The Milgram experiment
Stanley Milgram conducted his experiment to try and understand how German people allowed the genocide of the Jewish people to take place during the Holocaust. He was trying to figure out what condition it took for a person to continue to hurt someone. His main finding was that when an authority figure took responsibility for the acts people were committing they were able to continue to do them. The reason for this is that they no longer felt guilty for hurting someone because the responsibility of their actions was on the authority figure, not themselves.
Milgram's experiment relates to the Stanford prison experiment in the way that the guards were able to treat the prisoners like animals without consequences. This is because the responsibility of their actions fell on the psychologists conducting the experiments and the guards were just fulfilling their duties. A real-life example of the Stanford Prison experiment was the prison in Abu Ghraib, Iraq where American soldiers had Iraq Detainees. The American soldiers dehumanized the detainees and they were able to treat them this way because they were given extremely vague orders from their authorities. An example is when the soldiers were told to "soften up" the detainees before an interrogation. Some soldiers could take this as a message to scare them but others took it to a whole new level way beyond embarrassing acts.
These acts were not only indecent but in most cases, they were a violation of the International Humanitarian laws which state that prisoners "are protected against any act of violence, as well as against intimidation, insults, and public curiosity. IHL also defines minimum conditions of detention covering such issues as accommodation, food, clothing, hygiene, and medical care." The American soldiers broke against almost all of these rules which relates back to the Milgram and Stanford Prison Experiment. The American soldier's authority takes the responsibility for the detainees and they, therefore, felt they could do just about anything to them in order to help the US.
Milgram's experiment relates to the Stanford prison experiment in the way that the guards were able to treat the prisoners like animals without consequences. This is because the responsibility of their actions fell on the psychologists conducting the experiments and the guards were just fulfilling their duties. A real-life example of the Stanford Prison experiment was the prison in Abu Ghraib, Iraq where American soldiers had Iraq Detainees. The American soldiers dehumanized the detainees and they were able to treat them this way because they were given extremely vague orders from their authorities. An example is when the soldiers were told to "soften up" the detainees before an interrogation. Some soldiers could take this as a message to scare them but others took it to a whole new level way beyond embarrassing acts.
These acts were not only indecent but in most cases, they were a violation of the International Humanitarian laws which state that prisoners "are protected against any act of violence, as well as against intimidation, insults, and public curiosity. IHL also defines minimum conditions of detention covering such issues as accommodation, food, clothing, hygiene, and medical care." The American soldiers broke against almost all of these rules which relates back to the Milgram and Stanford Prison Experiment. The American soldier's authority takes the responsibility for the detainees and they, therefore, felt they could do just about anything to them in order to help the US.
Source: https://www.icrc.org/eng/war-and-law/protected-persons/prisoners-war/overview-detainees-protected-persons.htm
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