Lesson Learned

í Abu Ghraib is the old prisoner in Iraq that before the American invasion, it was used to torture Iraq’s enemies. Later it was used by the American for Iraqi prisoners. In April 2004, the torturing that was going on inside the prison came to public attention. The photographs of various abuses toward the detainees were taken, and were released. Some prisoners were beaten, some were ordered to form a human pyramid, so that the American soldiers could take photographs with their proud smiles on their faces. In my opinion, it is wrong and there isn’t anything that can justify those actions. Each individual has no right to abuse others regardless of their unfortunate deeds.

í What lessons were ignored?

In Abu Ghraib, the claim that society and environment can affect each individual’s personality and thoughts, and that every person has a potential to be evil are ignored. Milgram and Dimbardo’s experiments were the evidences that prove that those claims are true. Milgram performed an experiment by selecting random people; letting them controlled the electric machine that would shock the victim, if the victim spelled the given words wrong. The victim, however, was only pretending since there’s no electrical shock, but the person selected wasn’t informed about this. Under the authority (the professor wearing a white lab coat) the performers followed the professor’s instruction. The level of the shock increased each time the victim spelled it wrong. About 60 percent of all the performers reach the highest level of the shock, which if it was real, it could severely injured the person.

In Zimbardo’s experiment, college students were randomly selected to be acting in the prison-hospital. Some were assigned to be the prisoners, and some were the one who took care of the prisoners. In 6 days the experiment was stopped, although the experiment was meant to last for 2 weeks. The participants’ behaviors change: they become more violent and some become sick. Afterwards, when they were removed from the place, their personalities came back to what they were before. These experiments prove the claim that is involved with social psychology.