Monday, February 16, 2004
Watching "Iron-Jawed Angels". A retelling of the suffragists with a 21st century soundtrack. Brings up the classic paradox of how men who supposedly love women are perfectedly happy to beat them up when they disagree with them.
Notes from last Thursday's talk:
Last night I got the chance to see Jane Elliott. She's
the woman who was responsible for the "Blue Eyes,
brown eyes " exercises in the late 60s and apparently
she's still going strong! When I got there she was
talking about an most obnoxious remark she had hears
often, especially from liberal white females "When I
see you I don't see black".
She then invited a black woman and a white male to
stand up with her and point out how various
differences affected the power and privilege they had
in society--height, gender, age, race. Funny moment
when she asked the guy if he had ever been told "When
I see you I don't see male" and he said "Yes, but in a
different context". She said that most likely he would
not live as long as her because this society didn't
care about its males, working them to death and
sending them off to war. She admitted to knowing less
about racism than the black woman had forgotten since
breakfast(probably got that expression garbled).
She talked about how affirmative action was under
attack and misunderstood, then asked all the white
people in the room whether they would change places
with a black person to be treated the way they were
and no one stood up.
Then she started talking about gays and said she
doesn't say "straight" because gay people are not
crooked or bent. She looked at her thesaurus and
picked the word "staid" since it's the opposite of
"gay", meaning solemn or somber. She made everyone
promise to use the word staid to be more sensitive in
the future. Momentarily a girl in the second row took
the bait and said--Wait, I'm straight and I'm happy.
So Elliott picked on her until she stopped saying
straight and was a little uncomfortable, hence not
happy anymore.
She also mentioned gay marriage and abortion with
respect to religious tolerance. She asked everyone who
ate pork to stand up and told them her Jewish friends
thought they were wrong and they were all going to
hell and then asked everyone left who wore zippers or
buttons to get up and said her Amish friends were
wrong and they were all going to hell.
So all in all her message was pretty powerful and
provocative. Didn't do much justice to her, but she
was very dynamic. She showed the original "Eye of the
Storm" documentary but it turns out she has still been
churning out videos, the most recent one being "The
Stolen Eye" about whites and Aborigines doing brown
eyes/blue eyes in Australia and a college version of
Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes filmed at Bard College. She also
talked about the impact her work had her life--her
kids were harassed, her parents' restaurant went out
of business, her fellow teacher ostracized her--but
yet she kept on doing the lesson year after year so
she could make a difference.
Notes from last Thursday's talk:
Last night I got the chance to see Jane Elliott. She's
the woman who was responsible for the "Blue Eyes,
brown eyes " exercises in the late 60s and apparently
she's still going strong! When I got there she was
talking about an most obnoxious remark she had hears
often, especially from liberal white females "When I
see you I don't see black".
She then invited a black woman and a white male to
stand up with her and point out how various
differences affected the power and privilege they had
in society--height, gender, age, race. Funny moment
when she asked the guy if he had ever been told "When
I see you I don't see male" and he said "Yes, but in a
different context". She said that most likely he would
not live as long as her because this society didn't
care about its males, working them to death and
sending them off to war. She admitted to knowing less
about racism than the black woman had forgotten since
breakfast(probably got that expression garbled).
She talked about how affirmative action was under
attack and misunderstood, then asked all the white
people in the room whether they would change places
with a black person to be treated the way they were
and no one stood up.
Then she started talking about gays and said she
doesn't say "straight" because gay people are not
crooked or bent. She looked at her thesaurus and
picked the word "staid" since it's the opposite of
"gay", meaning solemn or somber. She made everyone
promise to use the word staid to be more sensitive in
the future. Momentarily a girl in the second row took
the bait and said--Wait, I'm straight and I'm happy.
So Elliott picked on her until she stopped saying
straight and was a little uncomfortable, hence not
happy anymore.
She also mentioned gay marriage and abortion with
respect to religious tolerance. She asked everyone who
ate pork to stand up and told them her Jewish friends
thought they were wrong and they were all going to
hell and then asked everyone left who wore zippers or
buttons to get up and said her Amish friends were
wrong and they were all going to hell.
So all in all her message was pretty powerful and
provocative. Didn't do much justice to her, but she
was very dynamic. She showed the original "Eye of the
Storm" documentary but it turns out she has still been
churning out videos, the most recent one being "The
Stolen Eye" about whites and Aborigines doing brown
eyes/blue eyes in Australia and a college version of
Blue Eyes/Brown Eyes filmed at Bard College. She also
talked about the impact her work had her life--her
kids were harassed, her parents' restaurant went out
of business, her fellow teacher ostracized her--but
yet she kept on doing the lesson year after year so
she could make a difference.
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