PowerPoint; #002; Racial Healing Show

Production and broadcast of PowerPoint is made possible by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. This is PowerPoint, an Information Age Clearinghouse for issues affecting the African American community, the nation and the world, and now PowerPoints Kenneth Walker. This week on PowerPoint, we explore ways to help move the nation closer to racial rapprochement, racial healing. That's the theme this time on PowerPoint, where we ask blacks, whites, Asians and Latinos this question. How do we move beyond the skin we are in? But first, the news. This is PowerPoint, news and information

to empower the community. I'm Verna Avery -Brown. I call it a rape of the community, because they are raping our community by going and doing what they want. Community activist Iris Baez, who's son Anthony Baez, was killed in 1994 by New York City police officer Francis LaVote. They have the green light to do whatever they want. Nobody is held accountable for their actions. The soldier is not held accountable, the lieutenant is not held accountable, the mayor is not being held accountable, the commission is not being held accountable. Then who is responsible for this? Are we the people responsible? No, the government is responsible and Clinton has to, we're bringing it here because Clinton got to get involved here. He has to come down to say this insanity has to stop. Busloads of families and friends of people allegedly victimized by police brought their concerns to the nation's capital recently, hoping to cast a national spotlight on their concern that police brutality is on the rise in communities of color. Richie Perez is a spokesperson for the

National Congress reporter we can write to New York City. This is the basis for the explosions of the future in our cities. The young people who are the victims of police brutality don't believe that there's any way that we will get justice from any level of government. In New York City, we couldn't get all of the victims on a stage. We've been to every level of municipal government, of state government. Now we're coming to the federal government and I hope they hear us because when the cities begin to burn again, as inevitably they will, not because we want it, not because we want it, because that's not what we want, we want social justice, that's what we want. But it's inevitable that this

kind of injustice and continued trampling on the dignity and humanity of people will eventually explode. Those concerns are shared by human rights activists around the globe. In this week, a special United Nations human rights envoy is on the second leg of a two -week mission to investigate, among other things, possible deaths due to excessive force by police. PowerPoint news asks special rapporteur Bakrach and Jai what he expects to learn. Well, I explain to see, first of all, what kind of measures are taken by the government to implement the international standards they have agreed to. And also how these measures are reflected in the awareness of judiciary, police and everybody involved of this international standard and how, what can be done to improve this conformity to international standards, which will help

to protect right, which is the US government has it cognizant, except that every human being has an inherent right to life. And also he has the takes to protect the rights by law. Special UN envoy Bakrach and Jai will visit Florida, Texas and California during the remainder of his mission. His mandate includes examining the manner in which the US imposes the death penalty. Last year, the American Bar Association called for the death sentence to be suspended because a disproportionate number of those condemned were poor in African -American and the issue has captured the ear of some lawmakers outside the Congressional Black Caucus, Minnesota Democrat Paul Wellstone. How could we end this century with one in three African -American men in jail, or awaiting trial, or on probation or parole, one out of every three African -American men? How can we continue to run a law enforcement policy where African -American

men are routinely stopped and often arrested for doing absolutely nothing even remotely suspicious? And how is it that more than three decades after we made a commitment as a country that if there was going to be any equity in urban life, we would have fair and just behavior by police officers, but we have police officers in our largest city who have behaved with a perversion that is literally unimaginable until it has happened in real life. And we have seen that in New York City today. We have a long way to go. We give lip service to prevention, but we do not invest. We do not prevent. We arrest and we convict and we incarcerate. Minnesota Democrat Paul Wellstone, speaking at Howard University in the District of Columbia. The United Nations Special Envoy will issue his report in the spring of 1998. For PowerPoint news and information, I'm Verna

Avery -Brown. Welcome back to PowerPoint, I'm Kenneth Walker, a wise friend once gave me a version of the meaning of life that seems very relevant to our topic today. He said that there are many pockets of wisdom and light locked deeply within each of us, and that each of these locked pockets can be opened only by a key that lies within someone else. Every person we meet has a key for one of these locked treasures in us, and likewise, we have a key for a lock within everyone we meet. For him, the main point of life was for all of us to see how many keys we can share and acquire in the course of our lives. PowerPoint hopes to provide the opportunity for our guests, our listeners, our callers, our producers, and myself to search for those keys from one to another. This is my

