The recent revelations about mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners by inexperienced guards, anxious to please authority figures (such as interrogators, CIA, etc.) reminds me of the famous prison simulation conducted at Stanford in 1965, by Philip Zombardo and Stanley Milgram. Stanley Milgram strikes me as the Andy Kaufman of Sociology. He's the same guy who got people to electrocute strangers.



(the BBC reenacted the experiment a few years ago.)