On 26/12/13 21:12, Warp wrote:
> You have all probably read about the famous psychological experiments
> where normal everyday people are put in charge of some "prisoners"
> (who are also normal everyday people) in an isolated environment with
> no control, no deterrents and no consequences for abuse. Sooner or later
> the "guards" will start abusing the "prisoners", starting with little
> things and slowly escalating to amazing proportions, even though these
> are, as said, just normal everyday people who would never do these things
> normally.
> 

I'm guessing that you mean the Stanford Prison Experiment (SPE) rather
than the Milgram Experiment.

> It seems to me that the TSA in the United States is a perfect example
> of exactly this in real life. The more I read about the extreme cases,
> the clearer this becomes. For example:
> 
> http://tsanewsblog.com/2572/news/yet-another-child-abused-by-tsa/
> 

Whilst I agree completely with your your viewpoint can I point out that
the real problem IMHO is that there appears to be no deterrent to the
TSA agents actions. This was exactly the case in the SPE and it could be
argued that Professor Zimbardo was actually encouraging the 'guards' in
their behaviour.
The lack of coverage by the mainstream media of this may be contributing
to the US government's lack of action. If you google 'tsa abuse' (in the
UK) the first mainstream hit you get is an article in the Daily Mail
from 2010 and that is slanted towards the agents' point of view. A few
headlines in the influential papers and/or on CNN et al would go a long
way towards civilising the agents' behaviour.

John
-- 
Protect the Earth
It was not given to you by your parents
You hold it in trust for your children

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