock therapy, and lobotomy.
Under duress, those who held to the doctrine of the absence of empathy might
have been more ready than otherwise to collaborate in killing their own
patients. |
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THE NAZI DOCTORS:
Medical Killing and the
Psychology of
Genocide
Robert J. Lifton
ISBN 0-465-09094
©
1986 |
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