It is the dispositional cement that binds men to systems of authority. Facts of recent history and observation in daily life suggest that for many people obedience may be a deeply ingrained behavior tendency, indeed, a prepotent impulse overriding training in ethics, sympathy and moral conduct. Obedience to authority is a phenomenon not to be ignored or discounted. It is thus a key concept in linking the psychological processes of the individual to the social structures of the larger world. As much as faith in bona fide authority is supremely beneficial, by conforming to bogus authority or an impure sanga, one becomes terribly, sometimes irrevocably, misled.
Social influences are extremely powerful.
Think about it. Obedience to authority. It didn't end with Hitler. Naturally, each one of us individually contributes to whatever misfortune that befalls us, and especially what we perpetrate upon others. There are also the samskaras that accompany us from our previous impious actions.