These 30 people have never met. By the days end, they may wish they never had. For one long day they’ll be at the mercy of “The Bitch”, a retired american teacher. Some would say she calls herself this way for good reason.
For 40 years Jane Elliott has been running an exercise that has ignited controversy around the world. She says it lays bare the hidden truth about racism in white societies. Many disagree, some vehemently. Now she’s bringing her extreme methods and message to modern Britain. She’s about to divide this group. Her aim: Simulate a racist apartheid style regime.
Will the British people accept her regime or stand up to it? Does it reveal that we’re all more racist than we’d like to admit? “How Racist Are You?” is a documentary investigating one of the most taboo subjects in society.
Blacks are a primitive race struggling to adapt – this is the root of the problem
The problem is that racism is just a made up word. It was used to describe things like slavery or the repression of minorities but now it’s been applied to someone who merely includes racial factors when judging someone else.
If I live in a gated community that keeps getting robbed by black guys dressed like punks I’m going to see that as a factor when judging whether or not a person might be in my neighborhood to rob someone. I’ll stop judging that way when it stops being true. Otherwise I’d be ignorant.
The idea that people can be brainwashed into societies that divide and turn people on each other based on pointless factors is nothing new and certainly not limited to race or physical appearance.
This Jewish teacher women is so wrong – she’s trying to equate eye colour and skin colour with race. Race and skin colour are not the same thing – colour is just one aesthetic component. More important differences include IQ and behaviour. Blacks don’t even smell the same.
Great now im racist against old white haired people
I read on wiki that this exercise was unfortunately infiltrated by some actors, so got discredited. Though I think that this was a terrible result.
Also I believe England has it’s class structure being a big factor in how whites view racism.
Most upperclass whites who deny racism, are in a much more privileged part of the society, they also won’t have to deal with socialising with racial minorities either. So they can’t have true empathy, because they don’t personally know or care about anyone going through it daily.
Whites in a lower class unfortunately are less educated, they can either be more aware, or just plain ignorant, because they suffer through class discrimination(which is a big issue in the UK still).
This exercise is good in places like the US where class separation isn’t as entrenched in society.
I live in New Zealand, an ex colony of the UK. The subtle racist attitude is what we have here, I too being a white kid growing up in a more vocally racist part of the country didn’t realise the subtle racism and what was wrong with it, because I was more opposed to the more obvious racism I witnessed.
I saw someone asked what “…that crazy Bitch meant when she said white people were conditioned “before birth”? ”
I think what she is saying is we are born with parents who have been conditioned, that it has been the result of generations, we as white children are always provided with positive white imagery all around us. So we are conditioned to this idea of superiority, we don’t get the choice in that either. But it’s to make the choice when we become older, and are able to understand this inequality to do something about it.
You can try raising your white child ‘right and non-racist’ but society and the system works against you as a parent trying to dismiss these ignorant stereo-types.
So white kids are born into the privileged position, they didn’t choose it. Just like the black kid doesn’t choose all the societal implications that go with being black in the white society.
Also after reading a lot of these comments, it still seems to me that a lot of white westerners don’t realise or want to acknowledge the global influence and effect white mainstream media has on parts of the world, where you have little Asian kids growing up(in Asian countries) looking at ‘beautiful white people’ and seeing that imagery all their lives (as well as their own) But for them they realise a lot younger than white people, that they’re ‘different’ ‘less than’ etc.
I guess my moving to Auckland in NZ which is very racially diverse, and being the token white guy working with Asian and Indian people, the self esteem (particularly the Chinese girls) have about their race and identity is sadly low. Some aspire to assimilate fully into NZ society, which really is what that guy who is mixed was talking about ‘playing the game’, it’s just assimilation to the white mainstream.
I’m just sad that more white people don’t see things on this level, there is an issue, it won’t go away with anti-discrimination laws and crap like that. It will never fully go away. But through education exercises, like this(though adjusted to the group you are working with) you can have a great deal of social progress.
Though I think the UK’s primary problem is the class structure, which picking on racial minorities when you are white and accused of privilege but happen to come from a low class, which means you actually have little to no privilege, but you have high class ‘educated’ (I’d say arrogant) whites accusing you of your perceived ignorance and racist tendency.
What I’m talking about I think is portrayed quite well in the movie “This Is England”.
