Channel 4's The Experiment makers defend fake Nazi-inspired care home

A new British television documentary has tested how members of the public react to a fake care facility for disabled people whose ideology is drawn from Nazi thinking. In The Experiment, members of the public are invited to tour a radical new residential home and see how residents are looked after, where they sleep and what work they do. The facility is not real. It was created for the programme, and the people inside it are actors. The home wraps prejudiced attitudes in modern language and glossy promotional material, with each room becoming more sinister as the tour goes on.

The programme was commissioned as a documentary by the broadcaster's specialist factual history department. Its producer, Nick Parnes, chief executive of Kalel Productions, said the aim was to examine the little known atrocity in which the Nazis sterilised and exterminated almost 300,000 disabled people before the Holocaust. He said the Nazis used propaganda that described disabled people as a cost and a burden, and as 'useless eaters'. He argued there are echoes of that language in current discussion of disabled people in parliament and in tabloids.

Disabled broadcaster and rights advocate Sophie Morgan, one of the presenters, said her reaction came after time in the United States, where debate about the autistic community focused on whether it could be fixed or healed. She said disabled people saw concerns about eugenics and echoes from the past. She wanted the programme to ask whether society is closer than it dares to think to repeating atrocities, and to place troubling historical attitudes in today's conversation about disability rights.

The interview pressed Morgan on the uncomfortable comparison between Nazi behaviour and current welfare debates, including personal independence payments. She said there are parallels. She pointed to language used by government and media that positions disabled people as people who cost the taxpayer or take too much in benefits. She said that language is not dissimilar to what was used by the Nazis in Germany before the Holocaust.

Parnes was also asked about the ethics of bringing unsuspecting members of the public into a fake facility and recording their reactions. He said the home was presented with a progressive, comfortable sheen, and that people had to dig below the surface to reach its sinister nature. He said producers expected a range of reactions, and some participants did think it was a terrible place while others thought it was warm and cosy. After the reveal, participants were brought back the next day and filmed again. Parnes said they signed two release forms, were shown why the experiment was linked to Nazi Germany, and felt they owned the experiment. He rejected the idea that it was a gotcha moment, saying the point was that people need to be careful with the information they are presented with and peel back the layers.