This reminds me of a social sciences experiment that was performed in our staff restrooms (locked from the public). The students went into the restrooms (male and female), decorated them with flowers and other nice touches such as thick, soft towels, and hung dry erase boards, with dry erase markers attached, inside the stalls. We were encouraged to write on the boards as we liked while we were idling inside the stalls. The students came into the restrooms every evening, took photos, and then reset the scene for the next morning.

In the beginning there was a great improvement in the restrooms. People threw their tissues and extra trash into the containers. We even saw a more polite behavior between us...we opened doors for each other and had polite conversation while washing our hands (well, in the women's restroom...I don't know what was going on with the men). Thoughtful philosophy was written on the dry erase boards. Everyone commented on the great improvement.

Over time (I think it was a period of a month) the restrooms became increasingly trashed. People stole or destroyed the flowers. The writings on the dry erase boards became increasely vulgar, and then eventually edged off the boards as people took the opportunity to write vulgarities on the walls and floors. People tsk tsk'd at how bad things were getting (but did nothing to clean up the mess).

Apparently it took less than a month for the veneer of civilization to erode and the true nature of the human creature be revealed.

It was all very sad, really.

But it's human nature, I guess.

Which makes you think.

Well, some of us.

I hope the students got an "A" in their class. They invested a lot of time and money in the experiment. But I bet they never looked as us so-called adults the same way again.

Message edited on: 07/25/2005 22:10