Woman Berates Clerk With Down Syndrome

May 17, 2010 — -- A hard-working supermarket clerk is bagging groceries at the end of the express checkout lane. He's doing a good job, but an impatient customer checks her watch and starts to criticize.

"Hurry up," the customer harps. "I don't have all day."

Rude customers are nothing new, especially in a grocery store located on a busy street in New York. What makes this scenario so objectionable is that the person bagging groceries has Down syndrome, and the customer starts to use indefensible language.

"Can you not understand me?" she yells, "You're absolutely retarded!"

Would you stand up and say something if you witnessed this cruelty?

To find out how customers would respond to such a scenario, we set up our "What Would You Do?" hidden cameras in a grocery store in Brooklyn, N.Y. While the scene described may seem extreme, it echoes behavior that happens all too often.

In this very store, a grocery clerk named Elvis -- who has an intellectual disability -- has been stocking shelves for more than a decade. His boss, Ivan, calls Elvis "the best," and holds him up as a standard for all other employees. Unfortunately, customers sometimes berate Elvis, using words like "stupid," "idiot" and -- the most hurtful -- "retard."

Madeline Will of the National Down Syndrome Society knows how this word damages people with special needs.

"It makes them feel less valuable, makes them feel less human," she said. "It's important to say, again and again, this is wrong, this is not fair, this is not how we treat other people."

But will customers take a stand when they see a person with special needs being verbally abused?

To find out we hired Josh Eber, an actor who has Down syndrome. Josh has spent his life acting opposite Muppets on "Sesame Street" and A-list actors in Hollywood movies, but for two days he played the part of a grocery clerk facing profound ignorance supplied by other actors, posing as customers in line.