Comparing Lord Of The Flies And The Stanford Prison Experiment
Zimbardo says, “core of human nature that good people can do evil things, and that good people will dominate over a bad situation, in fact, one way to look at the Stanford Prison study is that if you put good people in an evil place, and we saw who won, well the sad message is in this case is that the evil place won over the good people.” (The Stanford Prison Experiment). The main similarity between Lord of the Flies and the Stanford Prison Experiment was that they both descended into darkness. Three similarities that prove this is imprisonment, separation of groups, and a “mask” that shielded them from their conscience which brought out a beast. In both situations they felt that they were imprisoned and trapped. They couldn’t find safety.
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In Lord of the Flies Jack had painted a mask onto his face and had became chaotic. He had became a different person when he put the mask on. “He capered towards Bill and the mask was a thing on its own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and self-consciousness” (Golding, 63). He took on the character of the mask and began to do inhumane things like killing people. In the Stanford Prison Experiment the guards had a uniform that included sunglasses which hid their eyes. Zimbardo shares “Mirror sunglasses prevented anyone from seeing their eyes or reading their emotions, and thus helped to further promote their anonymity.” (The Story: An Overview of the Experiment). The glasses, just like the mask, created a shield that kept them from accounting themselves for their actions. It resulted in them doing things that they may have not done if they didn’t have those shields that hid them. Because of these shields, it resulted in the “beast” coming out. Both stories concluded that man is capable of doing “beastly” things and that the beast is inside of us (Golding 151). In Lord of the Flies there were multiple stranded boys on an island. It started off with order and innocence but ended in chaos and evil. The boys began innocent but soon they began to turn on each other with violence. They began to take on the role of savages. In the Stanford Prison Experiment, the guards took
In Lord of the Flies Jack had painted a mask onto his face and had became chaotic. He had became a different person when he put the mask on. “He capered towards Bill and the mask was a thing on its own, behind which Jack hid, liberated from shame and self-consciousness” (Golding, 63). He took on the character of the mask and began to do inhumane things like killing people. In the Stanford Prison Experiment the guards had a uniform that included sunglasses which hid their eyes. Zimbardo shares “Mirror sunglasses prevented anyone from seeing their eyes or reading their emotions, and thus helped to further promote their anonymity.” (The Story: An Overview of the Experiment). The glasses, just like the mask, created a shield that kept them from accounting themselves for their actions. It resulted in them doing things that they may have not done if they didn’t have those shields that hid them. Because of these shields, it resulted in the “beast” coming out. Both stories concluded that man is capable of doing “beastly” things and that the beast is inside of us (Golding 151). In Lord of the Flies there were multiple stranded boys on an island. It started off with order and innocence but ended in chaos and evil. The boys began innocent but soon they began to turn on each other with violence. They began to take on the role of savages. In the Stanford Prison Experiment, the guards took