‘All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players.’ But sometimes we take this roleplay way too seriously, and all that matters to us is our performance, even if that requires us to betray our humanity in the process.
Oliver Hirschbiegel’s‘Das Experiment’ depicts a devastating yet accurate portrayal of this attribute of our society. Based upon the famous Sanford Prison Experiment, the movie tells the story of a psychological experiment that places twenty volunteers into a simulated prison environment. Next, they are divided into groups of prisoners and prison guards.
The prisoners are assigned numbers and confined in cells, with strict supervision on their movements, food habits, and compulsory exercise.
The guards are all dressed in appropriate uniforms and instructed to maintain strict discipline; they may even punish rebels if needed.
The fictional wall initially created to give one group a false sense of superiority and power over the other becomes much more real as the volunteers start believing in their new identity and the story given to them.
A strong camaraderie forms among the oppressed prisoners while a visceral hatred builds between the prisoners and the guards. The show of power that began with necessary acts of law enforcement soon transformed into unrestrained, sadistic bullying.
Within the span of just a week, the situation escalates out of control, reaching a state where even repeated threats and attempts at persuasion by the researchers couldn’t disillusion the volunteers.
By the time the experiment was finally abandoned, many of the volunteers were dead, and most others had suffered great psychological trauma.
Although the main purpose of this experiment was to study the psychological effects of being subjected to or in command of authoritarian power, the general lesson drawn from the movie is that stories and imaginary identities can be unbelievably powerful.
We may not realise it, but this force is what governs our lives a majority of the times. For example, a terrorist desperately tries to maintain his perceived role as the protector of god, or a student obsessively scrambles for marks in order to prove himself in the role given to him.
The impact may be obvious (as in the case of the terrorist) or subtle (as in the case of the student who gradually becomes a mean, selfish, friendless being), but it sure is evil and harmful.
Experiments such as the Stanford Prison Experiment often bring light to such aspects of human society. But ultimately, it’s in our hands to develop a scientific mindset and not blindly follow the path shown by such forces.