hope. This is my prayer. Our search begins tonight on a topic where wisdom and light are pretty hard to come by. How to reconcile the deep divisions of race that exist in the United States. Our guests include two authors, one, Harlan Dalton, a professor of Yale Law School, who wrote racial healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites. He joins us on the telephone from Connecticut, I believe. Are you there, Mr. Dalton? Yes, I am. Welcome. Thank you. Also, we have Jonathan Coleman, a long -time journalist whose latest book is entitled Long Way to Go, Black and White in America. Welcome, Jonathan. Thank you. And finally, on this 40th anniversary week of the desegregation of Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, will be joined by Kenneth Reinhardt. Reinhardt was a white student at Central High School, who in the face of serious risk to his reputation, if not his safety,

he befriended one of 12 black students who were finally admitted to Central High School. Those students had to be escorted at the point of bayoneted rifles in the hands of federal troops. Mr. Reinhardt, welcome to our broadcast. Thank you. I'd like to begin with you, sir. Could you tell us a little bit about the time of the forced desegregation of Little Rock High School and what you were thinking at the time? Well, first of all, the commotion that occurred initially was a total surprise, I think, to a lot of people, even though the Arkansas legislator had passed four laws to prevent this occurring. It was very much a surprise, I believe, all of the commotion that occurred at the campus and the most vocal of the students, and certainly the most vocal of the adults, were opposed to the blacks being allowed to come into the school.

So much so that, along with the gearing and the racial epitaphs that the blacks heard every day, and incidentally there were nine students, not 12. Thank you so much for the correction. Very good. And the taunts and pushes and so on, they were physically pushed around, and I'm talking about being body slammed into lockers, tripped as they walked down the halls, scalded in the showers, things of that nature, and that went on virtually all year, even though one of the 101st airborne military men was assigned to follow each of the black students around. And what were the troops doing while this body slamming was going on? They would walk behind some 10 to 15 feet, and they would go get the white student away from the black student, but if there was any punishment or discipline related to those kinds of incidents, I'm not aware of them. I am aware of some other things after going through the museum that was just opened in Lonerock that I had not heard before, but as

far as those students being punished, I'm not aware of that. Well, continue as best you can with your recollection at the time of what was happening and how you came to be friend. Who was it again? Elizabeth Eckford. Elizabeth Eckford. How did you first meet her? How did you befriend her? She was in my speech class in the afternoon. I had classes with two of the Lonerock 9 and home room with another Ernest Green. And after the initial objection to this that I received, I made it a point to speak to the black students when I saw them. We never discussed what was going on, I just talked about schoolwork. And I had no idea that my daily conversations with Elizabeth Eckford had had that much of an impact on her and did not know until last year, 39 years after the fact, and we were eventually reunited and spent three days

together at National History Day at the University of Maryland. Well, at the time, I can very well imagine that your fellow white classmates, some of your friends outside the school, certainly some of the adults, must have taken great offense at this. Oh, yes. I introduced myself to Jefferson Thomas one day in cafeteria the next day, a group of my classmates shoved me to the floor in gym class and told me not to socialize with blacks that's not the term he used. And from that day forward, there wasn't a day went by that I didn't hear racial slurs and my parents started receiving obscene and threatening phone calls at night to the extent that they started restricting my nighttime and weekend activities. That sounds like an extraordinary amount of courage for any 16, 17 -year -old child in the face of that kind of adversity. What motivated you to divide? Well, first of all, I was brought

up in a home where the value of people was a given. We did not have discussions about race. It was just known. And I did not expect the repercussions that occurred. Once they did, I felt it was absolutely essential that I continue. Stand by for just a moment, Mr. Reinhard Hangen there with us. I want to give our phone numbers so that our listeners can join in this discussion with Ken Reinhard, who was a student at Central High School during the enforced desegregation of that school in Little Rock, Arkansas, some 40 years ago this week, Jonathan Coleman, who is the author of Long Way To Go, Black and White in America, and Harlan Dalton, Professor of Law at Yale University, who wrote, authored last year, racial healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites. Our number here is 1 -800 -989. 8255 -1 -800 -989

