An interview with Jane Elliott, internationally known teacher, lecturer, diversity trainer, and recipient of the National Mental Health Association Award for Excellence in Education, exposes prejudice and bigotry for what it is, an irrational class system based upon purely arbitrary factors.
- Jane! Why racism still exists?
- Because people have been indoctrinated with the myth of race for over 500 years, and the indoctrination still goes on, today. It will last as long as we fail to educate, instead of indoctrinate, in the schools in the US.
- You told that each white is a racist. Don`t you think that this is an exaggeration?
- No. Racism is the not-so-hidden curriculum, in this country. According to our 'history', only white males have done important things in the world. This indoctrination starts pre-birth and continues until after we die.
- You was born and grew up in a white family, surrounded by white people in a small farm near Riceville, Iowa. Can you say what psychological and personal reasons prompted you to fight against racism and against any forms of discrimination?
- My father, Lloyd Jennison, said that a fair thing is a pretty thing, and a right wrongs no man. I believed everything that man said. His morals were unimpeachable, and he was the most honest person I have ever known. What was happening to black people in this country, when I was young, was absolutely unacceptable, and I knew it had to end, with my generation, and the generation of the students that I was educating. When my father saw the film that was made by the CBC, in my classroom, he said, "I wish someone had taught me that when I was nine years old." He was 61 years old, at that time, and had learned something valuable from his daughter, who was never, according to the family, and the local citizenry, supposed to amount to anything. That statement was better than any award or accolade that I have ever received.
- Your controversial "Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes" exercise labels participants as inferior or superior based solely upon the color of their eyes and exposes them to the experience of being a minority. Everyone who is exposed to this work, be it through a lecture, workshop, or video, is dramatically affected by it. How they are affected?
- It changes the way they see their world, according to what they've told me. It teaches empathy in a way that nothing else seems to be doing. Seeing the films changes our perceptions of how we look to other people.
- What is a side effect of your exercise?
- The knowledge that we are responsible for our feelings and behaviors, and that we may not look to other people as we think we do.
- May be one of them is that how easy to manipulate people and create discriminative, unfair, depressive and suppressive conditions for people?
- And how easy it is to spot manipulative writing, and questions, and policies.
- One university did not include the Blue-Eyes-Brown-Eyes exercise in their list of successful strategies to reduce racism.
- Only one? Why? When I was enrolled in education courses, as a college student, the social studies instructor told us, "When you get into a classroom, do not teach in opposition to the local mores, the people who are paying your wages through their taxes have the right to have their children learn what they want them to learn." I thought that was bad education, then, and I think it's bad education, now. And I don't think that has changed.
- As we know, the roots of racism are social. America is considered as one of the most prosperous countries in the world. Why is racism there?
- Because prosperity does not guarantee morality. Part of the reason for our prosperity is our willingness to enslave, destroy, and incarcerate those whom we have been indoctrinated to believe are inferior to ourselves.
- You talk about white racism. What about black racism?
- What about it? Do you think that only white people are able to learn the message that treating those who are different from you in disgusting ways is appropriate behavior? We've 'sown the wind' and we will surely 'reap the whirlwind'.
- Do you know a country where racism does not exist?
- I'm not familiar with the norms of every country on the earth. If there is such a place, they probably don't have access to American television. Give us time.
- Do you think that religion is responsible for racism too?
- Religion hasn't caused racism, but we have used our religion to keep other people in their place. However, if you are truly a Christian, you must actively resist racism, or stop calling yourself a Christian. "In so much as ye have done it unto one of these, my brethren, so have ye done it unto me." In what way? We Christians have turned God into an old white man with a long, gray beard, who looks like Charlton Heston playing Moses. God is a spirit and has neither gender or color, but we white folks have created someone that we feel we can relate to. We have made the Virgin Mary into a blond, blue-eyed, pale-skinned woman, and the Baby Jesus into someone who looks just like the little Pillsbury Doughboy. The Bible tells us that he had feet of bronze and woolly hair. Put that on your next Christmas card.
- I was born in Soviet Union and in spite of officially declared friendship of peoples we had nationalism. Even today all post-Soviet space is struck by racism, nationalism, homophobia. I live in Estonia for 5 years and i see that Estonian politicians consider black people as a threat to the white race people. What can you tell to these politicians?
- Read the book, "The Myth of Race", by Robert Wald Sussman, and realize that we are all members of the family of man, and that family began with black women who evolved in Sub-Saharan Africa over 280,000 years ago. The people they have been taught to hate are their 30th to 50th cousins. Get over it!
- I guess that some of politicians read and watch my blogs.
- I'll bet they'll stop reading them, faster they read this one.
- What should children learn in schools first of all?
- That there is only one race on this earth; that it's the HUMAN race and we are all members of it. To judge others by the amount of melanin in their skins is the epitome of ignorance, and the schools must stop perpetuating the myth of the rightness of whiteness. We have been myth-led long enough.
- Is President Trump racist or not?
- Does the sun come up in the east? Does he look like a racist? Does he act like a racist? Does he talk like a racist? If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, and waddles like a duck, it's probably a duck.
- What do you think about political correctness? Is it necessary, for example, to erase the word "nigger" from the novel of Mark Twain?
- Read the book, "Free Speech For Me, But Not For Thee", by Nat Henthoff, I believe. Political correctness, in my opinion, is an attempt to limit our freedom of speech. To erase the n-word from Mark Twain's writing is to attempt to erase our history of ignorance and bigotry. Someone has said, "Those who forget the mistakes of the past are doomed to repeat them." That is a true statement. We won't avoid making those mistakes in the future by pretending that they never happened. Recognize that they are mistakes and act to avoid them in the present in order to prevent them from happening in the future.
- Do you stand with The Dakota Access Pipeline protesters for protection of water, land, and spiritual sites sacred to indigenous peoples of the Americas?
- I stand with them, and with all indigenous peoples all over the world, who are being manipulated and abused because of the ignorance of racism.
- Is it a form of racism to violate indigenous peoples rights?
- Of course it is. And Donasaurus T. Rump is going to continue to violate the rights of indigenous people as long as his billionaire friends tell him to, and as long as ignorant people in this country are willing to allow it.
Jane`s website: http://www.janeelliott.com/
Interviewed by Maxim Efimov
Maxim Efimov is a writer, social philosopher, freethinker, human rights activist, educator, blogger, civil journalist, political refugee
https://www.youtube.com/user/YHRGKarelia/videos
Комментариев нет:
Отправить комментарий