I largely agree with your perspective - with a couple of differences. Most importantly, while I see what you're getting at with #2, I don't think disproving the

I largely agree with your perspective - with a couple of differences. Most importantly, while I see what you're getting at with #2, I don't think disproving the SPE makes it so you can't explain things like neonazis, etc. The line that resonated with me was: > According to Alex Haslam and Stephen Reicher, psychologists who co-directed an attempted replication of the Stanford prison experiment in Great Britain in 2001, a critical factor in making people commit atrocities is a leader assuring them that they are acting in the service of a higher moral cause with which they identify — for instance, scientific progress or prison reform. We have been taught that guards abused prisoners in the Stanford prison experiment because of the power of their roles, but Haslam and Reicher argue that their behavior arose instead from their identification with the experimenters, which Jaffe and Zimbardo encouraged at every turn. So I don't think your second statement is disallowed by this article's findings. Most people randomly chosen off the street aren't necessarily evil - but some can be. And those who are can have a profound influence on those who aren't. Especially when there's a concept of a "greater good" on the line. (Insert Godwin's Law subject reference here). For me, that's the big lesson - be suspicious of the "greater good." [edited for formatting]