Terror and confusion, not malice, produce the act that makes one a perpetrator.

Evidence

I was so frightened and confused hearing my father screaming at me that I kicked the chair and watched as my father’s neck snapped in the noose. — Leonard S. Newman and Ralph Erber (eds.), Understanding Genocide, 644

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The chapter’s central paradox compressed: the victim’s obedience to his father’s last command is what executes him.
• XREF: connects to: A series of individually innocent actions can combine into a morally outrageous act; A chain of innocent-seeming steps can jointly produce evil — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4045

Broader Connections

• A series of individually innocent actions can combine into a morally outrageous act #corroborates (0.75)
• A chain of innocent-seeming steps can jointly produce evil #corroborates (0.75) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4045