I don’t know if anyone else has been following this story, but there’s been a very bizarre string of hoaxes affecting fast food restaurants in the United States over the past ten years, in which someone calls up a restaurant, states they are a police officer, and demands to speak with the manager. When the manager comes on, the “policeman” claims to be investigating a theft or drug dealing operation out of the restaurant involving an employee (always a member of the opposite sex from the manager). The caller then demands the manager strip search or perform sexual acts on the employee in an office or back room, and report the progress of the “search” over the phone.
Dozens of managers and employees across the country actually obeyed the caller’s demands, apparently because the caller sounded knowledgable about the law and forceful in his demands. These people did not know that a police investigation would never be investigated in this way, and followed the caller’s bizarre instructions, as in the account detailed in the Rapid City Journal:
"Assistant Manager Allan Mathis, then 52, was working at the Rapid City Hardee’s when a similar call came on June 5, 2003. For three hours, Mathis and a 19-year-old female employee stayed locked in the store’s office while Mathis told the woman to strip, do jumping jacks, run in place naked and perform other tasks, all at the caller’s direction. The employee complied for fear of losing her job. Mathis was later charged with kidnapping and second-degree rape and went to trial in February. A jury acquitted him of all charges. "
But the apparent perpetrator has been caught. It turns out that he is a prison guard. The story of the investigation is detailed in the Joplin Globe, along with the tale of a similar incident at a drive-in.
I find it hard to believe that people can be so gullible in this type of situation. I know most of the people on this board are pretty worldly, and probably wouldn’t fall for something like this, but do you know anyone – a relative, friend, or colleague – who obey strange or unusual orders if they were in a similar situation?
It’s not so strange. I can’t rmemeber when the study was done but it was something like this:
A person gets a new job where, when instructed, they’re suppose to press these buttons on a board that range from mild shock to death (or something like that). When an “employee” (this was all staged, only the employee didn’t know) pressed the more serious buttons you could here a person in the back ground yelling “OH GOD IT HURTS PLEASE STOP!” etc. As soon as an employee wanted to stop a person would come in the room and tell them (in an serious manner) that they would lose their job is they didn’t do this. Is was scary to see but most people would end up going all the way (this was supposedly life and death).
This experiment was done a while ago (I’m guessing the 50’s or 60’s) and they won’t let people do stuff like this anymore, so it’s hard to understand the dynamics. Saw it on the discovery channel back in the states, I’ll try to find a link about it (have done so in the past with no success).
Do a search on google or something to find more info if interested.
I guess memory did serve me kind of correctly.
The was also this other study that had people act like prisoners and guards in a prison. In the end things got so out of hand (prisoners spitting on guards, guards hitting prisoners, etc.) that they had to stop the experiment early.
I read a book about the milgram experiment a couple years ago. I wish I remembered the name. Might have been called ‘Obedience to authority’. Very interesting. A good read for sure. After every experiment, they would interview the people that were being duped, and some of the stuff that was coming out of their mouths just made me sick. “well, he told me to, and he’s the boss so…” A couple people flat out refused and I beleive one of them threatened to call the police on the doctors. Anyway, if you can find this book, it’s worth reading.
“Just leave the thinking to your boss, and do what you’re supposed to do”
(Screeching Weasel)