Which dictator was the worst in history?

[noname223]

I think Adolf Hitler was the worst. However, I am not sure whether such comparisons can be accurate when dictators were responsible for more than 10 million dead people.

I think the worst things with the Nazis were the concentration camps, the industrial mass-murder and the experiments with living humam beings.

Maybe my take is shaped by the fact that I live in Germany.

What do you think?

 

[DarkRange55]

Trump.

No.

Hmm… that's interesting/difficult question. It might depend on who you ask and what they personally experienced. What is your metric of measure? The method of torture? The number of executions? The level of famine? Child soldiers? Slave labor? The scale of genocide? Economic turmoil? Humans rights violations?

two of the most genocidal governments in the history of mankind, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. With the Nazis, their approach to genocide was that was one of their goals, one of their key concepts, was to kill these people (industrialized). Its almost like Soviets just didn't care about who died. Its almost like they didn't do it on purpose but they didn't care. So its almost like they just casually committed genocide which to me… is almost a little bit more creepier than what the Nazis did. And also its sad because nobody really talks about what happened back then. But yeah I consider that genocide.

After George Washington took power more than four million people were enslaved in America. Eight million Native Americans were killed. "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." - George Santayana

Mao's policies were responsible for vast numbers of deaths, with estimates ranging from 40 to 80 million victims due to starvation, persecution, prison labour, and mass executions…

My friend's family lived through the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.

I know a refugee from North Korea who went on to author a book about his experiences. Up to 10% of their country's population is in a prison camp often because they are a relative of an accused offender. 40% of their country's children are chronically malnourished and weigh on average 22 lbs less and are 6 inches shorter than their peers in the South. Same ethnic group, same language, same basic diet. Its all malnutrition.

My mom remembers seeing Idi Amin's speech at the UN. "…ruler for life."

Eritrea is worth looking at…



I'd be also curious about oligarchies like Myanmar's junta.


So it might be subjective


God willing its not future dictator on a grander scale or maybe AI…

 

[Agon321]

Just like the person above.
A matter of interpretation.

But I would like to raise an interesting issue.
People such as Genghis Khan often do not appear in such lists.

I know it was a long time ago and someone will say that antiquity and the Middle Ages had their own rules.

But according to some statistics, Genghis Khan's army could have killed up to 11% of the world at that time.
It could have been as many as 40 million people.
That's a lot of people.

Of course, these statistics may be inflated (there is a high probability that they are), but even if Genghis Khan is responsible for fewer deaths, he still fits my thesis.

How does this differ from dictators closer to our times?
In particular, the army of Genghis Khan was not necessarily famous for its gentleness.

In my opinion, this type of person should be placed in the same row as Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin, etc.
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But back to the main question, as I mentioned above, it is a matter of interpretation and perspective.

I am Polish, so my country was probably the biggest victim of World War 2.
From my perspective, Nazis don't look good (to put it mildly).

However, it is impossible to name the worst "dictator" in history. I think so.

Everyone may have a different view on this topic.

 

[Dr Iron Arc]

Personally, Chairman Mao probably fucked up my life the most. If it weren't for him I also probably wouldn't even exist so there's also that. Even if I did exist somehow without his rise to power, I'd probably still be better off without him because my father's side of the family was wrecked by him. My father was a shitty person and at least part of that can be blamed by him having to struggle growing up in rural Southern Taiwan after my grandpa escaped China and my great grandfather killed himself.

 

[Forever Sleep]

If a God exists then- it's surely them. They either created the very worst things that could happen or, they just let them happen. And in return, they expect devotion.

As for human dictators, I suppose Hitler is the obvious one. I watched a programme on Stalin once though and he did all sorts of atrocities too. I suspect there's a whole bunch of stuff we don't even know about. Probably most countries have skeletons in the closet.

 

[Pessimist]

Probably Adolf Hitler or Joseph Stalin.

 

[Pluto]

I regard Stalin as uniquely horrific for the way he tortured and massacred not only tens of millions of his population, but even routinely purged some of his own most loyal officers just to maintain a constant atmosphere of paranoia and fear. He also abused his son who ultimately died in a Nazi concentration camp after Stalin refused to exchange prisoners for him.

By comparison, Hitler seemed to genuinely believe in the lunatic conspiracy theories of his day relating to Jewish plots and German superiority. The resulting destruction left much of Europe in ruins, but at least had some deranged logic behind it.

Pol Pot might win in terms of killing the largest percentage of his country's population.

 

[DarkRange55]

Just like the person above.
A matter of interpretation.

But I would like to raise an interesting issue.
People such as Genghis Khan often do not appear in such lists.

I know it was a long time ago and someone will say that antiquity and the Middle Ages had their own rules.

But according to some statistics, Genghis Khan's army could have killed up to 11% of the world at that time.
It could have been as many as 40 million people.
That's a lot of people.

Of course, these statistics may be inflated (there is a high probability that they are), but even if Genghis Khan is responsible for fewer deaths, he still fits my thesis.

How does this differ from dictators closer to our times?
In particular, the army of Genghis Khan was not necessarily famous for its gentleness.

In my opinion, this type of person should be placed in the same row as Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin, etc.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

But back to the main question, as I mentioned above, it is a matter of interpretation and perspective.

I am Polish, so my country was probably the biggest victim of World War 2.
From my perspective, Nazis don't look good (to put it mildly).

However, it is impossible to name the worst "dictator" in history. I think so.

Everyone may have a different view on this topic.

I think thats a very interesting point!

 

[Saturn_]

I don't feel like a comparison can really be made. In my opinion, the same amount of evil goes into every decision to kill millions. What's evil isn't the amount itself, but the willingness to look at any such incomprehensibly large amount of bodies and say "let's keep going". Whether you kill 6 million or 40 million, it's all cut from the same cloth. It's the specifics and the numbers which vary instead of the level of evil.

 

[enduringwinter]

Personally, Chairman Mao probably fucked up my life the most. If it weren't for him I also probably wouldn't even exist so there's also that. Even if I did exist somehow without his rise to power, I'd probably still be better off without him because my father's side of the family was wrecked by him. My father was a shitty person and at least part of that can be blamed by him having to struggle growing up in rural Southern Taiwan after my grandpa escaped China and my great grandfather killed himself.

My first though too but ancient China was probably worse. So I'm just gonna say Qin Shihuang as a safe bet.

My mother also blames war and communism entirely for who she is. Personally I'm tired of making excuses for her but I can't help my heart. I think she's just too intelligent for her own good. It's all so sad.

 

[newave3]

It's a tie.
Obama and Biden

 

[whywere]

As far as just one human goes, that is a very hard question to answer. It depends on so many factors.

Now if one goes by how many of his/her countrypeople were killed it is hands down, Mao of China. His estimate of killing his countrypeople runs from 65 million to 80 million killed.

Now the evilest, heavens that can be a whole lot of folks. From Hitler to Pol Pot to Stalin to Genghis Khan, the world has had so many.

Now for me living in the U.S., I feel that Trump and Putin are the 2 most evil persons around right now.

My side came from Germany after WW2 and I heard plenty of stories on all that went on in Nazi Germany and I would never wish it to anyone to have to live under any of those type of conditions ever.

Walter