-8255. Please get your calls in early so that you can have some assurance of joining in this discussion. Jonathan, let me turn to you. I read, actually, I had a similar kind of reaction to both your book and to Harlan Dalton, both of which I found fascinating reading. As I neared the end of each of them, I found myself remembering something that John Hope Franklin said about one of President Clinton's racial healing speeches, and he said the president needs to go around to white communities to give this speech, because they're the people who need to know. And so it led me to wondering, this book is basically an account of several years you spent in Milwaukee, interviewing, talking, reporting on a wide range of people. But it mostly focuses on African -American citizens and activists in Milwaukee. And I'm wondering, first of all, how you think those kinds of stories sell in most

white communities in America? How they sell? Yes. I mean, can you tell them? Aside from, obviously, you're trying to sell the book. But I mean, how would these stories be received there? Well, it's been interesting. I mean, I've already since the book's been out, Kenneth, I've talked to a number of white people who've read the book, actually, including my own brother, who, in all the years I've known him, has never been one to sort of speak very much about his thoughts or his feelings. And he called me one day and he said, you know, this book has really been provoking me to think about things in different ways. It's made me realize that I'm really much more prejudiced than I thought. And it's sort of kind of causing me to look at blacks in different ways. And I think that the stories and the reason that there might seem that there are more stories about African -Americans in the book is, I'm the sort of white guy going through this. So, there's this first -person story, my own complicated journey through

this. But I interviewed a number of whites. There's just certain ones that I choose to use in the book. I think that a lot of the experiences that are brought to the page here are experiences and voices that a lot of white America doesn't hear. What they think about the inner city they get in large part from the news, from the story at 11. And I thought, I mean, there are a number of reasons I did this book. But one of them was to try to sort of bring those stories to the page. But to give voice to people that might not otherwise have an outlet to have that voice heard. Harlan Dalton, your book, racial healing confronting the fear between blacks and whites. Is there any doubt in your mind that for a long time now most white Americans would simply rather than talk about race and that most African -Americans have long been eager for reconciliation have hungered for healing? Well, there's certainly no doubt in my mind that for a long time most whites would rather

go to the dentist and talk about race and do it without Nova Cane. But I actually think that a lot of black folk also have been avoiding really honest, difficult conversations about race with white folk and for that matter with Latinos or Asian -Americans. I know that I personally realize in putting this book together that I have lots of ways that I can shut a conversation down at the very moment that it starts to get a little bit sticky. If I'm having a conversation with a white person, I can look for it or paint. I can call them a racist. I have a whole lot of different weapons that I quite honestly over the years I have used because they were getting a little too close to the bone and I wasn't that confident about my ability to protect myself and protect the race. I mean, speak a little globally about it. Hold that thought. Once again, our number, you really want to participate in this

discussion, is 1 -800 -989 -8255. That's 1 -800 -989 -8255. We're waiting for your calls. So you're actually, Professor Dalton, you're talking about the need to play the race card, as it's called, in opportune moments or moments where you feel that there's no other alternative. I just think that most of us, of every color, have not only gotten out of the habit about having real conversations about race, but we have lots of ways to avoid it. So, for example, I have lots of white friends who say, sure we can talk about this, but you have to promise me that you won't be emotional or you have to promise me that there won't be any hurt feelings. And I can't promise that because we're talking about a whole lot of hurtful stuff. So I just use that as an example. I also think that the one of the ways that we avoid having a real

conversation is by using a whole lot of short hands. You know, that is we have these catch phrases. For example, you know, for years, I've run around talking about the legacy of slavery without saying what I meant by that. And for somebody who, the average white person has no idea what I'm talking about. Why slavery should still matter in 1997 to me or to anybody else whose three generations? That's one of the things you mentioned in your book, Professor Dolt. You say, our task is to retell the slavery narrative in a way that makes it less of a history lesson, and more of a present reality. The key is to be explicit, you're right, you're right, about the ways in which slavery lives on in our lives today. What are some of those ways? Well, for example, if you think about how slavery was made acceptable to good, decent church -going white folk, the way it was was that people were convinced that the Africans and slaves were lazy, that they were violent, that they were

sexually loose, and that they were happy in their slavery. And those same very typical notions are with us today. I mean, if you look at, I recently saw a poll of children aged 49, white kid, in the sense of any Minnesota, and 72 % of these kids, age is 49, 72 % associated cleanliness with whites, and 79 % associated dirtyness with blacks. So 64 % associated with stupidity with blackness, and only 27 % associated with whiteness. So these are the same notions that were stupid, lazy, dirty, sexually depraved. The same things that allowed people to blink at slavery, allowed people to blink at conditions in the inner city today. So one of the ways in which slavery is still with us, is that a whole bunch of associations

