Wednesday, January 22, 2020

Why I'm a racist (video)

Jane "The Bitch" Elliott (Channel 4, 2009) via Per Christian Frankplads; Wisdom Quarterly



I'm racist. How racist are you? Are we all more racist than we realize or more than we would like to admit?

For this Channel 4 documentary Jane Elliott, a controversial former American schoolteacher from Iowa, recreates the shocking exercise she used beginning 40 years ago to teach her 9-year-old students about racial prejudice.

So what if I have blue eyes? I will bite you!
Elliott asks 30 adult British volunteers -- men and women of different ages and backgrounds -- to experience inequality based on their eye color. What this shows is how susceptible we can all be to bigotry in ourselves. We see what it feels like to be on the receiving end of arbitrary discrimination.

Does Elliott's exercise have anything to teach now in these enlightened times or outside the USA?

Presented by Krishnan Guru-Murthy, the exercise is overlooked by two expert psychologists, Prof. Dominic Abrams and Dr. Funké Baffour, who unpick the behavior on display. This is the full version first shown on Channel 4 in England on October 29, 2009.

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