Institutional strategies against prejudice; Patterns of American prejudice

I'm going to turn the session over to the individual chairmen of these sessions and ask each of them to spend perhaps five minutes summing up the specific kinds of proposals which came out of the workshops. And then Professor Glock would like to have a word at the end of this. I'll go through the program in the same order that we treated them in the symposium will begin with the question of the churches and the fight against prejudice. And I'd like to introduce to you now Mr. excuse me Mr. Walter Wagoner who is the associate dean of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley and whom you saw on Monday morning. The church group went through an experience which has been going through an increasing intensity for the last 10 years. The stark block indignities being one in a long line of necessary trues was which the churches had to deal. Since the sociologists really began salivating about 1955

with Will Herberg and that crowd the old problem of in a culture arise church womb to tomb a religious ghetto. With highly ambivalent people deeply affected by what they consider to be the ultimate values and trues of lives trying to apply these in most cases half heartedly and being excused in some cases by our own doctrine of original sin which is not passing muster much in terms of an excuse anymore. We have been convinced that spraying people with the preachments moralizing slogans Ten Commandments.

And all of the Sunday from Sunday school on up through commencement address type of religious oratory seems to accomplish a very little. The group of us struggled in various ways with how in the world you get a visceral emotional deep personal reaction to these prejudices. In a way which springs out of what what one believes about God in man and is able to be translated functionally and program magically into day by day life. Therefore many of the program matic suggestions had to do with with strategies which would bring all types of people in there in the religious fear together in an ecumenical free and open combat without regard to to

minority status or skin color. There's a very great restlessness about the effective ability of the old theological vocabularies and abstractions to speak meaningfully even to those people who are predisposed to listen. Thou shalt not steal means one thing but in a lumbering camp it should read Thou shalt not cut the ends off by neighbors logs. And there's this kind of incisive direct. Confrontation which is which is needed in church circles. One interesting suggestion was that neighborhood churches for example might attempt to at least as an experiment to parallel school integration plans by deliberately program matic way

breaking up congregations into some sort of exchange programs so that the the school children don't revert in church to segregated patterns of worshipping God. All kinds of remarks were made about new forms of parish life about parallel structures which would protect an audit that is not the correct word which would give the activists and those who are really committed some sort of of a arena for action which would be identify den a Fireblade Christian or Jewish law to say but which wouldn't. Result in economic intimidation by some with a large congregation our board of trustees some how to get out of the ordinary Perry structures in social action programs if all else fails in ways which which

simply go alongside are beyond the usual parish structures. Great deal of concern which verges on the psychodynamic as to why people are prejudiced. Plenty of talk about how we act in that all kinds of analysis. But what makes us bastards is. This is a very difficult thing to do to figure out in any deep sense in many many cases. I won't list here since I will give them to the chairman all the specific strategies which were proposed for local churches ministerial alliances and so on and so forth. I guess Carl Bart's remark again is the appropriate one to close with that the

church is not only the first place where man finds God it's often his last hiding place from God. Thank you. I feel that I should come and listening to this that it sounds as though there was a remarkable consensus an easygoing conversation in the workshops which produced and suggestions like this I attended almost all of them. And every time I stuck my head in the door I found people screaming at each other and so I don't think that you were in the only volatile session. Marie fielder who's the director of leadership training institute in problems of school desegregation chaired the school session on Monday afternoon Emory I believe is going to introduce two of the participants from her section who will review the findings of that workshop.

For Teacher kinds of people this was truly an unrealistic task to come up with some neat proposals in just an hour and some 15 minutes. We were eager to try and present any kind of phony consensus. And although Mr. Barry says that two people will present no everyone in the school group was indeed an articulate resource person and so that we couldn't decide on two we've decided on four and they will each have a minute. I'd like to have all four of them come out now and they will introduce each other so as to speed this along and I would I've been told that we should start with that Mrs. Eileen Hernandez from San Francisco State. Real has learned the real test of what you do if you're a group leader if you can't get consensus or at least get allies to present the non consensus. I think all of us were terribly

frustrated in our group and essentially I think we felt constrained by trying to come up with institutional strategies when we basically don't like the institution and we were very much concerned about trying to discuss within the realm of what the schools are currently doing how we can possibly do something about prejudice within the school system. We never came up with any solution we spent a great deal of time discussing our own personal points of views on things and then we suddenly found that it was 1 hour and 15 minutes gone and that we had nothing that we could really come up with as the consensus of our group. Basically my main point and I guess this is why I'm up here because I said it frequently enough in the groups is that I think what we've done with our school system is that we have over professionalize and over credential eyes and over institutionalized it and that we no longer have the kind of creativity about programs or creativity about how we can get to this to the young people in our school system that would make it possible for us to combat prejudice that we are making and

