>> [NOISE] Twenty seven years ago when
civil rights leader Martin Luther King Junior
was assassinated,
[NOISE] grief and frustration
erupted in America's cities.
[NOISE] Far away in Iowa,
one third grade teacher
knew she had to do something.
>> The shooting of Martin Luther King,
could not just be talked
about, and explained away.
There was no way to explain this to
little third graders in Riceville, Iowa.
I knew that it was time to
deal with this in a concrete way,
not just talk about it.
Because we had talked about
racism since the first day of school.
[MUSIC].
>> This is a fact, blue-eyed people
are better than brown-eyed people.
>> It was a daring experiment in prejudice.
>> I watched wonderful,
thoughtful children turn into nasty,
vicious, discriminating,
[LAUGHTER] little third graders.
>> Can one teacher in one day
change the lives of her students forever?
Tonight, A Class Divided.
>> [BACKGROUND] August 1984,
a high school reunion brings
some 50 former students to Riceville Iowa.
Eleven of them, some with
their spouses and children,
arrive early for a special reunion with
their former 3rd grade teacher, Jane Elliott.
>> [LAUGHTER] [inaudible]
>> This is my husband Tom.
>> Tom. Brian? [LAUGHTER]
>> I don't have one.
>> How are you?
>> I'm fine. Roy Wilson.
>> I made it.
>> You darling.
>> It's been long time [inaudible] 14 years.
>> I'm so glad
to see you [BACKGROUND] [OVERLAPPING].
>> [BACKGROUND] How are you doing?
It's been a long time since I've seen you.
>> Yeah. It has been
>> Where are your little ones?
>> They are at home with mom.
>> This is your husband?
>> Yeah, that's Greg.
>> Mr
>> Greg Rollin
>> Greg Rollin. Nice to meet you.
>> Fourteen years earlier,
when they were students in
her 3rd grade classroom,
ABC News filmed
a two-day exercise for a documentary,
The Eye of the Storm.
Now at their request,
they will see that film again and relive
the experience of her unique lesson
in discrimination.
[MUSIC]
>> This is a special week.
Does anybody know what it is?
>> National Brotherhood Week
>> National Brotherhood Week.
What's brotherhood?
>> Be kind to your brothers?
>> Be kind to your brothers.
>> Like you would like to be treated.
>> Treat everyone the way
you would like to be treated.
Treat everyone as though he was your brother.
Is there anyone in this United States
that we do not treat as our brothers?
>> Yeah.
>> Who?
>> Black people.
>> The black people. Who else?
>> Indians.
>> Absolutely, the Indians.
When many people see a black person,
or a yellow person, or
a red person, what do they think?
>> [BACKGROUND] Look at the dumb people.
>> Look at the dumb people.
What else do they think sometimes?
What things do they say about black people?
>> They call them Negros, niggers.
>> In the city,
many places in the United States,
how are black people treated?
How are Indians treated?
How are people who are of
a different color than we are treated?
>> Like they're not part of this world.
They don't get anything in this world.
>> Why is that?
>> Because they are a different color.
>> Do you think you know how it would
be judged by the color of your skin?
>> Yeah.
>> Do you think you do? No, I don't think
you'd know how that felt unless
you had been through it, would you?
It might be interesting to judge
people today by the color
of their eyes. Would you like to try this?
>> Yeah.
>> Sounds like fun, doesn't it?
Since I'm the teacher and I have blue eyes,
I think maybe the blue-eyed people should
be on top the first day.
>> Up here?
>> The blue-eyed people
are the better people in this room.
Yes, they are. Blue-eyed people
are smarter than brown-eyed people?
[LAUGHTER].
>> My dad isn't that stupid.
>> Is your dad brown-eyed?
>> Yeah.
>> One day you came to school and
you told us that he kicked you?
>> He did.
>> Do you think a blue-eyed father
would kick his son?
>> Yeah [OVERLAPPING].
>> My dad is
blue-eyed he's never kicked me [LAUGHTER].
>> Ray's dad is blue-eyed,
he's never kicked him [LAUGHTER].
>> Rex's dad is blue-eyed
he's never kicked him.
This is a fact.
Blue-eyed people are
better than brown-eyed people.
Are you brown-eyed or blue-eyed?
>> Blue.
>> Why are you shaking your head?
>> I don't know [LAUGHTER]
>> Are you sure that you're right?
Why?
What makes you so sure that you're right?
[LAUGHTER].
>> I don't know.
>> The blue-eyed people get
five extra minutes of recess,
while the brown-eyed people have to stay in.
The brown-eyed people do
not get to use the drinking fountain.
You'll have to use the paper cups.
You brown-eyed people are
not to play with the blue-eyed people
on the playground because you are
not as good as blue-eyed people.
The brown-eyed people in this room
today are going to wear collars,
so that we can tell from a distance
what color your eyes are.
On page 127. Is everyone ready?
Everyone but Laurie. Ready, Laurie?
>> She's a brown-eyed.
You'll begin to notice today that we spend
a great deal of time
waiting for brown-eyed people.
The yardstick's gone.
I don't see the yardstick, do you?
>> It's probably over there.
>> Hey, Mrs. Elliot,
you better keep that on your desk so if
the brown-eyed people get out of hand.
>> Oh, you think
if the brown-eyed people get out of hand,
that would be thing to use?
>> No.
>> Who goes first to lunch?
>> The blue eyes.
>> The blue-eyed people.
No brown-eyed people go back for seconds.
Blue-eyed people may go back for seconds.
Brown-eyed people do not.
>> Why not the brown-eyed?
>> Don't you know?
>> They're not smart.
>> Is that the only reason?
>> Afraid they'll take too much.
>> Might take too much [NOISE].
Quietly now, not a sound.
>> [NOISE]. It seemed like when we
were down on the bottom,
everything bad was happening to us.
>> The way they treated you felt
like you didn't even
want to try to do anything.
>> It seemed like Mrs.
Elliot was taking our best friends
away from us [NOISE].
>> What happened at recess?
Were two of you boys fighting?
>> Yeah.
>> Russell and John.
>> What happened, John?
>> Russell called me names and
I hit him in the gut.
>> What did he call you?
>> Brown eyes.
>> Did you call him brown eyes?
>> They always call us that.
Greg, and all of the blue eyes goes there.
[OVERLAPPING]
>> You can't call us brown eyes.
>> Come here, brown eyes.
>> [inaudible] call us blue eyes.
>> What's wrong with being called brown-eyed?
>> It means that we're
stupid or mean like that.
>> That's just the same way
as other people calling Black people niggers.
>> Yeah.
>> Is that's the reason you hit him, John?
[NOISE] Did it help?
[NOISE] Did it stop him?
[NOISE] Did it make you feel better inside?
[BACKGROUND]
Does it make you feel better inside?
[NOISE] It make you
feel better to call him brown eyes?
Why do you suppose you call him brown eyes?
>> Well, because he has brown eyes.
>> Is that the only reason?
You didn't call him brown eyes yesterday,
and he had brown eyes yesterday, didn't he?
[OVERLAPPING]
>> Because you said to
put those blue things on their neck.
>> They tease them. You can't tease them.
>> Is this teasing?
>> No.
>> Well, he did it once.
>> Were you doing it for fun,
to be funny, or were you doing it to be mean?
>> I don't know. Don't ask me.
Did anyone laugh at you when you do?
I watched what had been marvelous.
Cooperative, wonderful,
thoughtful children turn into nasty,
vicious, discriminating little 3rd
graders in a space of 15 minutes.
Yesterday, I told you that
brown-eyed people aren't as
good as blue-eyed people.
That wasn't true.
I lied to you yesterday.
[BACKGROUND] The truth is
that brown-eyed people are
better than blue-eyed people.
[LAUGHTER] Russell, where are your glasses?
>> I forgot them.
>> You forgot them?
What color are your eyes?
>> Blue. [LAUGHTER]
>> Susan Ginder has brown eyes.
She didn't forget her glasses.
[BACKGROUND] Russell Ring has
blue eyes and what about his glasses?
>> He forgot them.
Yesterday, we were visiting
and Greg said, "Boy,
I like to hit
my little sister as hard as I can.
That's fun."
[LAUGHTER] What does that
tell you about blue-eyed people?
>> They're naughty. They fight a lot.
>> The brown-eyed people
may take off their collars,
and each of you may put
your collar on a blue-eyed person.
[NOISE] The brown-eyed people
get five extra minutes of recess.
You blue-eyed people are not allowed to
be on playground equipment at any time.
You blue-eyed people are
not to play with the brown-eyed people.
Brown-eyed people are
better than blue-eyed people.
They're smarter than blue-eyed people,
and if you don't believe it, look at Brian.
Do blue-eyed people know how
to sit in a chair?
Very sad.
Very, very sad.
[NOISE] Who can tell
me what contraction should
be in the first sentence.
Go to the board and write it, John.
[LAUGHTER] Come on,
let's do it again. Loosen up.
Up, up, up. Come on.
That's better.
Now, do you know how to make a W?
Okay, write the contraction for we are.
Now, that's beautiful writing.
Is that better?
>> Yeah.
>> Brown-eyed people learn fast, don't they?
Boy, do brown-eyed people learn fast.
Very good.
[NOISE] Greg, what did you do with that cup?
Will you please go,
[LAUGHTER] and get that cup
and put your name on
it and keep it at your desk.
Blue-eyed people are wasteful.
[NOISE] You want to be timed this morning?
>> Yeah. [NOISE]
>> I use Orton-Gillingham phonics.
We used the card pack.
The brown-eyed children were
the low class the first day,
and it took them five and a half minutes
to get through the card pack.
The second day, it took
them two and a half minutes.
The only thing that had
changed was the fact that now,
they were superior people.
[BACKGROUND] You went faster
than I ever had
anyone go through the card pack?
[LAUGHTER] Why couldn't
you get them yesterday?
>> We were brown-eyed.
>> We had no powers.
>> [inaudible] block of cards.
>> You can see my eyes
keep rolling around, dizzy.
>> Oh, and you couldn't
think as well with the colors on.
Four minutes and 18 seconds.
>> I know [inaudible].
>> How long did it take you yesterday?
>> Three minutes.
How long did it take you today?
>> Four minutes and 18 seconds.
>> What happened?
>> Went down.
>> Why?
What are you thinking of?
>> This.
>> I hate today.
>> Me, too. I hate it, too [LAUGHTER]
>> Because I'm blue-eyed.
>> See? I am, too.
[LAUGHTER]
>> It's not funny, it's not
fun, it's not pleasant.
This is a filthy,
nasty word called discrimination.
We're treating people a certain way because
they are different from the rest
of us. Is that fair?
>> No.
>> Nothing fair about it.
We didn't say this was going to be
a fair day, did we?
>> No
>> It isn't, it's a horrid day.
Ready? What did you,
people who are wearing blue colors
now, find out today?
>> I know what they felt like yesterday.
>> I knew it, too.
>> How did they feel yesterday?
>> Down.
>> Like a dog on a leash.
>> Yeah.
>> It feels like
you're chaining them up wherever you go.
>> Like chaining them up in the prison, and
you threw the key away.
>> Should the color of
some other person's eyes
have anything to do with how you treat them?
>> No.
>> All right then,
should the color of their skin?
>> No.
>> Should you judge
people by the color of their skin?
>> No.
>> You're going to say that
today and this week,
and probably all the
time you're in this room.
You'll say, "No, Mrs.
Elliot.". Every time I ask that question.
>> No, Mrs. Elliot.
>> Then when you see
a Black man or an
Indian or someone walking down the street,
are you going to say, " [LAUGHTER]
Look at that silly looking thing?".
>> No.
>> Does it make any difference
whether their skin is black or white?
>> No.
>> Or yellow?
>> No.
>> Or red?
>> No
>> Is that how you decide
whether people are good or bad?
>> No.
>> Is that what makes people good or bad?
>> No.
>> Let's take these collars off.
>> Here, Mrs. Elliot, you can [inaudible].
>> What would you like to do with them?
>> Throw them away.
>> Go ahead.
[OVERLAPPING] [LAUGHTER]
>> Okay, Mrs. Elliot.
>> Now, you know a little bit
more than you knew
at the beginning of this week.
>> Yeah.
>> A lot.
>> Do you know a little bit
more than you wanted to?
>> Yes, Mrs. Elliot.
>> This isn't an easy
way to learn this, is it?
>> No, Mrs. Elliot.
>> Oh, will you stop that? [LAUGHTER] Now,
let's all sit down here together,
blue eyes and brown eyes.
Did it make any difference
what color you are?
>> No, no.
>> Down, girl. [LAUGHTER].
>> You found your friend, huh.
[LAUGHTER]
>> Are you ready to listen now?
Now, are you back?
>> Yeah.
>> Did that feel better?
>> Yeah.
>> Does the color of eyes that you
have make any difference
in the kind of person you are?
>> No, Mrs. Elliot.
>> Does that feel like being
home again, girls?
>> Yes, Mrs. Elliot. [LAUGHTER]
>> This was the third time
Jane Elliott had taught
her lesson in discrimination.
The first, two years earlier
was in April of 1968.
>> On the day after
Martin Luther King was killed,
one of my students came into the room and
said they shot a king last night,
Mrs. Elliot, why did they shoot that King?
I knew the night before that it was
time to deal with this in a concrete way,
not just talk about it because
we had talked about
racism since the first day of school.
But the shooting of Martin Luther King,
who had been one of our heroes of
the month in February,
could not just be talked
about and explained away.
There was no way to explain this to
little third graders in Riceville, Iowa.
As I listened to
the white male commentators
on TV the night before,
I was hearing things like,
"Who is going to hold your people together?"
As they interviewed black leaders?
"What are they going to do?
Who's going to control your people?"
As though these people were
subhuman and someone was going to
have to step in there and control them.
They said things like, "When
we lost our leader,
his widow helped to hold us together."
Who's going to hold them together?
The attitude was so
arrogant and so condescending and so
ungodly that I thought if
white male adults react this way,
what are my third graders going to do?
How are they going to react to this thing?
I was ironing the teepee,
we studied an Indian unit,
we made a teepee every year.
The first year, the students would
make the teepee out of pieces of sheet,
we'd sew it together,
and the next year,
we'd decorate it with Indian symbols.
I was ironing the previous year's teepee,
getting it ready to be
decorated the next day.
I thought of what we had
done with the Indians.
We haven't made much progress
in these 200, 300 years.
I thought this is the time now to teach them
really what the Sioux
Indian prayer that says,
"Oh great spirit, keep me
from ever judging a man
until I've walked in
his moccasins," really means.
For the next day,
I knew that my children were going to
walk in someone else's moccasins for a day.
Like it or lump it,
they were going to have to
walk in someone else's moccasins.
I decided at that point that it
was time to try the eye color thing,
which I had thought about many,
many times but had never used.
The next day, I introduced
an eye color exercise in
my classroom and split
the class according to eye color,
and immediately created a microcosm
of society in a third grade classroom.
Riceville hasn't changed much
in the 17 years since then.
It's still a small farming community
surrounded by corn fields.
Its population is still under 1,000,
and it's still all white and all Christian.