Anyway that was a waffly load of shit…
I read on wiki that this exercise was unfortunately infiltrated by some actors, so got discredited. Though I think that this was a terrible result.
Also I believe England has it’s class structure being a big factor in how whites view racism.
Most upperclass whites who deny racism, are in a much more privileged part of the society, they also won’t have to deal with socialising with racial minorities either. So they can’t have true empathy, because they don’t personally know or care about anyone going through it daily.
Whites in a lower class unfortunately are less educated, they can either be more aware, or just plain ignorant, because they suffer through class discrimination(which is a big issue in the UK still).
This exercise is good in places like the US where class separation isn’t as entrenched in society.
I live in New Zealand, an ex colony of the UK. The subtle racist attitude is what we have here, I too being a white kid growing up in a more vocally racist part of the country didn’t realise the subtle racism and what was wrong with it, because I was more opposed to the more obvious racism I witnessed.
I saw someone asked what “…that crazy Bitch meant when she said white people were conditioned “before birth”? ”
I think what she is saying is we are born with parents who have been conditioned, that it has been the result of generations, we as white children are always provided with positive white imagery all around us. So we are conditioned to this idea of superiority, we don’t get the choice in that either. But it’s to make the choice when we become older, and are able to understand this inequality to do something about it.
You can try raising your white child ‘right and non-racist’ but society and the system works against you as a parent trying to dismiss these ignorant stereo-types.
So white kids are born into the privileged position, they didn’t choose it. Just like the black kid doesn’t choose all the societal implications that go with being black in the white society.
Also after reading a lot of these comments, it still seems to me that a lot of white westerners don’t realise or want to acknowledge the global influence and effect white mainstream media has on parts of the world, where you have little Asian kids growing up(in Asian countries) looking at ‘beautiful white people’ and seeing that imagery all their lives (as well as their own) But for them they realise a lot younger than white people, that they’re ‘different’ ‘less than’ etc.
I guess my moving to Auckland in NZ which is very racially diverse, and being the token white guy working with Asian and Indian people, the self esteem (particularly the Chinese girls) have about their race and identity is sadly low. Some aspire to assimilate fully into NZ society, which really is what that guy who is mixed was talking about ‘playing the game’, it’s just assimilation to the white mainstream.
I’m just sad that more white people don’t see things on this level, there is an issue, it won’t go away with anti-discrimination laws and crap like that. It will never fully go away. But through education exercises, like this(though adjusted to the group you are working with) you can have a great deal of social progress.
Though I think the UK’s primary problem is the class structure, which picking on racial minorities when you are white and accused of privilege but happen to come from a low class, which means you actually have little to no privilege, but you have high class ‘educated’ (I’d say arrogant) whites accusing you of your perceived ignorance and racist tendency.
What I’m talking about I think is portrayed quite well in the movie “This Is England”.
Anyway that was a waffly load of shit…
I read on wiki that this exercise was unfortunately infiltrated by some actors, so got discredited. Though I think that this was a terrible result.
Also I believe England has it’s class structure being a big factor in how whites view racism.
Most upperclass whites who deny racism, are in a much more privileged part of the society, they also won’t have to deal with socialising with racial minorities either. So they can’t have true empathy, because they don’t personally know or care about anyone going through it daily.
Whites in a lower class unfortunately are less educated, they can either be more aware, or just plain ignorant, because they suffer through class discrimination(which is a big issue in the UK still).
This exercise is good in places like the US where class separation isn’t as entrenched in society.
I live in New Zealand, an ex colony of the UK. The subtle racist attitude is what we have here, I too being a white kid growing up in a more vocally racist part of the country didn’t realise the subtle racism and what was wrong with it, because I was more opposed to the more obvious racism I witnessed.
I saw someone asked what “…that crazy Bitch meant when she said white people were conditioned “before birth”? ”
I think what she is saying is we are born with parents who have been conditioned, that it has been the result of generations, we as white children are always provided with positive white imagery all around us. So we are conditioned to this idea of superiority, we don’t get the choice in that either. But it’s to make the choice when we become older, and are able to understand this inequality to do something about it.
You can try raising your white child ‘right and non-racist’ but society and the system works against you as a parent trying to dismiss these ignorant stereo-types.
