(Clearwisdom.net)

At the beginning of the 1960's, Dr. Stanley Milgram from Yale University in the United States carried out an experiment. The experiment, described in Milgram's Obedience to Authority, investigated the effect of "authority" on those who were given it. Volunteers who did not know the true purpose of the experiment were allowed to punish another group of volunteers with electric shocks. Those who were shocked were told the purpose of the experiment in advance, and were told not to cooperate with the volunteers who were administering the shocks. The main purpose of this experiment was to explore the influence of "authority" on an individual. In other words, to test how much a normal person's behavior could "deviate" under the protection of "authority".

Prior to the experiment, Professor Milgram estimated that at most only one half of one percent of those in "authority" would apply the maximum voltage (450 Volts, which is sufficient to kill someone) to punish those they had authority over. Unfortunately, he discovered that fully two-thirds of the volunteers (who were otherwise, typical "normal" people) applied such cruel punishment to their "opponents" under the protection of "authority."

Guards and police in the forced labor camps of Mainland China, under the protection of CCP "authority," apply similarly brutal torture to Falun Dafa practitioners, who have no enmity towards them. Hundreds of torture methods are used. The degree of brutality of these methods far-exceeds that of the method applied to the experimental subjects in the Milgram's experiment. History is always repeating itself, but people keep on failing to learn the lesson.

In fact, the tendency to "rely upon the stronger" is part of the human nature, and is for the pursuit of a sense of safety and of privilege without responsibility. In a person's heart there live angels as well as demons. The two are neighbors. The demons will emerge when awakened by someone they are connected with, someone who is in power, or is stronger, or has high authority. Such a person might stir up various kinds of gods or beasts in their heart. Some are kind while some are evil. Each one of us chooses our own future.

Posting date: 1/27/2006
Original article date: 1/27/2006
Category: Open Forum
Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2006/1/8/118279.html

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