Though Jane Elliott has continued
to teach her lesson in discrimination,
there has been little outward local reaction.
No objections from
school authorities or the parents of
the 300 odd students
who have by now been through it.
>> Okay. Let's get in a circle.
>> The reunion of
her former third graders was
Jane Elliott's first chance to find out
how much of her lessons
her students had retained.
>> All right. Now, Raymond I want to know
why you were so
eager to
discriminate against the rest of these kids.
At the end of the day, I thought
the miserable little Nazi.
[LAUGHTER] Really, I couldn't stand you.
>> It felt tremendously evil.
All your inhibitions were gone.
No matter if they were my friends or not,
any pent-up hostilities or
aggressions that these kids
had ever caused you,
you had a chance to get it all out?
>> Yeah, I felt like I was a king,
like I ruled them brown-eyes,
like I was better than them, happy.
>> You did it all day?
>> Yeah.
>> How did you feel when
you were the out-group?
>> Boy that day, after we went home
[LAUGHTER] talk about hating somebody.
>> Yeah.
>> It was there.
>> You hated me?
>> Yeah, of what you were putting us through.
Nobody likes to be looked down upon,
nobody likes to be hated,
teased, or discriminated against.
It just boggles up inside of you.
You just get so mad.
>> Were you just angry,
or was it more than that?
>> I felt demoralized, humiliated.
>> Is the learning worth the agony?
>> Yes. [OVERLAPPING]
>> It made everything a lot
different than what it was.
We was a lot better family altogether,
even in our houses, we was probably.
Because it was hard on you.
When you have your best friend
one day and then he's your enemy the next.
It brings it out real quick.
>> Some of the remarks were
the kinds of things I would have
wished I could have programmed into
them if I had been able to program them.
They're the things I would
have wanted them to say.
Some of the things were just mind-blowing.
>> You hear these people talking about that,
different people,
how they're difference and
they'd like to have them out of the country.
I wish they go back to Africa and stuff.
Sometimes I just wish I
had that color in my pocket,
I could whip it out and put it on and say,
"Wear this and put yourself in their place."
I wish they would go what I went through.
>> We was at a softball
game a couple weekends
ago and there was a black guy. "Hi, Verla."
We hugged each other and everything and
some people really look just like,
"What are you doing with him?"
You just get this burning feeling,
sensation in you that just want to
let it out and
put them through what we went through to
find out they're not any different.
>> I still find myself sometimes when
I see some people together
and I see how they act,
I think, well that's black.
Then right in the next second
I won't even finish the thought.
I'm saying, well, I've seen whites do it,
I've seen other people do it.
It's not just the blacks.
Everyone acts differently.
It's just the different color
is what hits you first.
Then later, as I said,
I don't even finish
that thought before I remember
back when I was like that and I remember,
everyone acts the same way,
it's just your way of
thinking is the difference.
>> Like when my grandparents or
somebody and they start
talking about old times and they say
the Japs and all this and that,
and they start holding
that against them, I think.
How would you like to been them?
Japanese Americans get drawn into
this camp just because they
happened to be part Japanese.
Calm down and think about it.
But when they get older,
they're set in their ways and
they're not going to change.
>> When you get older?
>> I'll be set in my ways,
but they're different than their way.
>> I was absolutely enthralled,
Sandy Dohlman's statements that,
"When my son comes
home with the word nigger and the
other things that he hears downtown,
I say to him, listen,
that isn't the way we judge people.
You don't judge people by how they look.
You judge them by what's on the
inside, not the outside."
>> I'm glad that she's
teaching them not to hate
because even though he
does here this from the other people,
if he goes home and thinks, Well,
Mom and Dad, like
the black people I'm going to like them too.
I don't think he's going to pick
nothing bad about it.
>> You chose your husband well.
[LAUGHTER]
>> He chose me.
>> You chose her well.
[LAUGHTER]
>> Little kids will take and
they'll listen to a lot of other people too,
so they're going to end up confused over it.
>> But if she keeps on telling them,
is he going to be person your kids
are or is he going to be
the kind who judge
people by the [OVERLAPPING].
>> Well, he'll know
somewhat right from wrong.
[OVERLAPPING].
>> But he'll have the ideas.
He won't be judging them by their color,
but he won't know what we
know fully having been through it.
>> He won't learn the color thing.
>> The prejudice from us.
>> He won't learn prejudice first-handed.
>> Yeah.
>> He won't learn to be prejudiced from us.
If they won't learn to
discriminate between people from us,
he might hear it from others,
but never from us.
>> Okay.
What's it like to be
married to somebody like that?
[LAUGHTER]
>> When I was going to marry Sheila,
I knew it for
my future that I was going into the military.
At first, I thought,
is she going to be able to
handle being with
all the different nationalities?
Then I read The Storm, read the book.
>> A Class Divided.
>> A Class Divided before we got
married and before I joined the army.
I said, hey,
she's not going to have any problems.
>> Should every child
have the exercise or should every teacher?
>> Everybody. [OVERLAPPING]
>> I think every school aught
to implement something like
this program in their
early stages of education.
>> If Jane Elliott's lesson
in discrimination changed
the way these young people feel
about discrimination and racism,
it also had a totally unexpected result.