So white kids are born into the privileged position, they didn’t choose it. Just like the black kid doesn’t choose all the societal implications that go with being black in the white society.
Also after reading a lot of these comments, it still seems to me that a lot of white westerners don’t realise or want to acknowledge the global influence and effect white mainstream media has on parts of the world, where you have little Asian kids growing up(in Asian countries) looking at ‘beautiful white people’ and seeing that imagery all their lives (as well as their own) But for them they realise a lot younger than white people, that they’re ‘different’ ‘less than’ etc.
I guess my moving to Auckland in NZ which is very racially diverse, and being the token white guy working with Asian and Indian people, the self esteem (particularly the Chinese girls) have about their race and identity is sadly low. Some aspire to assimilate fully into NZ society, which really is what that guy who is mixed was talking about ‘playing the game’, it’s just assimilation to the white mainstream.
I’m just sad that more white people don’t see things on this level, there is an issue, it won’t go away with anti-discrimination laws and crap like that. It will never fully go away. But through education exercises, like this(though adjusted to the group you are working with) you can have a great deal of social progress.
Though I think the UK’s primary problem is the class structure, which picking on racial minorities when you are white and accused of privilege but happen to come from a low class, which means you actually have little to no privilege, but you have high class ‘educated’ (I’d say arrogant) whites accusing you of your perceived ignorance and racist tendency.
What I’m talking about I think is portrayed quite well in the movie “This Is England”.
Anyway that was a waffly load of shit…
I think it is easy to miss the point – largely because she does not make it especially well, and it is not an especially interesting point to make. She shows a small group how it feels to be oppressed and picked on. Nothing in this convinces that group that the minority in their society is in fact victimized or mistreated. The testimony of black participants is the only content that is likely to do that and the whites by this stage are sufficiently p1ssed off that they are not likely to be listening.
Racism is hardwired into our DNA – we are tribal and trust people in our racial group more than others at a fairly primal level.Internally our “group” is a core of people we see as individuals and can make individual assessments about irrespective of external factors such as class and race. From memory this size is about 130 people or so – as big as an extended family / tribal village we evolved in. After that we rely on cultural and racial clues to tell us whether someone shares our geographical / racial background and can therefore be trusted to have at least a set of roughly aligned interests on a basic level. The more outside threat we perceive, the more strongly a larger group will bond.
Without external threat we tend to fracture along other lines – haves/have nots – religion – football team , whatever.
By definition the reverse applies – someone who looks, smells, eats and acts differently will be a threat and we will react differently to them if they are not on our “trusted” list.
There is some interesting research coming out of social media. A facebook “friend” request is 20x more likely to be accepted if they are already a friend of a friend irrespective of race.
Requests from strangers will however be assessed, on the whole, with a racial element. (ie, whites friend whites & blacks friend blacks)
This is not a function of being white, it is a function of being human. When you then put minorities into an otherwise homogeneous society how well they mix will depend upon the perceived threat level generally and economic factors. If the society is under economic stress or at war, minorities get a hard time. If the minority is big enough and angry enough to challenge the power structure (eg, Southern USA circa 1965, Rwanda 1996) the temperature in the pot goes up indeed.
To describe racism as “white behaviour” is just stupid and detracts from the lesson. We are all racist and we cant help it. What we can help is our actions and what we do to others both as an individual and in groups. Even in in societies where you get strung up for using the word “Nigger” in the wrong context there is a lot of subtle exclusion that minorites have to contend with but I don;’t think that lady makes this point very well at all.
You have a lot of good points, including the obvious: what was done to the blue-eyed people is nothing like modern Britain treats minorities. White people are not given half the answers to IQ tests, they’re not allowed to insult minorities to their face, they don’t get to eat first, and so on…
I wanted to say, though, that racism is not “in our DNA.” Our evolutionary history did not involve walking far enough to meet people of a different race. We are tribal, by nature, but not racist. There’s a good paper by Rob Kurzban that makes the point clearly.
By the way, did anyone know what that crazy Bitch meant when she said white people were conditioned “before birth”?
Wow, good job on choosing a typically Caucasoid characteristic like blue eyes. Good job.
Wow, good job on choosing a typically Caucasoid characteristic like blue eyes. Good job.
