# What Non-Governmental Group was the Most Atrocious/Evil? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 28, 2014, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535 "2014-02-28T19:21:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CapnPitt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/edb3f5/32.png) [@CapnPitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CapnPitt)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/1 "2014-02-28T19:21:55Z")
I think we can all agree that if a group has the levers of governmental power (especially the military), they can commit atrocities and evil on a gigantic scale. Obviously, Hitler, Stalin, and Mao’s regimes spring to mind. After doing some reading on groups like The Shining Path, it got me to thinking about what groups outside of governments and “regular” military were the worst the world has seen? I know this probably requires a tighter definition to get a better group of answers, but I’m going to let you all make your own criteria. Number of killings? Rapes? Nature of the killings? Nature of the atrocities? The choice is up to you. Plus, it’s Friday afternoon. What’s more fun to think about than the darker nature of humanity? 😃 Just to through some out there: European slave traders (probably too broad to consider as one group) U.S. Mafia Sicilian Mafia Sinaloa Cartel Tonton Macoute (though they might be considered governmental in a sense) Have at it. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/2 "2014-02-28T19:25:58Z")
Blackhawk. 21st century mercenaries shielding themselves under the US flag while doing some of the dirtiest work there is, largely on behalf of and to profit the biggest conglomerates. “Worst” because not only were/are they all those things, but they were organized by those who should have known better in an era when we should be intolerant of such corporate thuggery. ---
**Author:** ![LarkingPot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/bcef8e/32.png) [@LarkingPot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LarkingPot)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/3 "2014-02-28T20:01:15Z")
It takes two posts before the KKK/White Citizens Councils/Neo Nazis are brought in? Seriously? :dubious::rolleyes: **Amateur Barbarian** I think you mean Blackwater which is now Academi. ---
**Author:** ![CapnPitt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/edb3f5/32.png) [@CapnPitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CapnPitt)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/4 "2014-02-28T20:58:53Z")
Good call **LarkingPot**. Big oversight. **AB** , yep, mercenaries are bad anywhere, anytime, but they seem particularly heinous when corporatized and employed by a democracy. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/5 "2014-02-28T21:03:36Z")
> [@LarkingPot](#): > > It takes two posts before the KKK/White Citizens Councils/Neo Nazis are brought in? > > Seriously? As you’ve acquired your own Pit thread in about four posts, you might want to dial back the high snark factor. We aren’t here to see who can take each other down quickest. I suspect you even know what _verb. sap._ means. > [@](#): > > **Amateur Barbarian** I think you mean Blackwater which is now Academi. Yes, Blackwater which was some other stupid name (Wii? Hu? Wut?) before changing to the togas-and-laurels name. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/6 "2014-02-28T21:08:24Z")
> [@CapnPitt](#): > > European slave traders (probably too broad to consider as one group) I’d add the West African slave traders to that group. In a way, what they did is even more WTF do you think you’re doing. Have to put the KKK in there as well. While I doubt they were responsible for near as many murders as say, the Mafia, they were definitely evil. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2014, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/7 "2014-02-28T23:42:37Z")
There are some pretty nasty guerilla armies in Africa right now. ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/8 "2014-03-01T00:22:59Z")
Does the Aztec priesthood count? They sacrificed hundreds of thousands, maybe millions. I guess they were sorta a state religion though. And maybe not as evil if they’re delusional. What’s the most evil corporation? The East India Company? Goldman Sachs might seem bad, but they haven’t created a private army and conquered India…yet. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/9 "2014-03-01T01:22:04Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > I’d add the West African slave traders to that group. In a way, what they did is even more WTF do you think you’re doing. Why? I mean, it’s just as bad, but what makes it any more WTF? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/10 "2014-03-01T02:21:37Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Yes, Blackwater which was some other stupid name (Wii? Hu? Wut?) before changing to the togas-and-laurels name. It was Xe Services from 2009 to 2011. The reason was the company’s founder, Erik Prince, sold the company in 2010 but decided to keep ownership of the trademark Blackwater. ---
**Author:** ![j666](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de0a6/32.png) [@j666](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/j666)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/11 "2014-03-01T02:27:44Z")
I don’t think mercenaries count. They are not entirely non-governmental, as they are hired to fulfill government functions. ---
**Author:** ![Lamar\_Mundane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/12 "2014-03-01T02:40:35Z")
Al Qaeda? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/13 "2014-03-01T05:38:51Z")
