Eichmann and his 'new conscience'

Reflecting further on the nature of the relationship between the individual and the corporate in the light of comments in this article on Hannah Arendt's reflections on Eichmann's trial. I've found myslef reflecting on the way that human beings usually doseem to have a sense of right and wrong which is born of empathy which is, in turn, probably hardwired in most. However, this innate conscience is not impregnable. It can be subverted by re-framing and habituated to woe and ill:

Having redefined executioners as heroic sufferers and having stifled his empathy for human suffering, including his own, Eichmann was numb enough to follow his new conscience

And this is why we need morality grounded in a transcendent: there are times when our msoral compass is recallibrated by rhetoric, habit or ideology. We need something disruptive and weighty to challenge the Powers' reprogramming of our malleable minds.

The capacity for evil can spread like an epidemic | Elisabeth Young-Bruehl | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk