Are people really sheep? Most, disappointingly, are. Some are wolves. And a rare few try to keep the wolves from the sheep. They are haplessly outnumbered however. In the 1970s, Stanley Milgram conducted a series of social psychology experiments, in which he measured the willingness of people to obey an authority figure that instructed them to inflict pain on others. Surprisingly, a great deal of us would obey an authority figure, even if the acts we are asked to perform, goes against our morals, ethics and conscience.
The Milgram Experiment
It is no surprise then to learn of the evil that transpired at Enron during its rise. Enron, for those who don't know, was an energy company founded in 1985, that at its peak, had a claimed revenue stream of $111 billion. Of course, there wasn't much substance to Enron. At its heart, it was a financial company, trading in energy futures. It was also a slave to the market, and from the top down, it practiced a culture of making money and maintaining its stock price, above all else. Even if that meant breaking the law; stealing; committing fraud; and manipulating governments. With friends in high places -- CEO, Kenneth Lay, was very good friends of both Bush senior and junior -- Enron did what it wanted, and its accomplices, which included the largest US investment banks and accounting firm Arthur Andersen, ripped off countless Americans. All of this and more is chronicled in the documentary, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room -- which can be seen in its entirety below.
The Milgram Experiment
It is no surprise then to learn of the evil that transpired at Enron during its rise. Enron, for those who don't know, was an energy company founded in 1985, that at its peak, had a claimed revenue stream of $111 billion. Of course, there wasn't much substance to Enron. At its heart, it was a financial company, trading in energy futures. It was also a slave to the market, and from the top down, it practiced a culture of making money and maintaining its stock price, above all else. Even if that meant breaking the law; stealing; committing fraud; and manipulating governments. With friends in high places -- CEO, Kenneth Lay, was very good friends of both Bush senior and junior -- Enron did what it wanted, and its accomplices, which included the largest US investment banks and accounting firm Arthur Andersen, ripped off countless Americans. All of this and more is chronicled in the documentary, Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room -- which can be seen in its entirety below.
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