In a newspaper I read the story of a man who had “dobbed in” a wealthy businessman for dangerous driving. This kind of thing is encouraged by police these days. The man was an ordinary working guy. But it wasn’t long before he started getting phonecalls and letters asking him strange and personal questions. The wealthy businessman and his bored mega-rich friends were playing a game in which the first one to find out a particular personal detail about this man won a prize. How common is this kind of thing? Are the elite known to use ordinary people as their playthings? What would the prize be for driving someone mad? The news account was definitely true but I no longer have access to it.
I’m sure there are some movies or TV shows that used this sort of thing as a plot.
I really don’t know how often this sort of thing happens, but I’d imagine that the better-known wealthy people (i.e.- “celebrities”) would indulge in this sort of people-manipulation less often than those who have a couple million and have a good level of anonymity (for example, Rick Rockwell… who heard of him before he went on that Who Wants To Marry A MultiMillionaire? show?).
My reasoning for suspecting this is that celebrities are generally easily-recognized by the public, and if they tried to mess around with one of us “little people” (term used tongue-in-cheek), they’d have a higher likelihood of getting caught.
I don’t know if I addressed the OP, but I did the best I could 
Spoofe Bo Diddly: I know it sounds fictional, believe me, but why should it? In a Rolling Stone magazine years ago I read an interview with a conspiracy theorist who said that people were given badges of mental health for NOT believing in conspiracy theories. The kind of people who would be giving those badges could well be the sort that used to use peasants for target practise. Just because the world seems to be full of benevolent billionaires at the moment (Ted Turner, Anita Roddick, Bill Gates etc) doesn’t mean there is not room for other sorts.
I agree, although a person needn’t be a billionaire to be cruel and manipulative to other people.
Richer and less accountable people can play games on a larger scale I suppose. And the odds of them doing it are probably quite high. I have dreams of revenge myself which could only be enacted with a large supply of money, it’s not unusual. But the very rich would be more dangerous at this, you would think, because of their detachment.
Also: I didn’t mean those badges of mental health were in anyway literal, material badges. It’s just a way of talking.
So…anyone think this is going to be the plot of the next JG Ballard novel?