>> The second year I did this exercise,
I gave little spelling tests, math tests,
reading test, two weeks before they
exercise each day of
the exercise, and two weeks later.
Almost without exception,
the students scores go
up on the day they're on the top, down,
on the day there on the bottom,
and then maintain a higher level
for the rest of the year after
they've been through the exercise.
We sent some of those tests
to Stanford University,
to the psychology department.
They did an informal review of them,
and they said that what's
happening here is kids
academic ability is being
changed in a 24-hour period.
That isn't possible, but it's happening.
Something very strange is
happening to these children because suddenly
they're finding out how really great they are
and they are responding to
what they know now they're able to do.
It has happened
consistently with third graders.
>> The film made of
Jane Elliott's third graders
in 1970 has
been widely used with students and
teachers and by government,
business, and labor organizations
concerned about human relations.
Perhaps the most unusual use of it is here,
at Green Haven Correctional Facility,
a maximum security prison
in Stormville, New York.
[NOISE]
Here in a sociology course
taught by Professor Duane W.
Smith of Dutchess Community College is almost
exclusively black and Hispanic classes have
been seen the film for more than 10 years.
>> What I'd like to do is
introduce the subject
of prejudice and discrimination through
this film called The Eye of the Storm.
>> [BACKGROUND]
>> By this process really
learned the meaning of discrimination.
>> Most of the children
before the film started,
they had played in live together in
harmony and certain accident
coming from the teacher
and seeing that teachers have
an authoritarian figure
and someone to respect,
they accepted the views
that was being given to them.
But I think at the end of
the lesson they would make clearly see
their prejudices and other forms
of discrimination are things that
people build within their minds that they're
not actual physical barriers.
They say you, you can't cross a street.
>> The one kid I could really agree
with was at recess,
was a brown-eyed kid.
He had this inner turmoil
against this feeling of being
divided or prejudice against where he would
hit another kid that his known
for so many years in the gut.
Well, he also stated that it didn't help any,
so that automatically should be
a lesson to every adult in the world.
Violence doesn't help anything.
This is a film that I hope
my children get to see.
>> Unlike New York,
Iowa is 98 percent white Anglo-Saxon.
Yet even here, minority groups account for
more than 20 percent
of the prison population.
To make sure its prison system employees are
sensitive to the concerns
of this large minority.
The Iowa Department of Corrections
last fall hired Jane Elliott
to give her lesson to some of them.
The group which included
prison guards and parole officers was
told only that it would be
attending a day-long workshop.
David Stokes Barry.
>> Most of our training, you go to people,
give you information and you learn that way.
>> Blue eye.
>> When I first
came with the sign-up
and such and got put in the group,
I didn't know when
I started seeing the signs around,
brown eyes only and such,
I figured they were the
better group because they had a lot of
spaces available and they
we're known for the blue eyes.
When I got put in
the blue eyes group and put the color on and
I knew well then I was going
to be in the deprive group I guess.
>> Okay, now you can stay in this area.
>> The workshop was
supposed to begin at nine.
They took the brown eyes in
about nine and then
left us standing in the hall.
I literally stood because
there weren't enough chairs and
I didn't know whether or not I'd wanted
to fight to take a chair down,
I didn't know if somebody will come and take
the chair away from me if I did.
>> While David Stokes Barry and
the other blue-eyed people
waited inside the meeting room.
Jane Elliott prepared the brown-eyed people
for what was going to happen.
>> Now this is not something I can do alone.
This exercise won't work
without your cooperation.
Blue-eyed people aren't allowed to smoke.
Blue-eyed people aren't allowed to
sit in these empty chairs.
Do not let a blue-eyed person
sit next to you.
You know, you can't trust them,
and besides which, they don't smell good.
Everybody knows that about blue-eyed people.
You don't know what you can catch
from a blue-eyed person.
>> By 9:20, I felt some antagonism.
I'm stuck out here for 20 minutes
standing, waiting.
>> I still say we always say what kind of
reaction we'll get by,
everyone just simply going in.
>> But he seems to have the courage and
conviction to do a lot of talking.
[NOISE] [BACKGROUND] Yeah.
>> Opposed him by all singing a song [NOISE].
>> We Shall Overcome [LAUGHTER].
>> I need to have you keep it down,
I don't know how many times I need
to give that instruction,
but you need to keep it
down so you don't bother
people in the workshop?
I was pretty well ticked off by the time
we got taken in [NOISE] [BACKGROUND].
>> It would be
to your advantage in the future people
if you get to meetings on time,
it would also be to your advantage
if you'd put your gum away.
>> I'll leave.
>> Put your gum away.
>> I'll leave.
>> You want to get paid for today?
Well then stay but put your gum away.
>> I don't have a purse or
a place to put my gum.
>> I'm sure that you are inventive
enough to find a place for the gum.
Now, I'd like for you to
notice where she put her gum.
You have this problem with blue-eyed people.
You give them something
decent and they just wreck it.
You'll also notice that
blue-eyed people spend a lot of time playing,
look at me, see how cute I am.
I can be funny. I can make a joke of this.
This is amusing. I'm amused by this.
