Jan
9
Source: Boston.com
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A scientific study was put together in Toronto, Canada concerning the difference between what people say about racism and what people do about racism.
Here’s the scene: Researchers in Toronto recruited 120 non-black York University students for what purported to be a psychology study.
A participant was directed to a room where two actors posing as fellow participants — one black, one white — waited. The black person said he needed to retrieve a cell phone and left, gently bumping the white person’s leg on the way out. The white actor then did one of three things: Nothing. Said, “I hate when black people do that.” Or used the N-word.
The researcher then stated he was beginning a study and that the students had to pick the black or white person to be their partner. Half of these students saw the quoted incident, and the other half read about the incident. A stark contrast formed — those that read about the incident had a tendency to state that they would not choose the white actor and that such comments would upset them. Two-thirds of those that witnessed the incident, however, picked the white actor to be their partner, despite what they just saw. York University professor Kerry Kawakami, as a result of the experiment, stated that “It’s important to remind people that just because a black man has been elected as president doesn’t mean racism is no longer a problem or issue in the States.”
Kanye West did say “Racism [is] still alive.” The general problem is that people will say they stand for something but when actually confronted with it, they may not do anything about it. Eliot R. Smith, an Indiana University psychologist, says something to this effect at the end of the article. While this is true and perhaps obvious to some, the problem goes a little deeper. These students were most likely not confronted with the white actor when they had to choose a partner — that said, why did they choose him anyway? Did they not care that he might have called the black actor the N-word? If they were, it would reinforce Smith’s point; the article states that more experiments will be done to see if the people who witness these racist claims are just shy to confront the person. I would love to see the results.