The point that is being made is that she is demonstrating how it feels to be on the recieving end as a person of non white descent. It is about emphasising with past wrongs and acknowledging them and making them right. Looking back in history at colonisation and fast forward nearly two hundred years to the stolen generations in Australia. The white people in control didn’t care about the person they were discriminating against. They dindn’t care they were taking children away from their parents. The didn’t want to know if these people were nice people or not. They only cared about being in power and having that power over someone who is of ‘lower social status’ because of their skin colour. That is all I have to say on this subject because it is no good talking about when there is obviously room for improvement.
I kind of went a little off subject but I stand by what I say.
this is crap. she’s perpetuating hate. how many ppl who participated will continue *experimenting* out on the street? randomly picking victims who need to be “taught a lesson”, without even knowing the person. how is THAT good for society? may as well tell all the whites to line up every sunday in front of their house and bend over. then all the blacks can run down the street giving every white a good boot to the ass. that’ll teach ’em. won’t it? yeah right.
Racism is real, unfortunately.
Ms Elliot’s pseudo quasi-experiments were discredited in the U.S. years ago, so she’s hopped across the pond.
In the beginning, her methods may have done some good, but today, they just (as another poster already commented) expose her insecurity, much as the silliness from the University of Delaware’s Residence Life department has done; Delaware’s outcomes were undoubtedly based on insecurity. http://thefire.org/article/8597.html Take a peek at their departmental staff pages, at the “top” are the white ‘racists.’
Craziness like Delaware gets away with comes directly from Elliot’s statement, “I’ve reached a point now where I will no longer tolerate the intolerable. ” ummm hellloooo? anybody home? that makes you no better than than the intolerable.
I find it interesting in the bios, that the person responsible for that miscarriage of justice is proud to name her two mutts, but not her life partner and children.
Racism is real, unfortunately.
Ms Elliot’s pseudo quasi-experiments were discredited in the U.S. years ago, so she’s hopped across the pond.
In the beginning, her methods may have done some good, but today, they just (as another poster already commented) expose her insecurity, much as the silliness from the University of Delaware’s Residence Life department has done; Delaware’s outcomes were undoubtedly based on insecurity. http://thefire.org/article/8597.html Take a peek at their departmental staff pages, at the “top” are the white ‘racists.’
Craziness like Delaware gets away with comes directly from Elliot’s statement, “I’ve reached a point now where I will no longer tolerate the intolerable. ” ummm hellloooo? anybody home? that makes you no better then than the intolerable.
I find it interesting in the bios, that the person responsible for that miscarriage of justice is proud to name her two mutts, but not her life partner and children.
I was so hoping to be impressed by this experiment. Sadly, it was a huge clusterfuck. The one thing I gathered from this travesty is a freshly ignited contempt for the British.
God bless the USA. If you snivel like that in our melting pot, there is no skin color that could save you from an ass-kicking.
Why on earth would you have a contempt for the British after watching this documentary. I could be wrong but I think that this documentary would have been much better served if it had been shot in the USA not because people stand up more for their race in America but because they HAVE TO. Racism is ripe in the USA (god bless it.) but in the UK people live in a much more multicultural world where the divides between black and white, gay and straight, muslim and christian are much less potent, although not completely eradicated. I like how after watching a 45 minute documentary about prejudice you then feel the need to randomly attack the entire population of another country. Is there not irony here?
Why on earth would you have a contempt for the British after watching this documentary. I could be wrong but I think that this documentary would have been much better served if it had been shot in the USA not because people stand up more for their race in America but because they HAVE TO. Racism is ripe in the USA (god bless it.) but in the UK people live in a much more multicultural world where the divides between black and white, gay and straight, muslim and christian are much less potent, although not completely eradicated. I like how after watching a 45 minute documentary about prejudice you then feel the need to randomly attack the entire population of another country. Is there not irony here?
An excellent documentary though the real conclusion is strangely ignored. While the blue eyed group realised what it’s like to be discriminated against, the brown eyed group experienced what it is like to be a racist. It took only a few hours to make victims of discrimination completely reverse their role, and all it took was one authoritarian figure. Racism is a global issue present in every individual and should be addressed as such.
