Brown eyes, blue blood

[steepholm]

I first heard about Jane Elliott's blue eye/brown eye experiment many years ago, and was kind of surprised to hear that she was still going strong, as demonstrated in this Channel 4 documentary, where she gets to work on 30 British people. In the event, her attempts to whip the brown-eyed Brits into a hate-filled mob never quite came off, but it was still instructive as a lesson in the subtleties of privilege and the Protean struggles of those who deny having it.

On the other hand, for a truly exemplary instance of unexamined privilege we need look no further today's PM interview with the historian Christopher Lee, a man who on this evidence makes Brian Sewell look like a Trotskyist. The choicest part of the interview begins at 47.00 minutes in, being Lee's defence of inbreeding and nepotism as strategies for filling positions of power. After all, "It's much better to get hold of somebody you know, somebody you can trust, somebody who'll think like you." Well, obviously. And it saves you the trouble of putting out a sign reading 'Oiks need not apply' when you by-pass the application process entirely. Lee concedes that applications may have to be invited for less desirable jobs, but thinks the plum ones should be kept for him and his friends to divide between them. Oh, and he's appalled at the thought of anyone who isn't Oxbridge educated being able to work for the security services. It would be comedy gold, except that I think he really means it.

Comments

[hafren.livejournal.com]

Oh, and he's appalled at the thought of anyone who isn't Oxbridge educated being able to work for the security services

Well naturally - I mean, they have such a good record! In fact, were it not for the Oxbridge-educated being in positions of power, we wouldn't be where we are today...

Gotta hand it to them though, they make good comedians. I wonder if he was in Footlights.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

There's somewhere where blue eye/brown eye is regarded as a significant racial marker, isn't there? I've forgotten, but I think in one of the former Soviet states.

I remember friends who lived in the Caribbean for a few years said that hard hair/soft hair was used to describe the African/Asian split in the population.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

One of the oddest lines in The Dark is Rising comes when young Will Stanton of Huntercombe, Bucks, finds himself disconcerted by Farmer Dawson, whose dark eyes are "strange, in their blue-eyed county."

The past is a foreign country - they look at you differently there.

[emmaco.livejournal.com]

The whole interview is like looking into an alternate universe.

So many nice touches, like the how lower down people "send in their forms" (or do whatever it is the great unwashed do) is spoken of in such a tone of disdain. And fancy people who want a job being so foolish as to apply for it!

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

And fancy people who want a job being so foolish as to apply for it!

I know! How unspeakably vulgar of them!

[gair.livejournal.com]

And the two ideas synthesize beautifully in a dinner conversation I had with a couple of people I wouldn't have pegged as That Type at all, talking about how one of their kids is at Oxford and really worried because 'employers discriminate against Oxbridge graduates these days'. Which unfortunately caused me to snort and say 'Well, that's just not true, is it? It's like white people going on about how the disabled black lesbians have all the money', but this was apparently the wrong response, as the other interlocutor (a tutor at Oxford) was like 'ooh, yes, certainly in the BBC and the civil service These Days...'

IT MAKES ME RAGEOUS.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

Well, the solution is clear at least. They should have advised their child to give themselves a leg up into the Establishment by coming to UWE. /sarcasm