with skin color, that were developed and continued to do the very same job today, which is to make good people not worry too much about conditions in the inner city. I want to encourage all of each of our guests, you Jonathan, you, Harlan Dalton, and Mr. Reinhart, Ken Reinhart. This is a conversation, and don't feel particularly constrained by my questions. If something occurs to you, a point occurs to you, or you want to respond to a question, please just weigh in. But Mr. Reinhart, I did want to go to you. You said that until three years ago, when you met at three years ago at a national history meeting, that you had never had a conversation about race or really the consequence, the effect of what was happening 40 years ago, until three years ago. Tell us about that conversation. Well, actually it was a year ago, and it was for three days. A national

history day has held every year on the campus of the University of Maryland, and children from the 6th to the 12th grade compete in different types of presentations, video drama, and so forth. And a young girl in Union Town High School, which is an all -white school with an enrollment of 150, had seen a video from a newsreel on Elizabeth Eckford. She and two of her classmates and their social science teacher went to Little Rock Arkansas to interview Elizabeth in order for her to present a video on Elizabeth for her competition in national history day. During the course of the interview, the question was asked if any of the white students had befriended her. And Elizabeth said there were only two, and she mentioned me and another person in our speech class and Williams. The two boys decided to do a drama. They contacted me through my father and did a drama where one of them played an Arkansas segregationist and the other played me. When both the video and the drama

won at the state level, they contacted Elizabeth, and they contacted me, and asked us to come to the national history day finals. My wife and I drove to Little Rock, which is where my parents still live, and Elizabeth and my wife and I got together, and it was the first time I had seen her in 39 years, and until that day in her home had had no idea that our daily conversations had meant so much to her. Since then, or at this meeting that you went, were you met after 30 some years? Did you have, finally, or have you had, since, finally, a discussion about race? You mean with Elizabeth? Yes. Oh, many conversations. We were able to spend six hours with her a day before yesterday in Little Rock during the 40th commemoration, to hear how she has been doing, and her feelings on what was taking place this past week.

The significance of it, and what impact it might have, and she was very upbeat and very positive about it. If you're not aware of her circumstances, she suffers from post -stress traumatic disorder, and lives on disability. Does she associate that disorder with those times? Oh, absolutely. The year after 58 Governor Fall has closed the schools in Little Rock. The Little Rock 9 were sent to be with volunteer families in other states, Chicago, St. Louis, Elizabeth was sent to St. Louis. She never graduated from a high school. She went into the military for five years, and during that time completed her GED, and then got a college degree. And she was a history teacher until the impact of all of this manifested itself in such a way that she could no longer teach, and the diagnosis was the post -stress traumatic disorder from this experience.

Mr. Ronhart, this is Jonathan Coleman. I have a character in my book who said something that really struck me, and I think when I first heard it, I knew I was going to put it in. She was somebody who was part of the efforts. She was in middle school at the time of desegregation in Milwaukee. And she said when I interviewed her that if anybody asks, I'll say that I earned my racism, because of all that she felt she had to go through, which in retrospect was not all that much, but nonetheless, she felt she earned her racism by being in Milwaukee as a kind of guinea pig at the time. And she didn't know how to sort of adapt to adjust to sort of blacks yelling in the cafeteria. She was afraid to go to the bathroom. She didn't understand why blacks had free lunch tickets, but seemed, but were dressed better than she was. But she also said, and I'm sort of curious, if you have found this in talking, if you have talked with other white classmates from central high, that in

looking back, this particular person said to me that she felt that it better prepared her to deal with the world, and that actually she became the first person in the company that she worked for to hire a black person. I was just sort of wondering whether you've had that experience in talking with other whites, or if you have talked with other whites from central high. I want you to think about that question Mr. Reinhardt, because we have to take a break. Before we do, I want to give you our number again. It's 1 -800 -989 -8255. You want to join in this discussion straight away. We are talking with the author of Long Way to Go, Black and White in America, Jonathan Coleman, and Harlan Dalton, the author of Racial Healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites, and Kenneth Reinhardt, a student, a white student at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, 40 years ago this week, who befriended a terrified young black girl.

