Home / Series / Today I Found Out / Aired Order / Season 2017 / Episode 236

That Time Canada Tried to Make a Literal "Gaydar"

Skillshare: http://skl.sh/2fMEBJc If you happen to like our videos and have a few bucks to spare to support our efforts, check out our Patreon page where we've got a variety of perks for our Patrons, including Simon's voice on your GPS and the ever requested Simon Whistler whistling package: https://www.patreon.com/TodayIFoundOut This video is sponsored by Skillshare →Subscribe for new videos every day! https://www.youtube.com/user/TodayIFoundOut?sub_confirmation=1 Never run out of things to say at the water cooler with TodayIFoundOut! Brand new videos 7 days a week! In this video: We are all familiar with the colloquialism “gaydar” which refers to a person’s intuitive, and often wildly inaccurate, ability to assess the sexual orientation of another person. In the 1960s, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) attempted to use a slightly more scientific, though equally flawed, approach- a machine to detect if a person was gay or not. This was in an attempt to eliminate homosexuals from the Canadian military, police and civil service. The specific machine, dubbed the “Fruit Machine”, was invented by Dr. Robert Wake, a Carelton University Psychology professor. Want the text version?: http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2013/06/when-the-canadian-government-used-gay-detectors-to-try-to-get-rid-of-homosexual-government-employees/ Sources: http://facts.randomhistory.com/facts-about-lgbt.html http://www.damninteresting.com/the-gay-detecting-fruit-machine/ http://canadianhistorycomesout.wordpress.com/2010/01/27/1962-the-fruit-machine/ http://www.cbc.ca/archives/categories/society/crime-justice/mounties-on-duty-a-history-of-the-rcmp/rcmps-fruit-machine-to-detect-gays.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plethysmograph http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vaginal_photoplethysmography http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penile_plethysmograph http://abcnews.go.com/Travel/czech-officials-erotic-lie-detector-gay-asylum-seekers/story?id=12415658#.UbfYoJz7Am

English
  • Originally Aired October 10, 2017
  • Runtime 7 minutes
  • Production Code 6dmTREoebY4
  • Created September 18, 2020 by
    Administrator admin
  • Modified September 18, 2020 by
    Administrator admin