setting the rules by the people who have destroyed the system. And it's very hard to change your system if you've got the people who have been responsible for all the difficulties setting the rules for going about the change. So that's my contribution to the non consensus. But still we do have to work within the system as long as we've got it. It has to operate the best we can make it go. So here comes three small maybe major suggestions in one minute. Number one we ought to make a survey. Maybe the NEA ought to make this. To find out just what is being done in our schools of education colleges universities to prepare people to work effectively with disadvantaged with minority groups with children who live in this multicultural society. At our time and place we just don't know what's going on in public and private institutions here there. There are small studies but we don't know as a whole. Number two perhaps we might call somehow upon the colleges and universities to

make some effective intergroup education and necessary prerequisite to credentialing as teachers at every grade level and in every subject field. They need not only a conceptual understanding of these matters but of course they need also some sensitivity training. This should be part of the professional training of every teacher in the future. And thirdly we would like to call upon public school systems and perhaps private also to develop crash programs of effective intergroup education for all teachers in service. Now they need this as much as policemen do. And this needs to be not only understandings but also feelings not only techniques but also commitment not only materials but also curriculum revision. Not only school programs but also community relations. Right now there is great concern

for such matters as sex education and driver training intergroup education is far more essential. I think we may agree at least let's hear now from Mrs. Elizabeth Cohen's president elect of the NEA. That was Mr. Olson Olson is casting it at Heywood. I think we could generally agree that with all of these things that are so that the teaching profession itself and especially is expressed through professional organizations today has a commitment to make. And that commitment must be to fight racism and prejudice wherever it occurs in the community in the schools wherever children are concerned. And we know that there's a system that militates against this. And father I think you will expect to see greater militancy among teacher groups and insisting upon the fact that boards of education and whatever decision

makers have a responsibility to give evidence of the fact that it too believes that racism is bad for this country and that prejudice should not exist. And so it should be evident and contract and hiring practices transfer policies assignment of teachers etc. but that the professional organizations themselves must become courageous enough and are doing a great deal in this matter to devise means by which the educators themselves may be confronted with their own racism their own prejudices and where they might see evidence which the prejudices and acts of racism from our actual school systems. Right to present to you Mr. Bloomberg. A wind up person on this show. Who is the West Coast director of the Anti-Defamation League.

It's been I wish I were Jackie Robinson. Because if you're the mop up batter you really should have more skill than I have. However it would seem impossible unless you had been in our group that there was anything that perhaps the other people had not reported to from the group. But education is really two ends of the log and so far none of the people reporting from our group have looked at the other end of the law. We looked at the teacher. We looked at all of the things in the system and there were deep concerns about the youngsters themselves and some of the contacts that they might be able to make with the with each other that they felt were perhaps important for education. We looked at education in two ways then we looked at it as far as the person in the process. And then as far as the institutional aspect. And we found Mr. Samuels charges to business of relevance to us that there needed to be a commitment from the top

and then looking through the system as you were asking teachers to change as you are asking them to involve youngsters to what kind of rewards the system gave for the kinds of things that we hope teachers would begin doing. Then we looked at his third point a little bit some of us and that was on the recruiting and hiring promotion procedures. And then finally getting the all of the groups involved in the business of education we decided to that perhaps the idea of the systems analysis was important to us because perhaps it would be over simplifying if we were always to point the finger at exactly the same place in each institution to say here in is where the problem lies. This is where actually the prejudice is becoming the part of the problem. Unfortunately I think those of us representing different kinds of groups different kinds of institutions found very early that we not only

had a few successes we wanted to share but that many of our institutions were making different kinds of mistakes and we couldn't all point the finger at the right place to join in one place to place blame. We did have one consensus though Marie and that was that combating prejudice was everybody's business and that it was probably more everybody's business in the area of education than perhaps any of the other institutions that we talked about. Well that's an act to follow. However I think we have the person who can do that you've met beginning Sunday evening and then again last night had a very lively session. We've had the pleasure of meeting and listening to Mr. Dori Sheri. We'll ask him now to report on the mass media session. Thank you I want to report while there

was really no great you know nobody in our group. There was absolutely no screaming. None whatsoever. We just hit each other. We did come to some conclusions after a series of charges and after some self defensive action on the part of some of the representatives we agree that the newspapers or newspapers should examine a program interned ship in terms of their professional staff that they should establish a recruiting program not alone in universities but beginning with great and high schools beginning to find out with young people whether their commitments are geared to journalism. We feel that in addition to the universities in addition