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more information. For more information, visit our website for more information. Welcome back to PowerPoint. We're talking

about Racial Reconciliation, Racial Healing. We're talking with Jonathan Coleman, author of Long Way to Go, Black and White in America, Harlan Dalton, Racial Healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites, and Kenneth Reinhardt, a former student at the Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Mr. Reinhardt, I think Jonathan had asked you a question. Can you try to answer that for us now? Yes, I believe his comment was related to someone telling him they had earned their racism by the experiences that they had and he asked me if I had seen this or experienced this with other whites, particularly with my fellow students at Little Rock, Central High School. Let me answer first by saying I didn't have that much popularity with my fellow classmates and was not that close to a lot of them, but the fellow who referred me to this program Craig Reigns did have an opportunity to visit with him. And there was not a negative conversation in any of the groups that I was

among related to personal experiences. I have had that experience with a number of other whites and blacks who, because of their own personal experiences, have a bias in one way or another. They don't use the phrase, earn their racism or earn however they feel, but it based on negative encounters that they have had and tend to equate that to if it was a black person, then I'm going to be afraid of blacks. Or if it was something they felt were a black received benefit, then I think blacks are getting more benefits. But the second part of that is, as the years have gone on, have you talked with people who, with the distance that that has given them, look back on the years at Little Rock and now see them in a more positive vein? Oh, I'm sorry, thank you for clarifying that, absolutely. The photo on the list of the

experts that went across the newspapers shows a white girl behind her with her mouth open. Is that Miss Messery? Yes. Yes. She called the list, but five years after this occurred, 1963, found her to call and apologize. It was publicly done at the start of this week when the two of them got together. I think that she was, this lady was also on nightline on ABC, as well as on the NBC program. It was very effective program. We want to go to our phones. Once again, our number is 1 -800 -989 -8255. We're going to Jay and Baltimore out of our station, WEAAFM, Jay, welcome and what can we do for you? Well, can it first, much success to you and your program? Thank you so much. I like to hear some real talk on this issue and one of the things I like to do to get into mixes to say that we have to set aside some words like bias and prejudice when we're talking about

racism and recognize that it is the power that to deny a person because of a skin color. And we must start to step up to the plate and deal with the psychology and some of the reasons. And you hear words like white supremacy. When, in fact, we know that anybody who feels supreme would not promote racism. Anybody who knows about supremeness would not even feel as though they have to deny other people. So to react. But certainly, if the point is, Jay, to maintain a position of privilege and power, you do. That's right. And that's what I'm driving at. We have to get to the root cause of it and recognize that it is a group of people. My problem with this is why so -called good white people, even at the invitation of the president recently, have not really want to bring about any kind of discussion on this issue. Well, let me get Professor Dalton in here on that

question, Jay, because actually the president did call for a national dialogue on race. He appointed an advisory board, headed by a historian, Professor John Hope Franklin, to share it. Professor Dalton, try to respond to Jay's point. I actually think Jay is on to something. Let me see if I can just echo him at least the way that I heard him. I think too often we act as if we believe that the problem is that some people hate other people, that the problem is bigotry. That the problem is like Mark Furman. And what I hear Jay saying is that sure, Mark Furman is a problem, but the bigger problem in America is that what race does is it creates a hierarchy with some people on top and a bunch of other people on the bottom. So some people are privileged. White supremacy is one way to put it, one phrase to use.

Can it be used to phrase privilege? And I prefer to think of it that way. Skin privilege, white skin privilege. So the fact about it is that people that want to give up their position. Even though they may not hate, someone may not hate me. But that, and they may have gotten their job because in some way I've been hobbled up until now, but that doesn't mean that they necessarily want to have to give something up. And until we start acknowledging that, acknowledging that what racially does is to create this kind of pecking order, this hierarchy, this social and economic hierarchy. And that people have to let go of something. I can give very far. I agree with Professor Dalton. I mean, the fact is, and we just have to be honest about this, white America hasn't yielded all that much. I mean, I'm still in favor of affirmative action for that reason. I mean, whites are still in charge. You don't see a lot of honest surveys, but Orlando Patterson

conducted one a couple years ago and it said that only 7 % of whites could honestly say they had been adversely affected by affirmative action. But nearly 80 % said they were opposed to it. And I think one thing I found throughout this book is people are constantly calculating. But oftentimes, most of the time, the calculation is out of balance. It's on the one hand, what is good for me and my family. And what role do I have in contributing to the greater good? And I think that there has to be a lot more of a balance between that. I mean, even let's take the workplace. I mean, one of the reasons that middle -class blacks still feel so isolated and angry in the workplace and whites don't understand that is that our whites' acceptance of blacks has been far too conditional on their acting more white, more like us as if whiteness is a sort of normative way of acting. We have to sort of make our acceptance of blacks much more unconditional.