Another thing that is obvious about
blue-eyed people is that
they are poor listeners.
The first thing you have to do
when you're teaching in
a segregated situation when
you're working in a segregated situation
is teach the listening skills.
The listening skills are number 1.
Good listeners have quiet hands,
feet, and mouths.
Everyone needs to write these down.
I'd like for you to look at the man in
the back, in the black jacket.
The game we're playing is playing it cool.
This is a favorite blue-eyed
game, playing it cool.
Nobody can bother me, man,
I can handle this. I don't have to do this.
I'm going to ignore this whole thing.
Number 2, good listeners
keep their eyes on
the person who is speaking.
I take it you don't have a pencil?
>> Yeah.
>> Nor you?
>> No.
>> Perhaps you could borrow one from
one of your neighbors.
Sir, I realized that you
feel that you don't need to write it down.
Whether or not you write it down,
perhaps you could remember it.
[OVERLAPPING]
Good listeners have quiet hands,
feet, and mouths.
Do you know what that means?
>> I'm not sure.
>> I believe that.
Do you want me to explain it to you?
>> That's okay, I'll get a pencil and
write this down directly.
>> Look blue-eyed people
many of you have pencils.
Will one of you please lend him
a pencil or don't you trust him?
Which I can understand.
From the last 10 minutes,
what have you observed
about blue-eyed people?
>> Blue-eyed people are very stubborn,
very self-centered, and wish to
control as much of
their surroundings as possible.
People that wise, I mean,
very inconsiderate people I don't even
know why you're have them here
in the first place.
>> We have them here because we
are required to have them here.
>> We have to?
>> This is one
of the things you have to put up with.
Number 3, good listeners
listen from the beginning to the very end.
Good listeners decide to learn something.
This is the thing you'll
have the most difficulty with,
with blue-eyed people, they
decide not to learn something.
Some of you have had trouble with
blue-eyed people in your home environments.
Some of you have had trouble with
blue-eyed people in your workplace.
Does anybody have an example of that,
that they'd like to talk about? Anyone?
>> I have two nephews, one's
blue-eye and one's brown eye
and the blue one like he never
cleans his room and he's really lazy,
he doesn't seem to have a lot of
energy, the blue eyed one.
But the brown eyed one he's outgoing and
he plays in sports and
then he's pretty good at it.
He just seems like a better kid.
If I have kids, I hope they have brown eyes.
>> Are you barren?
>> No.
>> Then it's a good thing
you don't have kids.
You will know what to do
when you choose a mate.
>> Right.
>> Would you like to read that first
listening skill to me?
>> I haven't got all my paper yet.
>> Oh, why is that?
>> I have to borrow the pencils
write it down as yet.
>> You think it's unnecessary?
>> At this particular point, yes, I do.
>> Why?
>> I have it in my head,
for the most part [inaudible].
>> There is a lot of space up
there, it isn't their friend.
Do you suppose you could tell me what it is?
>> It had something to do
with keeping your hands and
feet still as I recall.
>> Has something to do with that?
[LAUGHTER] I
find it interesting that you're
amused by our having
to stand here and wait for
this man to do something that
everybody else has already done.
I find that highly
interesting, stupid, but interesting.
If you are in a situation where someone is
constantly refusing to do
what the people in authority ask them to do.
What do you know about them?
What do you know about that person?
>> Well, I think it's a game with
them, attention.
>> Has it gained anything for this gentleman?
>> Disrespect from I
think the brown eyed people.
>> Has it proven
anything to brown eyed people?
>> Yeah, so this is
a typical trait of a blue eyed person.
>> Now read the second one.
>> I don't have the second one.
Can I read it off her?
>> You don't have second one either.
>> No.
>> You were keeping it in your head.
What happened to that plan?
>> Just the first one I
had in my head not the second one.
>> Oh, the other three aren't important?
>> Well, there are probably important.
>> But not important enough for
you to write down, right?
>> Well, they're important.
I should have written them down
most probably.
>> Most probably?
Does anybody back there knows?
You don't have it written down either?
[NOISE] All should take a look
at these two so called gentlemen.
Now, we need to hear
the good listening skills from you.
I don't want you to think that
I'm badgering you boys.
[OVERLAPPING]
>> I don't like that.
>> On the other hand,
you're here to learn something.
If you learn nothing else today,
it would be nice if you would
learn the listening skills.
What do you know now
about blue eyed people that you didn't
know before you came in here?
>> I'm finding I might have
to explain things a
bit more explicitly to
a [LAUGHTER] blue eyed person,
than I would to a brown eyed person.
>> How many times did I have to repeat
the listening skills for Roger?
>> Well, brother Roger is having
a rough time today, isn't he?
[LAUGHTER] It was about 6-7 different times.
>> You think that's amusing Roger?
>> Apparently it is some what of you think.
>> As part of the lesson that
Corrections Department employees
took a written test.
>> I need these names and the scores.
>> I have K. R 11.
>> I'm sorry I can't hear you.
>> K. R -
>> Just initials.
>> -11.
>> Just KR, just an initial. No last name.
>> Yeah, no names.
>> How many?
>> Eleven, and [inaudible]
or Charles. I'm not sure.
