Okay, everyone knows about the Holocaust.  But there is something called the "forgotten holocaust" or the Rape of Nanjing (also spelt Nanking).  The Nanjing massacre occurred during roughly the same time period (historically speaking) as the Holocaust (the Nanking massacre occurred in 1937).  Several years ago, when I found out about the Nanjing massacare, at first I wanted to disown my own Japanese heritage (well I'm a quarter Japanese, half Chinese, quarter native hawaiian), because I was so disgusted.  What the japanese soldiers did to the civilian population was unbelievable, to me it was even worse than what the Nazis did to the Jews, Gypsies etc.  I mean you had japanese soldiers pouring sulfuric acid on a man's head to see what happens, decapitation contests, raping 80 year old ladies and 1 year old babies, slicing open pregnant women and putting the fetus on the tip of the bayonet.  And after the war, these soldiers had no remorse.  I remember reading about a japanese lady who in the 1950s remembers overhearing in a bar a couple of former japanese soldiers bragging about killing chinese in Nanjing and how far they could stick their arm inside a woman's genitals.  Unbelievable.

Even Nazis themselves were appalled by the violence.  There were a few Nazi officials residing in the diplomatic safe zone in Nanjing who witnessed what happened and chronicled it.

The Chinese population did nothing to provoke those japanese soldiers.  Why was there so much hate against the chinese?  It's not like how someone would hurt your wife or family member, and you want revenge.  No, these civilians did nothing to the japanese soldiers.

So my question is:  what is the nature of human cruelty?

Are we naturally evil?

Is it proof that we evolved from animals?

Because believe me, in war zones, humans, especially the males, can damn sure act like animals.  It's still happening in this world today in war zones, and I think it's utterly disgusting. 

What do you think about the nature of human cruelty?

Greed.

Well humans are rather cruel to the true best friend of man, the humble Rock Pigeon (Pigeon) People take them as pests, but yet they're fully domesticated animals and have been proven to be smarter than dogs AND among the top smartest animals in the world.

Point being next time you see one you should take your time and appreciate the little guy.

The Rape of Nanjing is absolutely disgusting. It was hard to read what you wrote about it.

I would have to go with the humanly "need" to be better than someone else. It always makes us hate someone because they're better (technically) than us, and we have to cover that up. (This doesn't have to apply to everything, but most of the time humans just have a need for better/more.)

Greed and power. People will always contain these two attributes.

And when they don't, less is more.

Which is why I would replace "most of the time" with "all the time".

when one man thought he was better than the other. kane and abel, when envy was invented.

Misconception of happiness

the sad part is that it gets worse from there....yes, worse......

The japanese experimented with biological weapons, dropping them on villages, they also had a medical unit that did vivisection (cutting open live human beings without anesthesia for medical study)--just incredibly disturbing stuff.

Only a tiny handful of the top japanese officers were punished, but everyone else went scot free, which brings me to my next point....

And this is the most disturbing thing of all.....is that supposed war hero General Douglas McCarthur brokered a deal with the japanese where the U.S. and it's allies would not seek prosecution of war crimes if the japanese would share information with the U.S. about scientific/medical information that was learned by the japanese when the japanese used biological weapons on chinese villages.  At that point, my heart sank and I felt like jumping off a bridge in disgust.

Shame on the Japanese!

Shame on the USA!

Shame on the entire ****ing human race.

The U.S. and it's allies were going to make a mockery of justice, just to glean info about biological weapons tests the japanese carried out on the chinese.  If that is not the definition of disgusting, then I don't know what is.....