Of course, some play the role of father figure more responsibly than others, as is evident in FX's documentary series "Black. White." (premieres March 8, check listings). The show challenged two families, one black and one white, to swap racial identities and see how the world looked different to them.

Now, the minute you hear about such a show, you imagine two extremely liberal, open-minded families going earnestly into the great unknown looking to unlock the experience of another culture and race. "My, these grits are good!" "Gosh, Talbots really is a great place to buy ladies' fashions!" Such an experiment, undoubtedly filled with polite, p.c. observations you could dream up without watching, might not be all that compelling. Luckily, though, the producers chose an infuriatingly ignorant, dorky, clueless white couple who consider themselves sensitive and progressive, but who emerge from the early stages of the documentary feeling that racism in this country is grossly exaggerated.

Of course, this flavor of arrogant, "If I can't see it, it's not there" egocentrism is exactly what should be unearthed by any show that purports to tackle the slippery issue of racism in America, since the refusal to admit that it exists is the main obstacle facing those who want to openly address racism in this country. Nothing is more frustrating to those who struggle against racism than people who are too wrapped up in their own experiences to grasp how pervasive racism is, yet feel free to issue sweeping statements on the subject as if they have special knowledge of it. Bruno Marcotulli and his wife, Carmen Wurgel, fit this profile perfectly. Soon after venturing out in his new makeup, Bruno reports back to his black counterpart, Brian Sparks, that he was treated exactly the same as a black man as he always has been as a white man. He seems excited that he didn't walk out the door and immediately hear the N-word, and takes this as proof that white folks aren't so bad after all.

Meanwhile, Renee Sparks has a different experience entirely, and she doesn't even have to wear her white makeup to have it. Sitting in a little bar in all-white Pasadena, Renee tells a stranger she just moved to the area and wonders if there are any black people around. The stranger, who looks like a typical long-haired California hippie, says there aren't too many blacks around, but tells her that she'll have no trouble fitting in, since she's different from most blacks. Then he starts to ramble on about how many blacks choose to be ignorant, which condemns them to being looked upon with disdain by more informed, upstanding citizens like himself. The man's outlandishly racist statements back up my own experience of Los Angeles as a far more segregated and racist town than my hometown of Durham, N.C., a place that most people assume is deeply backward and racist, but where blacks and whites interact far more often than I've seen in L.A., and tensions (and lifelong friendships) between them are out in the open and directly addressed.

While Bruno and Carmen aren't necessarily bad people, their total lack of experience with black culture, paired with their very stubborn refusal to consider the notion that they're as bogged down by prejudices as any of us, lead to some unforgettably cringe-worthy situations, like when they both decide to wear traditional African garb to a black church, where everyone else is dressed in normal old clothes. The Sparks family gets a huge kick out of this, but generally views the white family (excluding the very sensitive and humble teenage daughter, Rose) with disdain and annoyance.

The best moment of all comes in the second episode when, after hearing Rose's teen group of black slam poets perform in the house the two families are sharing, Carmen stands up and delivers a rambling soliloquy on how moving and special all of these fine black children are, replete with grand gestures, all stage-whispered in a voice dripping with condescension. The icing on the cake, though, comes when she refers to one of the female poets as "this beautiful black creature" like the girl just crept out of the swamp, a monster whose beauty only Carmen can truly see and appreciate.

The teenagers are all silent and look thoroughly irritated, but Renee Sparks is absolutely livid. She's hated this freakish woman since they were practicing "black lingo" together and Carmen jokingly yelled at her, "Yo, bitch!" thinking that black women insult each other ruthlessly as a form of greeting. What clearly bothered Renee was not that Carmen made a mistake, but that she couldn't manage an apology that wasn't filled with the self-righteous insistence that she hadn't done anything wrong and she didn't intend to offend and that, most of all, it didn't mean anything, all muttered with an indignant, angry strain in her voice. After the kids leave and Renee expresses disbelief at Carmen's absurd display, that same "Screw you, you're paranoid" tone returns. How do you enlighten someone who thinks they know everything already?

Ah, but white people have a long history of not being able to admit their mistakes, a history that most white people don't know about, since they'd rather order pizza and play Super Mario Bros. than consider the major blunders of the past. So this very worthwhile documentary series is left with one black couple who strain to point out the racist undertones they see everywhere, and one white couple who strain not to see any of it. It's pretty depressing, and will make the honkies among us deeply ashamed to be butt-white and filled with just as little understanding and just as many prejudices as Carmen and Bruno.

But at least some hope lies in the fact that these two jackholes so clearly demonstrate the stubborn, self-centered, small-minded beasts that exist in all of us, beasts that were formed through centuries of ignorance and elaborate, violent misunderstandings, beasts that can no more easily be shaken off or ignored than our very DNA. As sure as there's still big hair and boy bands and a "Three's Company" rerun playing somewhere out there, it's clear: Mistakes were made.