522
QUESTIONS OF GUILT
and persevered
In,
then perhaps there is the possibility of repentance or
reconciliation.
I've tried to think a bout ho\\' my remarks apply to somethin?:
tha t is called collective guilt. And I haye to con fess that I haye a great
deal of trouble. I can believe that a group of people might very well
be guilty about some transgression, some injury to the human order,
that they have all sha red in. But each is going to h ave his own priva te
sin to confront, whether the sins are go ing to be sins of omission or
commission. And for this reason, I tend - a nd I should say this is only
my present thinking on the ques tion - to think of collective guilt as
really a crude term to describe th e nature of guilt. There is somethin.g
about it which, I think, is reductive: in a funn y way, it di ssipates and
vulgarizes what is the private na ture of a person's guilt.
Perhaps I can just end here with a response to Dr. Lifton's notion
that guilt can be a good thing. I think it's a hideous thin.g. It's an in–
escapable thing for all of us. It can be contended with, for better or
for worse and, hopefully, for bet ter. So that, in that sense, I suppose it
is a good thing. Collective guilt is a potent weapon. It is a way of ap–
pealing to people's guilt feelings. And since people a re a lready guilty
enough, it is very inviting to join in something that is ca ll ed collective
guilt. One can join in being a racist, or being a sexist, or believing
that Everyman is Ei chmann, or whatever. But I find some thing evasive
about collective guilt when it is used in this fashion.
ARTHUR EGENDoRF: Dr. Lifton suggested that some GcrmalH who
did not have any direct responsibility for specific a trocities might feel
guilty for them. Is that a reductive kind of feeling or is it something
that in Dr. Farber's terms is part of their priva te guilt ?
FARBER: I think so. To what deg ree various Germans felt guilty
even though their relation to the actual atrocities was a distant one I
can't say, but I assume somewhat, and maybe more than somewhat.
But again, it would be of a private nature.
EGENDoRF: Would tha t be an authentic kind of guilt ?
FARBER: I think it could very well be authentic. That is. such a
person could look at the ways in which he had complicity, a t his. fail–
ures to oppose, and at the ways in which he had consp ired. e\'en
though quietly or indirectly. I don' t see a ny reason why such .guilt
couldn't be authentic.
EGENDoRF: Then isn't it conceivable that e\'erybody in German y.
at some point, who was alive during th a t period might come to see
his or her complicity, even through silence. in such a \\'a y that one
could speak of the collective guilt of the German people'
FARBER : I think it's possible to speak of it in tha t wa y, if you wish.
But I would still say that each person's guilt would be priya teh' con–
sidered, and he would recognize "collecti\'e guilt " as a ca tego ri ca l head–
ing tha t would stand for his own illumina tion. if that occurred.
LIFTON: The difficulty, Les, as I
see
it. in YOllr point of \·iew is
that despite the fact that "collectiye guilt"' can
be
a
\ TI"\'
\·ulgar. re–
ductive term, if one throws out the significance of that which is acti\'ely
shared in guilt, I think one loses a rather delicate sens!' of
\ "('1"\'
im–
portant dimensions of guilt that now plag ue us.
