Hannah Arendt

Hannah Arendt’s says, “the result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth is not that the lies will now be accepted as truth, and the truth be defamed as lies, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world- and the category of truth vs. falsehood is among the mental means to this end- is being destroyed” (Arendt, 15). Her main point behind this quote is that we live in is a fake reality. The lies said behind the truth and the truth that is depicted…

our human function does not prove to be stable basis in the realistic application of his philosophical views. Tackling this topic will be done by drawing a similarity between Aristotle’s ideologies about the contemplation of rational beings, with Hannah Arendt’s thoughts about the primacy of the contemplative life. The objective will be to prove that the active life is superior and is an essential requirement to the contemplative life; which then proves the impracticality of achieving…

Works of Nietzsche, Foucault, and Arendt: Punishment The unparalleled scale of human suffering during World War I (then known as the Great War) and World War II had a profound impact on the notion of punishment. The unprecedented tragedy paved way for a new outlook on morality and justice regarding the crimes committed. The works On the Genealogy of Morality, Discipline and Punish, and Eichmann in Jerusalem by Friedrich Nietzsche, Michel Foucault, and Hannah Arendt respectively all cover the…

Levi and Arendt: Banality Of Evil During 1941 to 1945 Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich tried to eliminate all Jews. What they did was a systematic, organized genocide. Some people shared the ideology of the Führer and believed that the Jews were the cause of Germany’s problems and therefore should be punished. Some people believed that what was happening in Germany was horrible and there were those that believed that what they were doing was not bad because they were only doing their job. Some…

Thwarting Totalitarianism Today After World War 2 and the rise of totalitarian government across Europe, people finally had the opportunity to contemplate exactly how a totalitarian government can come to be, and it was not until Hannah Arendt wrote The Origins of Totalitarianism that the public got a decent answer to how those governments can commit horrendous crimes against humanity. However, what the book does not do is outline how modern governments could help prevent a movement, like…

Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt discusses statelessness using Nazi Germany and discusses statelessness within a totalitarian government. While she does not address a change in government, the shift between democratic Germany and Nazi Germany is very clearly a shift in government and a shift in citizenship. The rest of Europe is also discussed during this time considering their stake in the war and considering the amount of people that became stateless during this time. Arendt calls the…

“We crushed their necks with wood. We hung them. We strangled them with wire. We cut off their heads. We ran them over with cars. We were allowed to do it,” (Adi Zulkadry - Fellow Executioner in 1965). Amidst the tumultuous state of Indonesia’s (socio)political climate during the mid-1960s, there was an outbreak of anti-communist sentiment that made itself evident in the form of a purge, carried out by a paramilitary group by the name of Pancasila Youth, and later coined as the ‘Indonesian…

loved Big Brother.” How does this radical transformation occur in Winston Smith—and moreover, what can it tell us about the power of language in totalitarian states? To answer these questions, let us turn, once again, to Hannah Arendt. In The Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt asserts that loneliness is the “common ground for terror.” And loneliness, itself, is the desired product of the war against words—breeding men who, trapped in their own minds, are unable to express themselves to those…

of Narnia by the White Witch. Next, I will explain and use Hannah Arendt’s theory on the “banality of evil” to interpret some of the fictional and historical connections Lewis makes…

In “Mario and the Magician”, the audience members’ choice to be hypnotized is an illustration of how people choose to submit to the supersense of Totalitarian regimes. Elisabeth Young-Bruehl, explaining Hannah Arendt’s thinking, argues that Totalitarian regimes construct a fictitious reality, the “supersense.” Similarly, Cipolla creates a false reality when he hypnotizes the audience members. It is evident that Cipolla does not possess magic powers, but rather Mann is highlighting the audience…