Monday, August 9, 2010

Unfairness on "Jeopardy"


Imagine you're a teenaged girl named "Hema Karunakaram," all-American non-white teen and possibly brought up in one of the religions popular in India or...?... and you've studied hard all your life and gotten onto Teen Jeopardy. You do well and make it to the semi-finals, competing against two anglo white boys. The game isn't going well for you but you've got some money to "bet" with... and then the Final Jeopardy category is announced: The Old Testament.

You bet all you have in the hopes it'll be something very commonly known. The question is "He was offered all the weapons of the first King of Israel but turned them down."

The answer you write: "Who is Moses?"

The answer the two white boys write: "Who is David." They come in 1st and 2nd.

http://www.jeopardy.com/minisites/teentournament-s26/videos/
http://www.annarbor.com/entertainment/saline-high-school-student-hema-karunakaram-matches-wits-on-jeopardy-teen-tournament/

Should this girl have known this trivia about David? Should Jeopardy have even used this question no matter who the contestants were?

2 comments:

Sorceror said...

Hell, I was brought up Jewish and I never knew that about David, and David is just about the most important figure in Jewish culture, as he fathered the lineage which will lead to the Messiah, and his shield is the symbol for Judaism and Isreal.

LadyAtheist said...

Before divulging the answer, Alex Trebek said "He gave it all up and relied on a slingshot." Well poopy just what she needed to feel even worse. She probably knew that part of the story.

They probably don't even teach that story in Sunday School anymore, since gigantism is a disease and killing someone for having a pituitary tumor is cruel.