The Experiment Continues

In the 60s a researcher named Stanley Milgram conducted a series of experiments in which the subjects were told they were participating in a teaching experiment, but the study was actually designed to measure compliance and obedience to authority. They were told to adminster shocks to the other subject (actually an accomplice to the designers) in increasingly severe levels, to see how far they would go when ordered. 65% of them administered what they thought was a lethal dose, when so ordered by a person of authority.

Milgram suggested that two things were needed to convince subjects to comply: One- The person giving the orders is perceived as being qualified to direct other people’s behavior. That is, they are seen as legitimate. Two- The person being ordered about believes that the authority will accept responsibility for what happens.

Ten months ago, researchers enrolled most of the adult populations in the industrialized countries in an experiment in which subjects were told they were receiving an injection that would protect them from infection of the SARS 2 virus. They were assured that if enough people complied, the population would reach herd immunity and all the restrictions on public life would be lifted. They were not, however, told that the authorities would accept responsibility for any bad outcomes. All agencies, the government, the medical industry and the media were enlisted to push this story and anyone speaking up to object were suppressed and banned.

Ten months in, we have been told that the injectable does not actually do what they promised it would. It does not protect the recipient from disease, it does not stop the spread of the disease and the restrictions have not been lifted.

If this experiment was actually about testing the safety and effectiveness of the drug, it would now be reasessed and the experiment stopped.

But instead the subjects are being told that since the product is ineffective, they need a booster shot. Clearly this is not about testing the product.

This is instead a continuance of the Milgram obedience experiments, a vast test of mass compliance to authority, even when authority has removed the second pillar of Milgram's hypothesis, the agreement to take responsibility for the results.

Targeting people's children is a new, and particularly unethical (in my opinion) twist. We have now sunk into Harry Harlow terrortory. Will people actually offer up their young to receive an injection that they know doesn't work for a disease that doesn't harm children? If I were a mad scientist I might be interested in this question. But as an ethical human being I am appalled.