>> Thank you, sir.
>> Your welcome.
>> Tell me the name again.
>> Turban.
>> You can't read the name?
>> No, I can't.
I can't make it out. [OVERLAPPING].
>> [inaudible] mine.
>> What's your name?
>> My name is Chambers.
>> First name?
>> Janine.
>> What was her score?
>> Six.
>> Next?
>> E. Riley with a five.
>> E?
>> E. Riley.
>> Would E. Riley please stand.
What you do to the image of blues
with your behavior is unfortunate.
What you three people
do to the image of women,
with your behavior really makes me angry.
The fact that you do this thing and
this sloppy work reflects badly on women.
I resent that doubly. Yes.
>> Ma'am, I'd really appreciate it if you'd
call us by name when
you say you three people,
we don't know who you're speaking to.
It could be anyone here.
>> My idea, if you wanted
me to call you by name,
you'd have put your name on your paper.
>> It's on my-.
>> It was was to be on your paper.
>> You didn't see my papers ma'am.
[OVERLAPPING]
>> I didn't get your name either
because it wasn't on your paper.
>> That's right.
>> Now, how can one call
you by your name if you
don't care enough about
your name to put it on your paper.
>> You don't know how to read? [OVERLAPPING].
>> Don't expect me to worry about it,
if you don't put it on your paper.
Don't sit here and say
my name is important to me,
after you have just
deliberately not put it on your paper.
[OVERLAPPING] You're
being totally unrealistic.
>> I don't remember saying my name
was important to me.
I remember
saying I'd like to know who you're
speaking to when you say you three.
>> Then what should you do?
>> Ask you to use my name, which I did.
>> Where should your name have been?
>> Right where it is.
>> On your paper around?
>> On my birth certificate.
>> Is it on your paper?
>> No, ma'am.
>> Where did you get a birth certificate?
>> Same place you got yours.
>> Out a slot machine,
same as you did lady. [LAUGHTER]
>> I think you're probably
right about your own. [OVERLAPPING]
>> At least I know who my parents are ma'am.
>> Is she being rude?
>> Yes.
>> She being inconsiderate?
>> Very.
>> She being uncooperative?
>> Very.
>> She being insultive?
>> Yes.
>> Are all those the things that we've
accused blue eyed people would be?
>> Yes.
>> Is she proving that we're right?
>> Yes.
>> Does anyone have any
comments to make at this point?
>> Do you feel that there
are important blue eyed people?
>> There are exceptions to every rule.
>> What are those exceptions?
>> There are
a few important blue eyed people.
>> Very few?
>> You said that. [OVERLAPPING]
>> Do you think that you're one of them.
>> No.
>> That's good.
>> Why are you up there then?
>> I'm blue-eyed, the difference
between you and me is I
have a brown eyed husband
and brown eyed offspring.
[LAUGHTER] I've learned how to
behave in a brown eyed society.
When you can act brown enough,
then you too can be where I am.
>> I wouldn't want to be where you are.
>> Are you certain?
>> Absolutely positive.
>> You like where you are.
>> I love where I am.
>> You like it so much that you don't even
identify your self on your paper?
>> I don't need to lady.
>> Her using the term
lady where I'm concerned,
what do you think she's trying to do?
[OVERLAPPING] Is it ignorance
or is it deliberately insulting?
>> [OVERLAPPING] I wouldn't say it was
deliberately insulting.
>> If it's ignorance,
she needs to be taught,
that do many of us,
the word lady is a pejorative.
I don't appreciate it.
[OVERLAPPING] It's a put
down and it's used
to keep women in their place.
>> Call you by the correct name.
>> I'm sorry?
>> I will call you by your correct name
after this, I won't be kind.
>> That was kindness on your part?
>> Yes, I think calling someone
a lady is a kindness.
>> Then your problem is ignorance.
>> You can call me lady anytime you'd like.
>> I wouldn't do that to you.
>> Now I know you wouldn't.
>> I really wouldn't.
That's part of the problem.
Is a total lack of
awareness at what sexism amounts to,
and how much you contribute to
the sexism that keeps you where you are.
>> I like where I am lady.
I did again, didn't I?
>> Yes.
>> I'm getting kind of fed up with
this whole bunch of garbage.
[OVERLAPPING]
>> What?
>> Brown eyed peoples are
no different than we are.
I hate to tell them that they have
these false delusions and such.
>> Are they being disruptive?
>> There were trained well.
>> No, you train them very well.
I think that's what they did with
the Storm Troopers in Germany also.
You guys do a real good job,
sitting up there.
>> You think that what's happening
here today feels like
it would have felt in Nazi Germany?
>> Yes, sure.
>> Who do you think you are in that then?
>> Where do I think I am?
>> If you were in Nazi Germany, who are you?
>> The Jews? [NOISE]
>> After a break for lunch,
Jane Elliott helped
the Corrections Department employees
analyze what had happened.
>> Did you learn anything this morning?
>> I think I learned from the experience
of feeling like I was in a glass cage,
I was powerless, there was a sense of
hopelessness, I was angry.
I wanted to speak it up and yet
at times I knew if I spoke up,
I'll be back in a powerless
situation, I'd be attacked.