I’M TANKFULL FOR THIS DOCUMENTARY. I’LEARNED SO MUCH TODAY. I’m polish girl living in france with french boy who is comming armenian-french and german family. I know what is like fell different each time when I open my mouth cause my accent. And I’m gratefull for that because it open my eyes for other groups of segergation. Last Christmas I spent with brother in law wife family witch is “all” french and we had discussion about “indivisible” groups of society. I’ll send this doc to everybody. And maybe next Christmas we wlill spend in more open minded way.
“Shut up whitey”
I grew up believing in hard work and determination. Glad I had good role models to keep me founded.
This exercise is meant to demonstrate how the majority does not even realize that there is racism by putting them in the same situation as the minority groups.
But those who are in complete denial are unable to accept the reality.
I cannot believe that one can be so stupid to compare their necessity to wear business attire to a situation where the mixed race father is afraid of showing up at his daughter’s white-majority school !
Probably they need to be inundated by the minority groups so that they become a minority when they will begin to grasp what is being conveyed. Pakis will probably do the job in UK ! Just kidding !
racism is rampant and is happening still today. Does something have to hit you in the face for you to be able to see it? check out this article for all racism deniers
http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/03/30/racism-is-a-mental-illness-barack-obama-rapist-of-freedom-and-the-statue-of-liberty/
http://www.alternet.org/story/56837/
http://www.alternet.org/story/16792
http://www.alternet.org/media/146040/what_white_people_fear_/
read this articles and tell me that racism is no longer an issue!!! It obviously is…
Hhm, she doesn’t seem to be carrying out a serious sociological experiment as much as she is acting out some past trauma.
I mean how else can you seriously interpret a woman who declares herself a “bitch” while carrying out psychological experiments on children?
Poor dear, I wonder what happened to her…
Anyway this doesn’t so much indicate latent racism in “white” culture, as much as it demonstrates the ability of emotionally insecure people to dominate the world view and actions of groups of people who are not yet fully self-actualized.
Didn’t address racism at all, really, just adopted race conflict as a kind of aesthetic.
Kafka and Orwell would have things to say to her.
According to one biographer, on the evening of April 4, 1968, Jane Elliott turned on her television to find out about the assassination. One scene she says that she remembers vividly is that of a (white) reporter, with the microphone pointed toward a local black leader asking “When our leader (John F. Kennedy) was killed several years ago, his widow held us together. Who’s going to control your people?” It was supposedly there, in her living room, that she decided to combine a lesson she had planned aboutNative Americans with the lesson done about King for February’s Hero of the Month.and frankly she did address the issue more then once, see nowadays racism is smooth, you don’t have to be calling out racial abuse to be labeled a “racist”, and if you do its always justified by, “well your in my country” which is true but the blame should be directed at governments for opening the flood gates OR dragging people back from jesuseastnowhere to be enslaved or simple take their resources, personally I loved how they squeaked at the mention of racism, where as me and my family usually get stoned or spat at, verbal abuse is nothing, its almost nice.
THE BITCH HAD BLUE EYES.
This is a GREAT Doc. Remove black and white and look at the news of today. we have racism involved . christian vs muslim. democrats vs communism. Its not only your looks today but your beliefs/religon, where you live, type of sex (male/female). For one to say that they suffer more racism than another is outlandish, it’s just more obvious to some.
There will always be racism. Lets start an ANTI- Racism movement. And anyone that feels that there should be racism isn’t aloud to drive a car.
There that solves that.
Many thanks for sharing this extremely powerful moment. People should pay money to watch this and learn from it!
Absolutely a bullshit documentary. A hysterical school teacher takes a simple minded idea and runs with it. It’s a mockery of the issue of racism.
no it shows u how stupid racism is in the first place u wouldn’t hate someone who had brown eyes because it is natural y then is it okay for something else natural to be ur basis of hate….racism is not complicated its someone hating u for ur natural and stating there reasons on other malice and judgmental things..she does a great job and it sad because some people will never understand what she understands because she took the time to actually stop and think…simple…i am non-Caucasian and she has the best approach to racism then anyone….people can debate all day she actually shows the beast’s ugly face and some people dont like that..they get uncomfortable
no it shows u how stupid racism is in the first place u wouldn’t hate someone who had brown eyes because it is natural y then is it okay for something else natural to be ur basis of hate….racism is not complicated its someone hating u for ur natural and stating there reasons on other malice and judgmental things..she does a great job and it sad because some people will never understand what she understands because she took the time to actually stop and think…simple…i am non-Caucasian and she has the best approach to racism then anyone….people can debate all day she actually shows the beast’s ugly face and some people dont like that..they get uncomfortable
racist
Tony, debatable, yes. Bullshit is being unfair though. It looks like she sure got your goat. It’s a double-edged knife that this woman had the balls to “run with”, as you put it. It is NOT a mockery of the issue of racism, that I happen to be quite familiar with. You don’t have to like the doc, but perhaps you want to give that a 2nd thought. Greetings 😉
I was so put off by this video that I was convinced that there would be a revelation at the end that the brown eyed people were behaving racist and the commentators were playing along to persuade the viewer to side with the brown eyed people.
