This movie focuses on issue of race and how it influences not only personal attitudes and behavior, but also on the way humans set up institutions come up with skewed policies that benefit certain groups while locking others out. The film depicts how benefits trickle quietly and invisibly to the white majority, not because of certain set up procedures like merit or effort put in, but based on the racial crafted laws, customs, and perhaps most importantly, housing. This episode unmasks the ideology of how the concept of race is not as a result of nature, but it is brought about by politics, economics, and cultural factors. It brings into light how our set up institutions are based on the race factor by disproportionally piping resources, power, life status, …show more content…
This led into an influx of many petitions from new immigrants to be recognized as whites in their efforts to obtain citizenship.
Franz Boas, who was an anthropologist served as a special witness due to his scientific background, assisted Americans gain citizenship.
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In 1922, Japanese by the name Takao Ozawa who had migrated to attend the University of
California appealed his deprival of citizenship where he held the view that the physical attributes of his skin indicated that he was white and that citizenship should not be determined on the basis of race. The Supreme Court decided that, based on scientific grounds, the Japanese were not white where it classified them as Mongoloid and not Caucasian. Another incident involving
United States vs. Bhagat led to a controversial and contradictory ruling by saying Indians were not white legally despite the fact that science proved them to be white. The justices said whiteness should be based on the white man’s understanding and not science. Following the Second World War, we see how well Europeans fared where suburbs like
Levittown sprung up in the country due to new government policies and financing. Real