Conformity and its contribution to the roots evil

Conformity plays a vital role in the implementation of evil on a large-scale, but it is not the beginnings of evil.  There is always an underlying group of conspirators who set evil goals that take much ingenuity to translate from the drawing board into action.  Like any well thought out plan, it must start from the top and trickle down through bureaucracy.  Arendt wrote about totalitarianism and the political backgrounds that lead up to them and occur throughout totalitarian rule.  However, conformity is not just a consequence of totalitarianism but is already imbedded in the fabric of most societies.  The difference is the lack of disparity in opinion under totalitarian rule.  People who think differently, are killed.  Therefore, people are forced to conform or flee.  In the case of the Nazis, blaming the Jews was something that only fed on the consensus of the group.  It took cunning subtle persuasion to slowly ease the society into the extermination of the Jews as a norm.  The policies are generally unopposed by those who have any influence so the norm goes on without being questioned.  However, the German people did not wake up one day with the common desire to kill all Jews. The ethnic discrimination was already present, all that was needed was a determined man with a strategy to turn that inclination into a hate strong enough to accept their demise.  Therefore, it takes more than conformity for evil to manifest itself in the world.  At the same time, only conformity can lead to a widespread acceptance and implementation of evil works and attitudes.  Each component is contingent on the other.  Conformity starts with an idea that spreads, whether evil or not, and together, the idea and the acceptance, evil becomes perceivable in the world.