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“To permit one's imagination to enter into the Nazi killing machine-to begin to experience that killing machine-is to alter one's relationship to the entire human project. One does not want to learn about such things”
At 86 years old he is stooped and looks physically frail, despite the contrasting shock of his full head of white hair. His apparent physical frailty belies the keenness of his mind and the strength of his voice with which he continues to speak out against evil, in particular the abuse of doctors' “mythic” role in society.
Psychiatrist and peace activist Robert Jay Lifton and his research are the central subjects of Robert Jay Lifton and The Nazi Doctors, an extended filmed interview with him that was shown at New York's Film Forum on October 6, 2010. It will be in national release in the United States in January 2011. I looked forward to the screening with keen interest since Lifton himself would be in attendance and, along with one of the film's directors, Wolfgang Richter, would participate in a question and answer session following the screening.
In writing this essay I see how much my anticipation of Lifton's commentary colored my experience of the film. Like many others both within and outside the fields of psychiatry and psychoanalysis, I hold Lifton