Robert Jay Lifton

Robert Jay Lifton , born the May 16th 1926, is a American Psychiatre . He in particular illustrated himself in the study of the misdeeds of the war on the psyché human one.

Of 1951 with 1953, it carries out its military service in the American air force in Japan and in Korea. Later, he teaches with the Washington School off Psychiatry , with the Université of Harvard and the John Jay College off Criminal Justice where he accompanies creation by the center of studies of human violence.

Reform thought

In 1961, with its work Thought Reform and the Psychology off Totalism: With Study off " Brainwashing" in it Clouded leans on the mental Manipulation and defines with precision the methods which lead to mental control such that the sects or China Maoist practice them:

Control of the environment of the subject (relations of the subject with the outside world its controlled)
mystical Handling (the group has a more “raised” goal that all)
the confession of the sins present and passed (self-criticism)
car-sanctification by the purity and a perfection impossible to reach.
Omniscience of the group of which the “knowledge” is perfect and sacro-saint.
lexical Manipulation (the words have a new direction, the thought manichéenne and limited is encouraged)
the doctrines is higher than the individual
an existence under the threat (those which are devoted to the group are saved, the others cursed)

It is in this work that Lifton creates the concept of Thought-terminating stereotyped (stereotyped stopping the thought). He proposes also the concept of totalism , which describes organizations of which the goal is to exert a total control on all humanity.

Medicine Nazi

With The Doctors Nazi: Medical Killing and the Psychology off Genocide (1986), it makes the first serious study on the way in which the doctors Nazi S were brought to take a central share in the holocaust and on the way in which they rationalized their crime.

Against the war and violence

Opponent militant for the use of the atomic bomb ( Death in Life: Survivors off Hiroshima - 1968), with the war of Vietnam ( Home from the War: Vietnam Veterans-Neither NOR Victims Executioners - 1973), with the war in Iraq, the sorrow of died or the instrumentalisation of terrorism, it is inclined towards the victims of the wars as much as on the boureaux ones and the mechanisms which lead somebody to take the role of torturer.

Price and distinctions

Prize winner of the Gandhi Price for peace.

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