The sense of hopelessness,
oppresion [OVERLAPPING].
>> Had you ever experienced that before?
>> I realized this morning that there are
very few times in my life that I've ever
been discriminated against, very few.
>> You are this uncomfortable
in an hour and a half?
>> I was amazed at how uncomfortable I
was in the first 15 minutes.
>> Can you empathize at all then with blacks,
minority group members in this country?
>> I'm hoping better than before.
>> We tried to argue with you.
You would use just the mere argument as
reason for us being
lesser than the brown-eyed folks.
You know, you couldn't win.
>> Yeah, don't we do that every day?
>> I think some do, yeah.
But I would hope that
I never get so unreasonable.
The statement you were making
were groundless and
such and yet we couldn't argue
with them because if we argue,
then we were argumentative and not listening
and getting into our place and all
that stuff and that was frustrating to me,
and then frustrating to me was
the other little green tags
are sitting on their hands.
My group here was,
I didn't think, boisterous
enough in our opposition to the whole thing.
>> Why didn't you people support one another?
The blue eyed people on this
side just sat there,
and let's face it, you
covered your asses, right?
Why did you just sit there?
>> I think that's symptomatic
of the problem as a whole.
We see that in society in general.
We see a few people who are making lot of
noise and the rest of
the people sitting back waiting
to see what they're going to do.
>> Okay. As long as I was picking
on him, I was leaving you alone?
>> Right.
>> I'd say a lot of people
accept that they let a few people do
the fighting for them and may stand
back and if this person's going to win,
then they'll get on this side,
but if that person's not going to win,
they'll stay back over here.
That's just how it works.
>> If you were in a real situation
where you had to do something about racism,
would you stand up and be counted?
>> What I would do, I don't know.
It would depend on the exigency.
[OVERLAPPING]
>> But you would do something?
>> I would have to do something.
I couldn't go home tonight
and face my kids if I didn't.
>> How did you brown-eyed people
feel while this was going on?
>> It was a relief it
wasn't a blue-eyed person.
>> Sense of relief that
you had the right colour
of eyes?Absolutely.
>> I really understood,
at least I felt that I understood,
what it was like to be in the minority.
>> Why were you angry?
>> First of all, because it was unreasonable.
Secondly, because I felt
discriminated against.
Thirdly, I think that all of us,
everyone in this room has dealt
with discrimination on both sides.
You don't have to be black or Jewish
or Mexican or anything
else to have felt
discrimination in your life,
and as you become an adult,
you learn to deal
with those feelings within yourself,
you learn to handle those and when you feel
yourself in a situation
that you can't get out of which we couldn't,
we were captive audience.
It was not a normal situation
because normally aren't badgered.
>> What if you
had to spend the rest of your life this way?
>> I don't know how to answer that.
>> You don't wake up every
morning knowing that you're different,
you wake up as a white woman who was
going to her job at
eight o' clock or whatever,
for a black person is
going to wake up knowing for
a minute they get up out of
the bed and look in
the mirror, they're black,
and they have to deal with the problems
they've had to deal with ever since
they were young and realize that I am
different and I have to deal
with life differently.
Things are different for me.
I don't think you can
really say that you have felt,
maybe you felt some sort of discrimination,
but you haven't felt what it is
like for a black woman to go
through the daily experiences
of arguing and saying,
listen to me, my point of view is good,
what I have to offer here is good,
and no one wants to listen.
Because white is right,
that's the way things are.
>> I think the necessity for
this exercise is a crime.
No, I don't want to see it used more widely.
I wanted to see it's the necessity
for it wiped out and I think if
educators were determined that we could
be very instrumental in wiping
out the necessity for this exercise.
But I want to see something used.
I'd like to see this exercise used with
all teachers, all administrators,
but certainly not with all
students unless it's done
by people who are doing it for
the right reasons and in the right way.
I think you could damage a child with
this exercise very, very easily.
I would never suggest
that everybody should use it.
I think you could have
training classes for teachers,
bring them in, put them through the thing,
explain what happened, do the debriefing,
and then practice doing this until
a group of teachers
were able to do it on their own, and I did.
Teachers are not disabled learners,
they could learn to do this, obviously.
If I can do it, most anyone can do it.
It doesn't make a super teacher
to do this exercise.
>> What began in a third
grade classroom has spread
from students to teachers,
to corrections officers.
At the center, is still
a single teacher determined
to inoculate her students,
both young and old,
against the virus of bigotry.
>> After you do this exercise,
when the debriefing starts,
when the pain is over and you're all back
together and you're all one again,
you find out how society could
be if we really
believed all this stuff that we preach,
if we really acted that way.
You could feel as good about one another as
those kids feel about one another
after this exercise is over,
you create instant cousins.
I thought maybe that
lasted just while they were in
my classroom because of
my superior influence.
But indeed, these kids still
feel that way about one another.
They said yesterday over
and over the remark was made,
We're kind of like a family now.
They found out how to hurt one another,
and they found out how it feels to
be hurt in that way,
and they refuse to hurt one another
that way again, and they said,
We're kind of like a family now,
and indeed we were.
[MUSIC]