The Event: How Racist Are You?

[H-KQGE]

Are we all more racist than we realise or would like to admit?

For this Channel 4 documentary Jane Elliott, a controversial former schoolteacher from Ohio, is recreating the shocking exercise she used forty years ago to teach her nine year-old pupils about prejudice.

Elliott is asking thirty adult British volunteers - men and women of different ages and backgrounds - to experience inequality based on their eye colour to show how susceptible we can all be to bigotry, and what it feels like to be on the other side of arbitrary discrimination.

Does Elliott's exercise still have something to teach us four decades on and in a different country? Presented by Krishnan Guru-Murthy, the exercise is observed throughout by two expert psychologists, Prof Dominic Abrams and Dr Funké Baffour, who will be unpicking the behaviour on display.

First shown on Channel 4, Thursday 29 October 2009.

Firstly, I did a search and didn't find anything on the forum. Secondly I watched this when it first aired and I wanted to refer to it sometime last year on the forum, I never caught the name, and I didn't really know how to use YouTube till last year... oi, stop laughing! Okay now this exercise is pretty simple but it seemed to have taken effect better in other countries such as Australia and America. Well it didn't have the same effect in the UK with the subtle racism that's highly prevalent to anyone "switched on" as it were. This is about power dynamics and of course programming by the system.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6MYHBrJIIFU

Sorry, I'm not able to do embeds from my end. I thought that this was still interesting even with the knowledge and awareness that I've gained now, and a decent exercise in reading people and situations, paramoralisms, paralogistics etc. Watch out for the schoolteacher and her comments, (the black or mixed race child and their cut) at the time I watched it I wanted to hurl the telly out of the window! Mainly as I know LOADS of that type of woman growing up and some now still.

 

[Dragon Snacks]

Sometimes I feel like hyper-vigilant anti-racism is the new racism. In light of the notable progress made against racism, it's seems like the media demanding we stay fixated on it is just another way to distract and divide us.

 

[luke wilson]

Sometimes I feel like hyper-vigilant anti-racism is the new racism. In light of the notable progress made against racism, it's seems like the media demanding we stay fixated on it is just another way to distract and divide us.

I personally don't suffer any overt racism or even subtle one as far as I can see. As far as I am aware, most of the hardships that I suffer are due to my own programmes/trauma etc.

However, I think it's dismissive to throw the issue to one side as I think doing so is the same as one of the people in the top 10% saying the economy is booming and that the worst is over. The reality is simply different out there for the majority. The statistics also show it. When you have the bottom of society populated unproportionately by minorites, or the 'prison-industrial complex' unproportionately populated by same, then you can't just say it's all by mere chance. Either you think those people deserve to be there (because of lack of effort, because of just being criminals or whatever the reason for justification is) or the system is systematically stacked against them.

Saying all the above, the issue of race as well is used by minorities to essentially give up or accept their situation. It's pervasive when you are attacked to the last fibre of your being. Imagine a minority child, undefensive, growing up with all the subtle suggestions that because of his race, he is lesser than the rest of the population. Even when he/she comes of age and can think for him/her self, overcoming such programming is as hard or even harder than other people overcoming their programming from childhood.

 

[Dragon Snacks]

I don't see in our zealously politically correct society the non-white people getting the message that they are lesser. But there are a lot of messages reminding minorities how badly they've been oppressed in the past. And a lot of messages that push the fight against racism, as if that's the only thing worth living for. So a lot of energy and rhetoric is spent promoting this fight, at the expense of everything else it seems. It keeps a lot of minorities in victim mode. Many identify as victims and are thus, immobilized.

I think I would agree with you on the prison thing. Cops and government in general are there to control us all, though. It just so happens white folks run the justice system and probably do have their biases.

Dwelling on whether or not you've been wronged kind of keeps you stuck, and ironically, under the thumb of the man you hate. I know, easy to say from a white guy but I still think it's true.

 

[Anthony]

Sometimes I feel like hyper-vigilant anti-racism is the new racism. In light of the notable progress made against racism, it's seems like the media demanding we stay fixated on it is just another way to distract and divide us.

I personally don't suffer any overt racism or even subtle one as far as I can see. As far as I am aware, most of the hardships that I suffer are due to my own programmes/trauma etc.

However, I think it's dismissive to throw the issue to one side as I think doing so is the same as one of the people in the top 10% saying the economy is booming and that the worst is over. The reality is simply different out there for the majority. The statistics also show it. When you have the bottom of society populated unproportionately by minorites, or the 'prison-industrial complex' unproportionately populated by same, then you can't just say it's all by mere chance. Either you think those people deserve to be there (because of lack of effort, because of just being criminals or whatever the reason for justification is) or the system is systematically stacked against them.

Saying all the above, the issue of race as well is used by minorities to essentially give up or accept their situation. It's pervasive when you are attacked to the last fibre of your being. Imagine a minority child, undefensive, growing up with all the subtle suggestions that because of his race, he is lesser than the rest of the population. Even when he/she comes of age and can think for him/her self, overcoming such programming is as hard or even harder than other people overcoming their programming from childhood.

You can check out your implicit beliefs by doing an online exam mentioned in the book Blink by Gladwell.

_https://implicit.harvard.edu/implicit/

 

[luke wilson]

I don't see in our zealously politically correct society the non-white people getting the message that they are lesser.

It's not a surprise that you don't see this because you really don't have any reason to see it.

The message is there, pervasive, all over the place, all the time.

You have stereotypes that always put you in your box. You have other people's implicit assumptions, views etc which also put you in your box. People's unspoken views DO make a difference on other people... People communicate with more than just the words that come out their mouths. You have manifest reality which is the biggest one of them all... Look outside your window and see...

Another way to see how these sorts of message works, look at inner city poverty and crime, which is something that affects both minorities and white people alike. Kids who grow up in such an environment don't have their teachers saying they will be stuck there, or they if they are lucky, not even their parents. However, there whole environment, implies it nonetheless. They will relate to it, this is where they belong, they don't belong in the other side of town with all the rich people.. there social interactions will be different compared to a kid in a rich neighbourhood going to a high-end school. There views on what is possible in life will be different. All these differences and messages function implicitly most if not all the time. Sure you can have the explicit messages but the ones that really hold you down are the implicit ones. The ones you feel/hear but are unaware you are feeling or hearing them and even if you know you are, are unsure how to counteract it because it's very pervasive. That is one of the big reasons why social mobility is so hard and that poverty remains in families for generations...

Applying it to race, the messages are still there, it's not even an issue of having money or not, you can be the richest minority out there but that doesn't mean you have overcome the issue of racism. This is a construct that took centuries to make, it isn't going to disappear overnight just because they changed some laws or we have magically become enlightened...

 

[Dragon Snacks]

Ever heard the saying, "When you're a hammer, all you see are nails."? If you're on the lookout for something, chances are you're going to see it, and are more likely to interpret things as racist that may be neutral. And sure there's racism out there, but it sure isn't the 50's anymore either.

I just think it's a dead end for minorities to focus on it, yet they are constantly being told that it's something they should be very concerned about, above all else.

To me the media focus on it is just another Machiavellian tool used to keep us bickering with each other.