But if you did...like me, I'm sure the first thing you have to say is, "WOW! I can't BELIEVE that people could be so warped and twisted as to raise their children to be like that!" It's absolutely horrfying to me.
It makes me think of an old song from a popular Broadway musical turned award-winning movie, LONG ago...
In 1949, the popular songwriting team of Rodgers and Hammerstein addressed the issues of racism and interracial relationships in the play, "South Pacific". Both the original Broadway production and the subsequent film version earned numerous awards and accolades in addition to winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1950.
When the play first came out, as with everything that a certain sector of the population dislikes, the accusations of "communist agenda" and "indecency" surrounded the production initially. Lawmakers in Georgia even introduced a bill banning entertainment with "an underlying philosophy inspired by Moscow", and one even said that "a song justifying interracial marriage was implicitly a threat to the American way of life". Although I'm sure THAT guy would probably LOVE the above video (hey...for all I know they're his grandchildren), I find it absolutely sickening.
Pressured to remove the song from the show, it is said that, "the authors replied stubbornly that this number represented why they had wanted to do this play, and that even if it meant the failure of the production, it was going to stay in."
In case you are completely unfamiliar with the plot, the story involves a young (white) sailor in love with an island girl and the racism they are facing. The line that leads into this song is that racism is "not born in you! It happens after you’re born..."
You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.
You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught!
Why, oh why do people keep perpetuating this hatred? I will just never understand.
Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Pacific_(musical)#Film_and_television_versions
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