Why do the oppressed become the oppressers?

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chris1989
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08 Jan 2024, 3:50 pm

It saddens me when countries whose people were oppressed by other countries or by past regimes in their own country become the new oppressors. I seem to think we saw this in the 90s with the Serbs oppressing the Croats and Bosnians, who had terrorised and oppressed the serbs in World War 2 and I feel we are seeing it happening to the people in Gaza by the Israelis, the people whose grandparents suffered the horrors under the Nazis. It makes me think surely new generations should learn from the past and not repeat them in the present or future and be more tolerant even to those race, religion, and so on is different from them.



cyberdad
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08 Jan 2024, 3:59 pm

A number of psychological studies conducted in the 1950s and 1960s demonstrate that societies are capable of internalising, normalising and conforming to create in-group bias against other out-groups.

We humans are more alike than different. Under certain environments/situations and history the roles can and will reverse.



funeralxempire
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08 Jan 2024, 5:43 pm

Internalizing the idea that might makes right, combined with viewing one's self as a righteous victim.


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cyberdad
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08 Jan 2024, 6:37 pm

funeralxempire wrote:
that might makes right, .


Hasn't this always been the way?



belijojo
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08 Jan 2024, 11:43 pm

As long as there is an emphasis on difference-whether nation or state-oppression is bound to arise, after all, "that person is not like me" is a great excuse.


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ToughDiamond
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10 Jan 2024, 3:43 pm

If the world is good to me, I tend to want to be good to the world in return. If it oppresses me, I might turn nasty, and it's hard to be perfectly precise about who to be nasty to, so the innocent might get it in the neck along with the guilty if I'm not very careful. I suspect it's human nature.



goldfish21
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10 Jan 2024, 10:06 pm

https://youtu.be/-R7VChN-jKc?si=TyiV-1xtIdv8W2On&t=79

Like Gord said, "The pendulum swings.."


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bee33
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10 Jan 2024, 10:36 pm

I think who the oppressors are and who the oppressed are tends to remain the same in our world. Yes, there are exceptions. But the powerful oppressors tend to remain powerful and the oppressed tend to remain powerless. The only way that the state of Israel is able to be the oppressor of Palestinians is because it has the backing of the huge power of the United States.



MuddRM
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10 Jan 2024, 10:38 pm

chris1989 wrote:
It saddens me when countries whose people were oppressed by other countries or by past regimes in their own country become the new oppressors. I seem to think we saw this in the 90s with the Serbs oppressing the Croats and Bosnians, who had terrorised and oppressed the serbs in World War 2 and I feel we are seeing it happening to the people in Gaza by the Israelis, the people whose grandparents suffered the horrors under the Nazis. It makes me think surely new generations should learn from the past and not repeat them in the present or future and be more tolerant even to those race, religion, and so on is different from them.


As the saying, supposedly by Disraeli, goes:

“Those who fail to study history, are doomed to repeat it.”

Too bad history takes a back seat to everything else (and I say this as a former music history major in his younger days.)



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11 Jan 2024, 9:23 am

A poison snake bites you and then you're poison too.


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NibiruMul
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11 Jan 2024, 6:36 pm

chris1989 wrote:
It saddens me when countries whose people were oppressed by other countries or by past regimes in their own country become the new oppressors. I seem to think we saw this in the 90s with the Serbs oppressing the Croats and Bosnians, who had terrorised and oppressed the serbs in World War 2.


Not all Bosnians fought on the Axis side during WWII. Many of them joined the Yugoslav Partisans too - the Partisans weren't just Serbs. There were Croats in the Partisans too.

Also, people seem to forget that some Palestinians (such as Mohammed Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem) collaborated with the Nazis as well.



Nades
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12 Jan 2024, 8:50 am

Vengeance perhaps or sometimes the oppressed might not be as oppressed as they believe and underestimate the power they actually have, not realising the irony in the process.