Describing actions or behaviors as “white behaviors” is racist in and of itself. Encouraging groups of people to be prejudice against others isn’t productive in the slightest, even for an experiment.
While Ms. Elliott’s original exercise proved to be quite powerful, I have serious misgivings regarding her strategies for revealing racism in society.
kevin all of american media tv, movies, news, goverment, and economy is based off of a white standard…y do u think every picture of man in any evolution picture is white…why is jesus portrayed as white….when everybody knows life started in africa and the Mediterranean region jesus would be black along with alot of others that are portrayed as white….america was built for whites y would u feel that any other race would be portrayed in this society..american has always tried to keep itself white at the core..even after they released the stolen africans from the plantations they still ad to fuck with them…keep them uneducated and not allowing them to own property and lets not forget that this is when they birthed american racism…just an all out war against blacks and others for no reason at all other than whites feeling treatened by the precence of those who were oppressed by them…they thought that this would be the end of them so they had to look strong when really they were a bunch of scared hicks…so when u think of saying white behaviors again like they dont have any please think of all the racism that has gone on and is still going on and hopfully u will see ur white behavior…also watch right america feeling wronged and u will see alot of white behavior still alive and well.
Swan: you have a few valid points but Please remember that when the pictures of Jesus were drawn, it was mostly by European artists that portrayed him as thus so the people could relate to him and because that was their personal view of him. Also, the reason that jesus is not portrayed as being black is because…well, he was born in Israel so he’s an Israelite.
please note that bigotry is not predominately white, though i am certainly not suggesting that people who are white are not perpetrators of racism.
white people have been called all sorts of things : cracker, whitey, pecker-wood, and have been on the receiving end of all sorts of hate. racism goes all ways: black on white, white on black, latino on black latino on white etc etc.
when white people are faced with being called racism it is also very difficult for them to defend themselves and i have encountered people that throw out the race card at a whim and who think that people with a white heritage should owe them something because the “whitey’s” ancestors had enslaved their ancestors.
race is a very touchy subject but please remain open minded about it and don’t fall into the common victim traps
Swan: you have a few valid points but Please remember that when the pictures of Jesus were drawn, it was mostly by European artists that portrayed him as thus so the people could relate to him and because that was their personal view of him. Also, the reason that jesus is not portrayed as being black is because…well, he was born in Israel so he’s an Israelite.
please note that bigotry is not predominately white, though i am certainly not suggesting that people who are white are not perpetrators of racism.
white people have been called all sorts of things : cracker, whitey, pecker-wood, and have been on the receiving end of all sorts of hate. racism goes all ways: black on white, white on black, latino on black latino on white etc etc.
when white people are faced with being called racism it is also very difficult for them to defend themselves and i have encountered people that throw out the race card at a whim and who think that people with a white heritage should owe them something because the “whitey’s” ancestors had enslaved their ancestors.
race is a very touchy subject but please remain open minded about it and don’t fall into the common victim traps
But historically, through extreme, inhumane and evil ways white supremacy and racism has become the hallmark of whites. Theoretically, you’re right about the racism going both ways, but you must remember that racism perpetuated by minority groups, not to discredit is validity and severity, has and can not affect whites in the same manner; socially and politically minorities suffer from racism not whites. Minorities are because of their complacency perpetrators of white supremacy and racism, but these phenomenon should not be pawned off as an “everyone does it” type of thing. This type of human interaction was unheard of before the 17th century and the biggest perpetrators and supports of it are whites because they have historically benefited from it. Even the poor whites if they wanted to buy into the mainstream society and “advance” themselves, just by virtue of their skin color would have an easier time of succeeding because of white privilege.