The Road to Hell: Neutralization of Killing in War

A Model of Neutralization Techniques

“…Hewitt and Stokes 1975). Kooistra and Mahoney (2016) found that this technique is extremely important in war where soldiers justify their killing by believing that their actions harm no one. Solders can deny the existence of their victims and their victims' injuries because they do not see their faces and bodies.…”

“…Some examples are "We are above the law," "Rules are meant for other people," and "Ethics and laws are for lesser firms" (Anand, Ashforth, and Joshi 2004;Barriga and Gibbs 1996). Individuals could also acknowledge that the norm is relevant for them but then argue that the norm in question is not meant to be followed, such as the belief that a specific rule is meant to be broken (Kooistra and Mahoney 2016). Liddick (2013) calls this subtechnique the denial of the necessity of the law.…”

“…So people argue that they are overloaded (Haines et al 1986). Other things that people can blame are their jobs: "I hated doing it, but it's my job" (Geva 2006) and "My job made me a real bitch" (Thompson, Harred, and Burks 2003); technology and tools: "I did not kill, my gun or grenade did it" (Kooistra and Mahoney 2016) and "The computer is to blame" (Geva 2006); receipt of inadequate information: "Information didn't reach me" (Geva 2006) and "We received unreliable or inadequate advice" (Rhodes and Cusick 2002); culture: "The messenger gets shot a lot" (Badaracco and Webb 1995) and "They don't trust me" (Marx 2003); and childhood: "It's not my fault. I commit crime because I had a troubled childhood" (Liddick 2013).…”

“…Rice (2009) mentions in this regard the defense of automatism, which refers to people appealing to being on autopilot as an excuse for their deviant behavior. The defense of automatism is also described in Kooistra and Mahoney (2016) as a technique where soldiers in combat may feel themselves dehumanized, lose sharpness of consciousness, and forget about their own death by losing their individuality; They act as automatons, behaving almost as mechanically as the machines they operate.…”

Denying the Darkness: Exploring the Discourses of Neutralization of Bundy, Gacy, and Dahmer

“…Neutralization theory has been well researched and applied to a variety of different behaviors, including (but not limited to) cheating and underage drinking by college students [60,61], street "tagging" [62], "positive" deviance (i.e., high-achieving students) [63], white-collar crime [64][65][66], domestic violence [67][68][69], breastfeeding [70], animal rights activists [71], sexual violence [72][73][74][75], pedophilia [76,77], zoophilia [78], and killing in war [79]. However, there are limited studies examining murderers' use of neutralizations, particularly how serial murderers may use these not only to account for their crimes, but also manage their identities [1,12].…”