Everybody has to sort of be allowed to have their quirks, their eccentricities, and so forth. You know, we just can't continue to sort of say, you're here, however you got here, but we don't necessarily have to accept you. Once again, our phone number here is 1 -800 -989 -8255. Later, if you'd like to send your comments, tourists, or questions, or suggestions over the internet, our email address is PowerPoint at worldafrican .com. That's PowerPoint at worldafrican .com. Or you can write us at post office box 4 -51385 at Latter Georgia 3 -1 -1 -4 -5. We want to go to Titus with WCLK in Atlanta. Atlanta, Georgia, welcome to PowerPoint Titus. How can we help? Yeah, how are y 'all doing? We're doing fine. Good. I'd like to say that it's an excellent program. Thank you so much. It's something that society really needs. It's a very important issue,

especially in America. What do we do about it? What do we do about it? There's the beginning. The president really did make a good move by initiating this kind of conversation, because it's a really healthy thing. It's healing for America. What's healthy about it? Given the general reluctance as some of our guests have pointed out, and even talking about it, and even when we talk about it, we try to do it superficially, or as Professor Dalton says, each of us, everyone has these little devices we use to either steer or shut down or blunt the discussion. How do we get beyond that? Well, like we just said, this is the beginning, when people start talking, honestly, about something so deeply rooted in this country. That's a meaningful direction, you know what I mean? Titus, what is this Harlem stuff? One of the things that I realize is most people, even if they got it the courage to really deal, don't have any place to talk to people who are different than they are. I mean,

most white people, like most black people, live in a segregated environment. No, but they have the workplace, Professor Dalton. For the middle class, that's an opportunity for people. I agree. I think the workplace is one of the few places that people have, where they actually can engage with another, but then what happens often times is what Jonathan Coleman was talking about, which is that people, they kind of showcase what they have in common. So the black people, what we have in common with whites, that's what we kind of show. And then everybody thinks, yeah, we're getting along so well, but we don't deal with what we don't have in common. And so what we need to do is, when we have these places where we come together to take the next step and get past the fact, you know, we both like the trauma or whatever the hell it is, we have it in common. And really, for example, when we have a situation like the

police brutality that was talked about at the top of the show, that we really talk about how differently, we think about those kinds of issues, and we push it to the past the comfort zone. You know, I'd be very interested in hearing from Kenneth Reinhardt and as a guy who took a stand and maybe at the time, you didn't even know you were taking a stand 40 years ago. What is your perception in the 40 years that have passed these days and in the intervening time of the kind and quality of conversation you have either with other whites about race or with blacks? I wanted to comment related to a previous. Well, glad, glad. And your question leads me right into that. I believe there has been a sea change in attitudes where not anywhere near where we need to be and I don't know that we ever will be in anyone's lifetime. But I never thought we would reach the point that we are today.

Which is where? Which is where? I work for a company that has 22 ,000 employees in four states. As a result of a study entitled, I believe, Workplace 2000, which stated that by the year 2000, 85 % of those workers entering the workplace in the year 2000 would be non -male, non -white. Hired a diversity training consulting group to put on diversity training for everyone in our organization starting from the chairman and working down. And that is about halfway through the organization. But basically in the company that I work for, any kind of conversation, activity, or whatever, related to any kind of racial bias is grounds for dismissal.

And you do not hear racial jokes. I heard slurs every day of my senior year and for a number of years afterwards. And racial jokes. I do not hear them anymore in the workplace at all. So I take it from you that you think that the situation is improved substantially greatly. Absolutely. Not anywhere near where it needs to be. And part of that is because that's a heart change and not just a head change. But I think part of the improvement is that by and large, with the exception of intractable places where such things as what was described on your lead in new story still happens, but that by and large America is aware it's not acceptable, it's not right. But Mr. Reiner, that's still a question between not making racial comments, racial slurs, and whether there's some sort of deep level of understanding

between whites and blacks, how much extends beyond your workplace between interaction between whites and blacks? I don't mean just lunches. What's your guess on that? Very limited. Very limited. Why do you think that is? I think partly because of the differences in where we live and where we go to church outside of the workplace. You know, I see parents all over putting their kids in cars, taking them 10, 15 miles to play soccer, to take piano, to do this, that, and the other. But I don't see parents. White parents are talking about now. But in all parents, putting those kids in the car and taking them 10, 15 miles to be in a position where they can interact with children who are different than they are. And I should think that every parent in America wants their children to have an easier time of dealing with race than we do. And why would we want to hold the whole next generation to be as frightened and as confused

