This is a live-action show in the UK that aims to test whether ordinary people can kill people under the influence of circumstances and the orders of others.
Before filming, the program team recruited experimenters to the public, and selected a few for a small test. The content of the test is: the experimenter enters a room for an interview, and there are 3 actors pretending to be interviewing. They repeatedly stand up and sit down in the ringtone. If the experimenter also imitates these actions, it shows that their Society succumbs to the strong and vice versa.
(Note: Social subordination refers to obeying authority, obeying orders, thinking that the opinions of others are right, thereby suppressing inner thoughts and being led to do what others want them to do)
In the end, the program team selected 4 people with strong social submissiveness to shoot the show, but deliberately told them that they failed the interview and were eliminated by the program team, so that they could shoot without defense.
Filming begins, and the protagonist is Experimenter 1. (Experimenters 2, 3, and 4 will be briefly mentioned at the end)
Experimenter 1 abides by the rules in life, understands the law and is ethical, and is an executive of a company. In real life, he was invited to participate in a charity auction, but the participants were all actors, posing as members of the upper classes of society, the so-called authority figures with the right to speak.
Experimenter 1 arrives at the auction and is scheduled to meet the director of the charity project (pretend). Suddenly, the director was told that there was a problem with the food supply at the meeting site, only meat and no vegetarian food. The Director then asked Experimenter 1 to help disguise the meat as vegetarian. Experimenter 1 obeyed this little order without thinking.
Because at this auction site, only Experimenter 1 was wearing casual clothes, and in a group of bright and bright social celebrities, he would subconsciously feel that he was inferior to others, so he would not consciously obey the orders of others (that is, authority).
This is the first little test: you do someone a small favor, and you might do a bigger favor later. If this thing is unethical, then you are tacit accomplices.
Then, the director kept asking Experimenter 1 to do small things, such as fetching wine and carrying bags, which reinforced his submissiveness.
Next, Experimenter 1 was referred by the Director to a charity donor. Later, the superintendent and the donor got into an argument, which resulted in the donor having a heart attack and death. At this time, in order not to affect the normal operation of the auction, the director asked Experimenter 1 to hide the corpse (a fake corpse that was enough to look like the real one) in a wooden box with him. Although Experimenter 1 believed that an ambulance should be called or the police should be called, but after struggling for a while, he obeyed the order and hid the body together. At this point he had basically fully believed in the Director and considered himself in the same boat as him.
The auction will then begin. Experimenter 1 was mistaken for the donor himself, so the director asked him to pretend to be the donor and asked him to speak on stage. Experimenter 1 had no time to think, and despite being against his heart, he was pushed to do this series of things.
In a stressful environment, if there is no time to think deeply, a person will subconsciously obey the orders of others, especially if the person has already ordered himself to do a lot of things in an authoritative manner.
Next, the director thought it was unsafe to hide the corpse in the wooden box, and wanted to transfer the corpse, and ordered Experimenter 1 to help transfer the corpse to the stairwell, disguised as the donor who had suffered a heart attack and fell down the stairs. However, falling down the stairs caused bruises on the body, so the Director asked Experimenter 1 to kick the corpse, creating bruises on the body.
Experimenter 1 refused the order out of moral principles. In the face of right and wrong, Experimenter 1 still has a strong principle.
They have since learned that the donor had sleeping sickness, which looked like he was dead, but was only asleep. So the director and experimenter 1 confessed the matter to the directors of the charity project, and went to the stairwell together to get medicine for the "corpse", but found that the "corpse" had woken up, and became furious, saying that they would withdraw the donation and report them.
At this point, the director and the charity directors worked together to put pressure on Experimenter 1, saying what they were doing was a crime, that his posing as a donor was a fraud and that he should go to jail. The only solution was to push the donor off the building (while the donor was smoking on the edge of the roof) and then announce that he had fallen ill.
All agreed to do so, and Experimenter 1 was asked to perform the action. But Experimenter 1 finally refused after a strong struggle. He would rather go to jail than kill.
Experimenters 2, 3, and 4 performed the same experiment, but they all chose to kick the corpse and push the donor downstairs. (It was really pushed down, the donor's feet were tied with ropes, and they were pushed down and hung in the air)
The experiment ends here.
An ordinary person, with basic legal awareness, conscience, and morality, under the guidance of authority, in order to integrate into the environment, will do a series of things that go against his heart and violate morality, and even kill people. This is no longer easily judged by good people and bad people, because this is the complexity of human nature.
As the Japanese veterans who experienced World War II recalled: Before participating in the war, many people were good husbands and fathers in the family, but after entering the battlefield, they gradually turned into demons. It is the environment that transforms them, it is the authority that guides them.
This reminds me of the question of whether the teacher-student relationship is prohibited or not. In the United States, most colleges and universities prohibit the relationship between teachers and students. Although love is free, teacher-student love is not supported. Love or not love is not important. The important thing is that in this kind of relationship, there is an asymmetry of power. As a person with power, the teacher can influence, guide and even coerce the students in the relationship, so that the students have to submit.
The so-called authority may come from a certain person, such as an expert, an official, a superior, a teacher, etc., or it may come from a group, or a certain ideology.
Strong-willed people are not so easily guided, but more people may choose to obey, because people will give up thinking in the face of authority, and thus blindly obey. This is also called herd mentality, because groups can give people more sense of security.
(“As soon as people enter the group, their IQ is seriously reduced. In order to gain recognition, individuals are willing to abandon right and wrong, and use their IQ in exchange for that sense of belonging that makes people feel more secure.” - "The Crowd")
This is the terrible thing about authority, it can be used to maintain social order, and it can also be used to guide people to do things that go against the order.
So, we have to be wary of authority and ask ourselves what am I doing before making a decision. We must also be wary of the group. The so-called truth is often in the hands of a few people, because most people are more influenced by public opinion, manipulated by a certain ideology behind public opinion, lose the ability to think independently, and give up the right to choose go out.
Submission to authority happens in every moment of our real life.
If at work, you are asked by your superior to sign a fake order, and the probability of the incident happening is very small, or the incident has little impact on you, then will you succumb? I think a lot of people will sign it when they know they are violating laws and regulations. Because first of all, our entire social atmosphere is like this. There are always some gray areas in work, and the probability of someone going to verify the truth is very small; secondly, the other party is your superior and represents the authority. If he says there is no problem with signing the contract, you may believe him.
If you are still undecided, then you are very likely to consult other authorities, such as legal experts, such as senior colleagues, they tell you, it doesn't matter if you sign, everyone comes here. At this moment, you may have firmed up the courage to sign, because "everyone" represents the group, and the group represents a sense of security. You feel relieved, so you sign.
Then, you become the leader's accomplice. You help him with this small favor, and you may gradually help him more in the future. The threshold of moral tolerance will increase, and things that violate the rules will become commonplace. Risk awareness gradually numb. Or, when things are slowly getting out of control and you want to refuse, you find yourself standing on his thief boat, being held in hand, and there is no turning back.
The strong wind starts at the end of Qingping.
The downfall of nations, the downfall of things, and the downfall of human nature all start with inconspicuous little things.
Don't easily give your choice to others, don't blindly follow the so-called authority, ask your heart before making a decision, he will know the answer.
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