John Quiñones: What Would You Do Exposes Racism & Homophobia

The View: John Quiñones What Would You Do?

What Would You Do? is burning up the airwaves as this season’s most popular hidden camera show (are there even any competitors?). When you put people in extremely awkward and uncomfortable situations, the results are almost always shocking or at least interesting to see. What Would You Do? host John Quiñones came on The View to talk a little about his experiences interviewing the people on the show.

The View: Would You Tell On A Nanny For Drugging Someone’s Child?

The first situation took a few actors and made it look like a nanny was medicating their children with cough syrup when they were acting up in a restaurant, because every good nanny knows to keep the Robitussin handy for when little Johnny won’t just sit quietly and try to find Waldo on his placemat.

Anyhow, when the parents come in to find their child knocked out at the table, the show wanted to see if the people would inform the parent that the nanny had been slipping their kid the good stuff. Right away, an elderly woman and a middle-aged woman dutifully ratted the nanny out, saying, “if you see something, say something.” Bravo! No, the little kid was not actually given Benadryl.

What makes many of the situations so awkward is that these are normally family situations, situations that you would normally avoid butting in on, but are bad enough where someone might speak up.

The View: What Would You Do Exposes Racism

The next clip had three teenage kids planning on pulling a dine and dash loud enough for the rest of the customers to hear. Would the customers speak up, or be guilty of criminal negligence? The same stunt was pulled by three white kids, and three black kids. As you might expect, the results were not exactly the same, and brought racism to the forefront.

John Quiñones wanted to make this show because he knows that many people are inherently good, but many are afraid to speak up, and this show proves that, when you speak up, you can make a difference. Psychologically, once one person speaks up, more will usually follow.

The View: What Would You Do Exposes Homophobia

The last clip showed a young boy who went to the nail salon with his mother asking to get his nails done too with pink nail polish. What would you do if someone started criticizing the boy? Well, one woman straight up shamed him, saying that pink nail polish is for women and that the boy might grow up to be gay. While a few people stood up against the detractors, many were right with her in saying the boy shouldn’t be wearing pink nail polish.

What Would You Do airs Friday nights at 9 p.m. on ABC.