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Hannah Arendt

“None of the various 'language rules,' carefully contrived to deceive and to camouflage, had a more decisive effect on the mentality of the killers than this first war decree of Hitler, in which the word for 'murder' was replaced by the phrase 'to grant a mercy death.' Eichmann, asked by the police examiner if the directive to avoid 'unnecessary hardships' was not a bit ironic, in view of the fact that the destination of these people was certain death anyhow, did not even understand the question, so firmly was it still anchored in his mind that the unforgivable sin was not to kill people but to cause unnecessary pain.”

Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil
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Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil by Hannah Arendt
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