Shout out for the [North African pirates who enslaved Europeans](http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/mar/11/highereducation.books): > [@](#): > > North African pirates abducted and enslaved more than 1 million Europeans between 1530 and 1780 in a series of raids which depopulated coastal towns from Sicily to Cornwall, according to new research. > > Thousands of white Christians were seized every year to work as galley slaves, labourers and concubines for Muslim overlords in what is today Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria and Libya, it is claimed. > > Scholars have long known of the slave raids on Europe. But American historian Robert Davis has calculated that the total number captured - although small compared with the 12 million Africans shipped to the Americas in later years - was far higher than previously recognised. > > His new book, Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters: White Slavery in the Mediterranean, the Barbary Coast, and Italy, 1500-1800, concluded that 1 million to 1.25 million ended up in bondage. > > Prof Davis’s unorthodox methodology split historians over whether his estimates were plausible but they welcomed any attempt to fill a gap in the little-known story of Africans subjugating Europeans. > > By collating different sources of information from Europe over three centuries, the University of Ohio professor has painted a picture of a continent at the mercy of pirates from the Barbary Coast, known as corsairs, who sailed in lateen-rigged xebecs and oared galleys. > > Villages and towns on the coast of Italy, Spain, Portugal and France were hardest hit but the raiders also seized people in Britain, Ireland and Iceland. According to one account they even captured 130 American seamen from ships that they boarded in the Atlantic and Mediterranean between 1785 and 1793. > > In the absence of detailed written records such as customs forms Prof Davis decided to extrapolate from the best records available indicating how many slaves were at a particular location at a single time and calculate how many new slaves were needed to replace those who died, escaped or were freed. > > To keep the slave population stable, around one quarter had to be replaced each year, which for the period 1580 to 1680 meant around 8,500 new slaves per annum, totalling 850,000. Also, deserving of a [mention for efforts in slavery](http://evoandproud.blogspot.co.nz/2013/07/the-other-slave-trade.html) - the Crimean Tatars: > [@](#): > > The Crimean Tatar society was based on raiding the neighbouring Slavic and Caucasian sedentary societies and selling the captives into the slave markets of Eurasia. Approximately 75 percent of the Crimean population consisted of slaves or freedmen, and much of the free population was highly predatory, engaged either in the gathering of slaves or in the selling of them. It is known that for every slave the Crimeans sold in the market, they killed outright several other people during their raids, and a couple more died on the way to the slave market. ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/14 "2014-03-01T16:16:18Z")
> [@Captain\_Amazing](#): > > Why? I mean, it’s just as bad, but what makes it any more WTF? Not to put too fine a point on it, but it’s one thing to buy and sell people who you stupidly believe to be sub-human and turn them into slaves. It’s quite another to grab your neighbor who looks just like you and do the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/15 "2014-03-01T16:24:27Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > It was Xe Services from 2009 to 2011. Thanks. Wasn’t worth looking up. > [@](#): > > The reason was the company’s founder, Erik Prince, sold the company in 2010 but decided to keep ownership of the trademark Blackwater. Why? Was he impressed that Procter & Gamble is holding “Rely” in reserve for a new generation of killer tampons? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/16 "2014-03-01T16:34:55Z")
Blackwater is one of the great liberal lies. It started out as an ex-military guy running training services and then the CIA and DOD increasingly asked him to do more and more work and he agreed because he was a businessman obviously. They were almost exclusively protection services, and they had fewer incidents with civilians overseas than the U.S. military or basically any other entity that was over there. The idea that they rank even in the top 100 of bad NGOs is basically retarded. There are NGOs during the Age of Imperialism that actually committed mass scale (as in millions of dead) genocides. Blackwater on the other hand at the very worst had some of its employees act negligently in a manner that resulted in a few civilian deaths over like a 5 year period. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/17 "2014-03-01T17:31:55Z")
Blackwater was a key element in sustaining the profitability of two wars for megacorps… something right out of a bad cyberpunk novel. Total deaths in those two wars range from 150,000 to double that to over one million “related” deaths. The number of deaths directly caused by Blackwater are irrelevant to their role in sustaining not just the war, but the corporate presence and profitability thereof. You can’t compose a reasonable sentence about that without using words like “despicable” and “filth.” I guess the next argument is that they were just following orders? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 5:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/18 "2014-03-01T17:37:36Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Blackwater was a key element in sustaining the profitability of two wars for megacorps… something right out of a bad cyberpunk novel. Total deaths in those two wars range from 150,000 to double that to over one million “related” deaths. The number of deaths directly caused by Blackwater are irrelevant to their role in sustaining not just the war, but the corporate presence and profitability thereof. You can’t compose a reasonable sentence about that without using words like “despicable” and “filth.” > > I guess the next argument is that they were just following orders? I’m sorry I didn’t realize it was childish conspiracy theory hour. Completely ignore the nonsense you just posted, I’ll ask again: do you seriously believe Blackwater is worse than the NGOs during the imperialist age that enslaved and committed genocide against _millions_? ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/19 "2014-03-01T17:41:35Z")
I didn’t and wouldn’t say “worst,” but I give greater weight to atrocities committed in the modern era, yes. And greater weight to those committed or abetted by those on a payroll to do so rather than for personal or national gain. Sue me. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2014, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535/20 "2014-03-01T17:41:54Z")
I’ll go with the Tea Party. They’ve basically made the US government dysfunctional and will likely do so for decades. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-governmental-group-was-the-most-atrocious-evil/682535.md?page=2)