This massively reminds me of the "The machine fired me" [0] post from today morning's HN front page. Or, for what it matters, of the inhumanity that currently goes on in the US, with even toddlers being detained (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/tender-age-shelters-tru...).
Following orders, eh?
> I can't fathom a situation where we want to automate what should be human interactions.
I can, it's called fascism. Break the individual responsibility of a human down and you can get them to do anything. There is a reason why in firing squads some members always have blank magazines [1] and why in the lethal injection sites a random of the required buttons for delivery will not work[2]. The individual member can try to evade responsibility by thinking "it was my button/gun that had the blanks" (apparently called "Diffusion of responsibility").
I recommend everyone able to do so a visit to Europe and one of the concentration camps the Nazis built. No matter which one, there are more than enough sites to remind us of what humans can do.
[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17350645 (thanks to @larkeith for pointing it out)
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Execution_by_firing_squad#Blan...
[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lethal_injection#Procedure_in_...