How to teach another perspective Although all humans are capable of empathy, it seems difficult to teach it in schools. Jane Elliot is a primary school teacher-turned-diversity program expert who has

Megumi@Ibaraki

How to teach another perspective Although all humans are capable of empathy, it seems difficult to teach it in schools. Jane Elliot is a primary school teacher-turned-diversity program expert who has employed her controversial teaching method called "The Blue -eyed and brown-eyed exercise" since the 70's with the aim to teach what it feels like to be a minority. In the experiment, she assumes a merciless, authoritative attitude while mistreating the target group (blue- or brown-eyed people) solely based on their eye color. she has the role of the System of society who puts down the minority to make the majority stay in power. Some adults can't stand to be put themselves in the oppressed people's shoes even for a limited period of time, so they leave. Her method was criticized, and in fact, her family, as well as herself were attacked financially and socially because some people thought it was just too harsh and mean-spirited to put down white people. In my opinion, some of the problems of this method are -It does not deal with self-hate. It does not address the issue of people who are hating their own race/gender/sexual orientation etc. -It does not directly promote equality for all. It just teaches people what it feels like to be oppressed by society. If one thinks it's more beneficial to maintain injustice, he/she can choose to keep the status quo. -Nowadays, the social fabric is more complex so you cannot always equate social status with race/gender/sexual orientation etc. Therefore, the dynamics of the experiment seems a little too oversimplified, which makes it hard to believe the experiment room as a microcosm of society. Do people actually have to be mistreated, though it's for a short period of time, to truthfully understand what it means to be the receiving end of injustice? If you say "I know it's bad to treat people unfairly so I make my very best efforts to change the situation, although I have some privileges to help me coast along in society." would that make you a hypocrite? Would that sound patronizing? Apparently she thought so. Despite all the controversies, she has long been a firm believer and a hard-core activist for justice in her own way. Her method surely raised a lot of questions but definitely a step forward for awareness for discrimination back then and possibly now. If the purpose of this method is to teach empathy, I think it works. The Angry Eye - Brown Eye-Blue Eye Experiment https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pv8mCHbOrs

Apr 19, 2014 8:54 AM

Corrections · 2

How to teach another perspective

Although all humans are capable of empathy, it seems difficult to teach it in schools. Jane Elliot is a primary school teacher-turned-diversity program expert who has employed her controversial teaching method called "The Blue -eyed and brown-eyed exercise" since the 70's with the aim to teach what it feels like to be a minority. In the experiment, she assumes a merciless, authoritative attitude while mistreating the target group (blue- or brown-eyed people) solely based on their eye color. Sshe has the role of the System of society who puts down the minority groups to make the majority stay in power. Some adults can't stand to be put themselves in the oppressed people's shoes even for a limited period of time, so they leave.
Her method was criticized, and in fact, her family, as well as herself were attacked financially and socially because some people thought it was just too harsh and mean-spirited to put down white people.

In my opinion, some of the problems of this method are
-It does not deal with self-hate. It does not address the issue of people who are hating their own race/gender/sexual orientation etc.
-It does not directly promote equality for all. It just teaches people what it feels like to be oppressed by society. If one thinks it's more beneficial to maintain injustice, he/she can choose to keep the status quo.
-Nowadays, the social fabric is more complex so you cannot always equate social status with race/gender/sexual orientation etc. Therefore, the dynamics of the experiment seems a little too oversimplified, which makes it hard to believe the experiment room as a microcosm of society.

Do people actually have to be mistreated, though it's for a short period of time, to truthfully understand what it means to be on the receiving end of injustice? If you say "I know it's bad to treat people unfairly, so I make my very best efforts to change the situation, although I have some privileges to help me coast along in society." would that make you a hypocrite? Would that sound patronizing? Apparently she thought so. Despite all the controversies, she has long been a firm believer and a hard-core activist for justice in her own way. Her method surely raised a lot of questions but definitely a step forward for awareness for discrimination back then and possibly now. If the purpose of this method is to teach empathy, I think it works.

The Angry Eye - Brown Eye-Blue Eye Experiment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pv8mCHbOrs

Well written. It's an interesting experiment. I just watched the first video. I don't know if something this extreme is necessary all the time but I can see how it may be beneficial at times. We can talk a little about this Monday if you want.

April 19, 2014

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