about these issues as succeed generations? And yet we don't do, even if we're living in different places, you know, that could be broken down in the same way that parents manage to get children to other things that they think are valuable for them. But, you know, I want to say one other thing, which is, I think two things are true and yet they sound contradictory, but they're both true. I think that Kenneth is right that in many ways things, when it comes to race, things are much better now than they've ever been. I think it's also true that in many ways things are worse than they've ever been. Those things are both true. I mean, at the top of this story, you talked, you had to get wealth down, talking about one out of three African -American males with a certain age range, being either in prison or in probation or parole. That's different than when I was a kid. I'm about to turn 50. That's much worse. We've had a kind of

fragmentation in black communities across the country. We've had an increase in despair. That's just really different. Again, earlier on in the program, one of the speakers was saying, young people, that they have no reason to believe that things are going to improve in their lifetime. I think that, and Kenneth, this is not a comment about you, but I think very often times people will point to the positive side as a way of not also acknowledging the negative side. And they're both true. We have to talk about both of them. But we're talking about racial reconciliation, how to get beyond the skin we are in. We're talking with Jonathan Coleman, the author of Long Way to Go, Black and White in America, Harlan Dalton, author of racial healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites, and Kenneth Reinhardt on the phone from Louisville, Kentucky, who 40 years ago this week was a student at Central High School in

Little Rock, Arkansas, and did the right thing. We're going to the phones we have Walter, out of Washington, D .C., listening to WEAA, Welcome Walter to PowerPoint. Hello? Welcome. Peace to you and your guests. Thank you so much. A problem that I see that overwhelms me in my daily life, and I don't know how many other black people is the threat that is unrighteous. We perceive to us by white people. That is that we want what they got, when I could kill us, what they have, I will work for what I can get to make me and my family comfortable. I am not out to steal, rob a cheat for it, or whatever. I see white America, rob and steal, and dominate the world resources, and monetary systems worldwide. But I am a criminal. And as that fake statistic that he just shared with us, again, for the

umpteenth million times, one -third may have some connection to the criminal justice system. But in that one -third, there's no mention on those who were set up unjustly stopped by police and forced into the court, or legal justice system, that one -third does not represent those who just as a matter of jail walking and all of the criminalizing of the black man, in particular, is what I want to talk about now. Walter, we're going to talk about that, but we need you to hold on with us. Stick with us. While we take this break, please stay with us and call us at 1 -900 -898 -9800 -989 -8255, as we talk about racial reconciliation, when we come back. That's what becomes most important. .

. . Welcome back to PowerPoint. I'm Kenneth Walker. We're talking about racial reconciliation, racial healing with Jonathan Coleman, author of long way to go, black and white in America. Winter call on a teacher, J. Harlan Dalton, author of racial healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites, Kenneth Ryanhardt, who was a student 40 years ago this week at Central High School during forest desegregation in Little Rock, Arkansas. Walter, you're still with us. Let me try to get some of our guests. Let me try to get our guests, hold on a second. Let me try to get our guests to respond to a couple of your

points. One of those was that you mentioned how we can confront these questions in the reality and the light of the reality of notions of white supremacy, both domestically and internationally. Jonathan Coleman in your book, you refer to Robert Moses when he built the Long Island Parks in New York. And Moses realized that most blacks came to the parks and beaches in Long Island on the bus. That's right. You went on to write that so while designing the overpasses for the vehicular traffic to get to the Long Island beaches, he actually had the heights of the buses measured. And then he designed the overpasses so that they were two inches shorter than the buses. In the face of these kinds of attitudes, when a lot of people don't know. When powerful policy makers, when powerful policy makers can take the time, the energy and the imagination

to set public policy in a way that excludes black people, then how much hope can people have? How much hope can people have for an honest dialogue about our differences in solving them? All right. Well, I want to say two things. Go ahead. Go ahead. I mean, when Robert Moses designed those, when he dropped that overpassed down a couple of inches or whatever, I forget the exact measurement that didn't happen yesterday, but it happened. You don't have any doubt that stuff like that still goes on to you. I think stuff like that still goes on. I don't think it's as pervasive as that. I mean, I mean, if we're talking about the relationship between the police and the black community. Yes, I mean, I know from how you're talking about basically a local politician who doesn't want a lot of poor black people to traffic in his neighborhood, and you doubt that those kind of considerations don't go into zoning

