"What Would You Do?"... Gay Parents Refused a Meal

ABC's Wednesday night hidden camera news magazine sets up some interesting social experiments, and then captures them using hidden cameras. It's Allen Funt with a social agenda.

Last night they constructed two social situations where minorities were being verbally abused in a place of business.

First, they had an actor insult a grocery store clerk with Down's syndrome. This scenario generally brought out the best in onlookers - particularly the women, who jumped in to defend the grocery clerk even when the male abuser was physically intimidating.

But in a separate segment the show took over a Brooklyn diner and had an actor posing as a bigoted waiter start to loudly hassle gay parents with their children. They tried it with two mommies first, then two daddies - but in both cases the results were similar. Surprisingly few onlookers actually spoke up to defend the gay family. One lady, seated at a table nearby, actually laughed through the entire confrontation and later remarked how funny she thought the idea of "two mothers" was.  She must have signed a video release, so obviously she failed to realize how bad she comes across.

The show's narrator explained that they ran the experiment nearly a hundred times and less than a dozen onlookers actually spoke up in defense of the gay family.  Thankfully, the segment does include a few of those notable exceptions – and they do warm your heart a bit. (I particularly liked the guy with the switchblade necklace who was about ready to come to blows with the waiter.) But still, less than a dozen? That's pretty discouraging.

What would I do? Probably never ever eat at that diner.

You can check out the full segment below.