Locked in a Classroom

We met with the participants of an experiment that shocked the world. In 1967, students at a high school in Palo Alto asked their teacher, Ron Jones, "How could people allow the Holocaust to happen? Why did everyone obey the villain?" Instead of giving them an answer, Ron proposed an experiment. For several days, the students followed orders without question, refrained from asking unnecessary questions, and even wrote reports on those who resisted the system. The conclusion of this experiment served as a warning for all of us. Sixty years later, we reunited with Ron and his former students to explore how one can unknowingly turn into a monster—and how to resist that transformation.