or access or traffic or the placement of mass transit or whatever. One thing that I encountered in this book, I was visiting a black family in Milwaukee. And you might think this is incredibly naive of me, but I, to this day, feel indignant about it. On their behalf, and just in what happened, I'd spent a long evening with them working for life. I mean, probably best characterizes a couple who was under the category of the working poor. Wonderful parents, family had stayed together, end of a long evening, none of us had eaten. And I simply said, and this where white privilege gets taken for granted, why don't I call dominoes and get a pizza? And Marin Alexander, the father of the family, said, it didn't say anything. He laughed. He said, dominoes won't deliver here. He said the only place that will deliver here will come down to the street, but they won't come to the door. Dominoes won't come down to the street on my blog, but go ahead and finish history.

And I just, my first sense was I was just sort of bewildered, I was angry. And here's something that I take for granted every day. And I couldn't get these people a pizza. Now I read this passage in Milwaukee two weeks ago before 600 people. And when I finished the line that said, I suggested we call out to dominoes for a pizza, all the black people in the audience laughed. Because they knew what the next line was going to be. When I said Marin laughed, they won't deliver here. You did say you had another point you wanted to make a response to Harlan, something Harlan said. And the point I wanted to make earlier when Harlan was talking about lack of opportunity, I want to say this, that whites have such a perception or stereotype of people in the inner city, families that, you know, that there's just a sea of dysfunction all around. I went into the inner city and have learned from people like the Alexander's a whole lot about both family and parenting. What I want to say

is there are opportunities. But there are so many more hurdles that have to be gotten up and over to get to those opportunities. There are a lot of, there are a lot of kids who are motivated in the inner city. But it's, you know, they have to work even harder to sustain that motivation, to get to the point where they basically say, I'm going to make it no matter what. And that no matter what means basically pushing the vice -lords out of their way, on the way to school, so many things, and so many more things that whites in the suburbs have to encounter. I mean, but, but there are opportunities, you just have to, yeah. I'm going to connect to the comment you just made with part of what Walter said before the break. Because Walter was saying this figure one out of three black men within a certain age, just, you know, under the jurisdiction of criminal justice system, he said that that,

the question is, what does that mean? Why is that so? And what Walter said, it's part of why that so is because, and just bear this out, that, especially among people who use drugs, whites and blacks, blacks are much more likely to be arrested for the very same behavior. Among those who are arrested for the behavior blacks are much more likely to be convicted, they're much more likely to be convicted, and among those who are convicted blacks are much more likely to be sent to prison. So that's the part of what that statistic, that there's a story that needs to be told about that statistic. Now, you're also telling another part of that statistic, Jonathan, I think, which is that, that we need that, that people living in, in the inner cities in America are living under an enormous economic and social and psychological pressure and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and why America needs to understand. And there's also block America. And we, we, and Latinos

need to understand that, that we are truly struggling in need to take pride in our accomplishments, particularly when you take into account how much they are against the odds. And so, so, I think that that's, that's all, well, I think we're, I think we're, we're well, they're saying if we make a mistake, if we just, so we toss that number out there and don't, and don't think about what are people, what are people going to make of that number. And one, and the one thing people might make of that number one out of three is, boy, these people are criminal, and that's the wrong lesson to take home, which is why we can't just be insured and we have to have a whole story. We've been talking with Harlan Dalton, author of racial healing, confronting the fear between blacks and whites, Jonathan Coleman, long way to go, black and white in America, and Kenneth Reinhart, who was a student, a white student at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, 40 years ago, this week, I want to thank each and every one of you for your

contribution to this dialogue tonight, unfortunately, tragically, sadly, we're run, we've run out of time for, for any more of this particular discussion, but communication is the key and that's what PowerPoint is all about. If you want to communicate with us to share ideas, suggest stories, or show topics, write to us at post office box 451385 Atlanta, Georgia, 31145, or send email to us at PowerPoint at worldafrican .com. I'm Kenneth Walker, and this is PowerPoint. PowerPoint is made possible by a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting's Radio Program Fund. This is PowerPoint, a production of Hicks and Associates.