Jane Elliott criticizes GOP efforts to ban the teaching of racism in schools

Jane Elliott, an anti-racist activist best known for the April 5, 1968 blue eye, brown eye experiment that showed prejudice is a learned behavior, recently condemned Republican efforts to limit discussions of race in classrooms.

Elliott whose racism experiment is linked to the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968 in Memphis, discussed her feelings about Dr. King’s murder and the broader implications of Republican policies for education on CNN.

“My whole body is reacting to the horror I felt when I realized that we had killed a man whose sole purpose was to improve the situation of not only the people we call Black people… but all people on this Earth.” Elliott said.

In 2017, Elliott said she saw the Conservative responses at the time as part of a broader backlash. “This is white people’s reaction to eight years of a black man in the White House. This means that we have made no progress since the beginning. We drove people underground and that’s what they did.”

She told CNN that conservatives’ efforts to ban her from higher education are a terrific compliment to her. Elliott explained to the portal that attempts by conservatives to control education are part of the broader historical context of white Americans’ fear of losing the statistical majority.

“This whole thing now is about ensuring that white people don’t lose their numerical majority. “Jane Elliott’s writings are banned from colleges and university campuses, and I think that’s the highest compliment I’ve ever received,” she said. “It’s the best way to convince me that what I’m doing is good.”

This was revealed by her famous exercise Social roles shape the way people treat one another, even when the role is assigned according to the student’s eye color. According to Elliott, some of her students turned on one another because of what the experiment attributed to the children based on their eye color.

Elliott noted: “In five minutes, I turned this group of loving, kind, generous and caring people into individuals who behave similar to the individuals who in this country can judge people every day based on physical characteristics. “

Elliott also told CNN that America doesn’t properly teach its own history. “We indoctrinate children with racism on daily basis in the schools of this country. We don’t tell the truth in this country.”

Elliott continued, “And that’s why a lot of pale-skinned people are afraid, because their children might learn the truth and start acting on it… Education should prevent you from accepting the bigotry and self-imposed ignorance of those around you.”