to examining students for this inturn program. Students in journalism courses that newspaper should look to students in political science and on other side of the social sciences and an effort to get young reporters who are sensitive to minority problems and problems of religious and racial prejudice. We think that this reproving recruiting program should not only be geared to just finding people on the editorial staff of the reportorial staffs but on the business end of newspapers that there has to be a a program really that all newspapers should adopt. We've heard of one newspaper The Philadelphia Bulletin that has such an active program and it's apparently working out for them. It's a recommendation we would like this university to make to the owners of newspapers. We

also agreed on an endorsement of that part of the Karna report that specifically deals with the establishment of the Urban Institute without any government interference whatsoever. We also felt that the universities. Should begin to work in conjunction with newspapers and university training programs in journalism that again will address itself to civil rights and prejudice and Urban Affairs at the university has a real role to play in this section of the activity. We also felt that a greater effort should be made by all the media particularly the entertainment media in this instance to introduce blacks into programs as a normal part of American life as part of what has been dubbed many years ago as John Q. Public

not the the sport in our life but the actual working citizen. We also felt that the responsibility of the press ultimately depends on self judgment a self evaluation process we recommend to them. But this is going to be a difficult thing for them to establish because when you get into this area about Crisis Reporting the newspapers become very alarmed because they see a red signal which is called censorship which all of us would deplore. But we do believe that itself a value added process having to do with judgment in the reporting of news without in any way becoming a victim of censorship might prove fruitful. Finally we do feel that the big

area of need is a recognition on the part of all mass media that what we're facing is not just a pattern of prejudice. What we're facing is a national crisis and that all media must adopt a program having to do with this crisis. It need the mass media needs a mass program to fight this crisis. If we're going to really begin to use the mass media as a deterrent to violence and to an acceleration of hatred and a prejudice we wish that we could give you a more detailed program of how some of these things can be implemented. But we do believe that if these recommendations are followed and if newspapers and

TV and films in the theater radio would really take seriously this mass crisis that has brought all of us here then perhaps something good can come out of it. Thank you very much. Thank you. The next speaker will be on politics and government and prejudice you've met him this morning. Professor Herbert McCloskey who was with the political science department here at Berkeley and also with the Survey Research Center. I'm afraid though that we came up with more questions than answers or and certainly I doubt that we came up with answers that most of you don't already know. What I can report is perhaps the

emphases that were given to some of the answers that you already know. I think the most important feeling in the members of the discussion group on government and prejudice a concern the need to enforce the laws. Most people seem to feel that the laws that are on the books are for the most part good enough but that they're not enforced that there are many laws that would if they were enacted in practice achieve many of the results. But that for one reason or another they simply do not get applied. One recommendation was that the procedures for enforcing the laws be simplified so that they could be enforced directly without by civil rights via trading civil rights violations as crimes and punishing them directly in the courts rather than by suits and various other kinds of complicated procedures that accompany the laws that are on the books. A second

general thrust of the discussion. Concerned the use of the power structure and the existing institutions for purposes of for civil rights purposes that is to say there are some people who felt that one could talk directly to people who were in important positions in society and one could influence them more often than one thinks too. To provide jobs or to provide housing or to make other kinds of appropriate accommodations to the needs of people who are presently deprived. Against this position I don't myself think that they are necessarily in opposition but they tend to be polarized in the discussion against this position. Others argued that the major effort should be put on civil rights groups organizing themselves the feeling was strong among some members some of the participants that progress depends on self help and self

organization and that muscle is needed to break the resistance of those who are currently protected by the cry of the present system of prejudice. It was admitted in fact insisted upon that tolls will have to be stepped on that there is no avoiding it. That all change means that somebody will be challenge that existing claims and established modes will be upset and that this is simply one of the prices one has to pay for the kind of change that is so drastically needed. But the two positions do tend to be to stand in opposition to each other but to some extent depending on the degree to which they are each of them pressed. Still another general conclusion that kept or recommendation that kept coming up concerning the feasibility of approaching public officials directly. Some

maintain that we ought to lobby them directly and that we ought to write to them and that they are more more susceptible to persuasion than one thinks they need to feel however that someone cares and that they themselves will pay the price of defeat if they fail to act properly. It was also felt in some quarters that President Johnson for example ought to be publicly pressured to endorse publicly the Kerner Commission report and that documents of this kind ought to be given the legitimacy and the validation that can come from endorsement by public officials backed by people who insist that such actions be taken. I related to this. This is I'm sure you recognize a new and completely original idea. Find good men who understand and believe in the things we believe in. Work for them and elect them to office. I mean I think

