The prison experiment

The video ‘The Stanford Prison Experiment’ illustrated an experiment aimed at trying to explain whether prison guards were naturally violent people or it was the poison environment that forced or led them to engage in such behavior. For the purpose of the study, a group was selected upon careful evaluation and given the role of either being the prisoners or prison guards. The roles which the volunteers played were determined through a simple coin toss and this ensured there was no bias when assigning roles. Observing the video revealed various ethical issues that the characters had to deal with for the purpose of the study.

One of the purposes of jail sentences is to ensure that prisoners are punished for the crimes that they had committed. Other than maintaining peace, the prison guards are tasked with the responsibility of ensuring that prisoners who go out of line while in prison are punished accordingly. In the case of the video, the prison guards faced the dilemma of deciding what amount of punishment was ideal and to what extent were they expected and allowed to punish the prisoners. Another dilemma faced was on the side of the prisoners. Since a lot of torture was inflicted on them by the guards, they faced the ethical dilemma of whether to accept it as punishment for their crimes or to rebel against that kind of inhumane treatment.

Such dilemmas are experienced today by criminal justice employees especially when dealing with dangerous criminals. Since they have been given the authority to use all measures necessary if given cause when dealing with criminals, they face the dilemma of deciding the appropriate amount of force or violence to exercise. This is especially because criminals tend to be violence and will do just about anything to ensure that they are not apprehended and taken to jail.

Reference

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZwfNs1pqG0