"...there was a limitless affront in being beaten by a Negro as black as oneself... as low-born; perhaps branded, too. It was as though, in the same family, the children were to beat the parents, the grandson to the grandmother, the daughters-in-law the mother who cooked for them. Besides, in other days, the colonists... had been careful not to kill their slaves, for dead slaves were money out of their pockets. Whereas here the death of a slave was no drain on the public funds."
(Alejo Carpentier, The Kingdom of this World, 116-117)
This is a hard concept to deal with - black slave owners treated black slaves worse than the white owners did. How could this happen, when just a few years previous they were all slaves? What made them think that it was okay to treat each other like that, committing the same atrocities that they themselves endured? A scripture comes to mind:
(Alejo Carpentier, The Kingdom of this World, 116-117)
This is a hard concept to deal with - black slave owners treated black slaves worse than the white owners did. How could this happen, when just a few years previous they were all slaves? What made them think that it was okay to treat each other like that, committing the same atrocities that they themselves endured? A scripture comes to mind:
We have learned by sad experience
that it is the nature and disposition of
almost all men, as soon as they get a
little authority, as they suppose, they
will immediately begin to exercise
unrighteous dominion.
~D&C 121:39
I can think of two (infamous) scientific studies that proved the idea mentioned above. The Milgram Experiment is a classic textbook example of deceitful and unethical research. Considering the horrific acts committed by Nazi soldiers led Stanley Milgram (a Jew) to design this study to test obedience to authority figures. He found that 65% of test subjects would administer huge electric shocks to other people (it was fake, but they didn't know that).
The Stanford Prison Experiment was another demonstration of how brutal people can be when given power. Twenty-four males were randomly selected to act as either prison guards or prisoners in a mock prison situation. The purpose was to study the psychological effects assuming these roles in such a scenario. All participants were normal, healthy students with no criminal or psychological history. Very rapidly, the "guards" were using cruel punishments and psychological abuse. Many of the "prisoners" had mental breakdowns. For the safety of the subjects of the study, it had to be ended after only 6 days. To me, the sad thing about this experiment was that they all knew (initially) that it was fake, and that they'd been randomly assigned the positions.
I think there's more of a dark side to ourselves than maybe we realize. Let's always remember to take a second and consider how we treat others... you can't go wrong with the Golden Rule.
The Stanford Prison Experiment was another demonstration of how brutal people can be when given power. Twenty-four males were randomly selected to act as either prison guards or prisoners in a mock prison situation. The purpose was to study the psychological effects assuming these roles in such a scenario. All participants were normal, healthy students with no criminal or psychological history. Very rapidly, the "guards" were using cruel punishments and psychological abuse. Many of the "prisoners" had mental breakdowns. For the safety of the subjects of the study, it had to be ended after only 6 days. To me, the sad thing about this experiment was that they all knew (initially) that it was fake, and that they'd been randomly assigned the positions.
Comments from the designer and participants of the study.
I think there's more of a dark side to ourselves than maybe we realize. Let's always remember to take a second and consider how we treat others... you can't go wrong with the Golden Rule.
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