we all indoors there especially encourage minority group members to enter politics to run for office and to finance and to find finances for them. And as a part of this particular set of recommendations vote for people who support what you believe reward those who favor what you believe punish those who do not. Don't. In other words distribute your resources casually make sure that whatever forces you have are applied forcefully and in the right direction. Another recommendation. Do things that one can do for oneself directly. Don't worry so much about influencing congressmen and high ranking public officials. But act in whatever personal context that you find yourself and can be

effective. So it was suggested for example that one might move a Negro family into a community help to find them a job. Encourage minority groups in a direct face to face way without having to focus heavily or to worry so much about moving the entire institutional structure of the society all at once. See to it as another recommendation that funds are distributed to deprive groups directly and that the people who are to receive them have something to say about the purposes and uses to which the funds are to be put. This of course is also a recommendation that has been much discussed in connection with the poverty programs and related programs. Still another suggestion encourage government to assume the leadership role in the institutional context there was a feeling among some of the participants that government plays a particularly strategic role in educating people in democratic values and in shaking up the press

or the churches and other institutions of the society through common efforts on behalf of deprived groups. And finally tried to get adequate staff for enforcing compliance with civil rights laws to get people who are qualitatively able as well as people who have a genuine commitment to the purposes of the present civil rights legislation. I don't know what one says about this particular inventory of approaches. I don't think that they are any of them inconsistent with the other. I come back personally to the instructor and I think it's contained in these ideas to the suggestion or to the added to the thought that was expressed a long time ago by Gunnar medrol who still in my opinion as has written one

of the most important books ever offered on this question when he talked about the principle of cumulative causation and pointed out that again in any direction at any place at any level in any form has it effect beyond its immediate consequence and that it is likely to affect gains across the line so that I suppose where one comes out with the not terribly useful suggestion that one must do whatever one can wherever one can. In what in whatever way one can thank. Well in introducing the last reporter from the sessions I should say that when we send out invitations to the delegates to come to the symposium we were very happily impressed by the caliber of people who said they would come here to

Berkeley some from well 3000 miles away to come here and be with us for the symposium one of these is Mr. Dawn Sleman who is the director of the Civil Rights Department of the AFL CIO. And we were very fortunate to get him to chair the discussions in the industry workshop. And we'll ask him to report on that session now. I have two embarrassments one as a union representative chairing an industry where to shop and to the time the time element in discussing what can and should be done at the end of a conference. We had both a good deal of agreement and a good deal of heat and disagreement because we started out really at the end of the conference we didn't deal with any of the problems of prejudice and the the problems of education many of the problems of morality

we picked up from where the undersecretary left us in discussing basically the problems of jobs. For first the hardcore unemployed and then job opportunities for the minority group Youth and and adult and we really didn't even get much into the problems of discrimination. We spent a good hour and 15 minutes just on looking into what affirmative action programs have been developed. What was some of the problems that were raised in working on them. And I would say we didn't even get to the important point of spreading the successful ones and how we we would get at the expanded primarily the discussion revolved around estimations of if there were good intent and if there were vigorous action what was

involved in bringing people into work who had had been out of work for a long time or maybe who never had a job. To what degree was special programs necessary. To what degree was this exaggerated. We had a long discussion whether the war experience where hundreds of thousands of workers came off farms or came out of schools into plants and went to work. Showed the job from scratch and then went to work. That was a good deal of discussion that there's a difference between now and wartime that there was a greater efficiency needed and therefore even management with good intent couldn't Jess do that take in any workers that could come on the job and this was too costly unless they got some help from government. There were other opinions that this was exaggerated that although there were problems with people who

were unemployable and and there were special measures needed to bring them into productive employment. That there were lots of others who just hadn't found their way to jobs because of either discrimination or lack of knowledge of jobs or many other hangups which we may not know all the reasons for it. We had some discussion of the old problems of how much discrimination there still was by unions or employers of what problems existed in normal systems which had to be looked at. If we had to see that there were not only jobs for the hardcore unemployed but also some upward mobility. And we had a good deal of discussion from a variety of people from people from management in the South's management in the north. Union representatives that had actually engaged in both recruiting

programs and training programs. And on balance I would say we learned a good deal. Suggestions were simple that more this should be done that there was an absolute need to ensure that everybody involved in the employment field management and labor did all they could to ensure that there were pulling of people into the job market and not screening them out. And that is about as far as we got in an hour and 15 minutes.