October, 1991 The Broncos' Voice Page 11
One Instructor’s "Thoughts On Racism"
Dr. Daniel Campagna
"Racism is man’s greatest
threat - the maximum of
hatred for a minimum of
reason." Abraham Joshua
Heschel
As a white professor of
Criminal Justice at a historically black
institution, I have been asked to
comment on the issue of racism. In an
era of " politically correct " semantics
on college campuses, racism rates as
one of the most volatile topics of
debate. Some academicians have
responded to the destructive, divisive
challenge of racism with false bravado,
posturing, and a veritable sirocco of
rhetoric. In other words, all sound and
fury signifying nothing.
I am part of a minority of white
professors at F.S.U. but have never felt
unwelcome or disparaged because of my
off-white Caucasian ancestry. Yet
racism is a frequent topic of concern
among some employees and students for
a number of reasons, many unavoidable
and others regrettably familiar. When
opportunities are blocked, promotions
withheld, and the future starts to look
bleaker than the present, racism offers a
means for explaining the absence of
hope or optimism.
There are Criminal Justice
majors, for instance, who firmly believe
the judicial process is universally biased
against persons of color. To persuade
them to consider alternative explanations
is akin to pushing the proverbial boulder
uphill. After all, we tend to seek out
information, ideas, and people that are
in concordance with us. Racism offers
limited minds a straight and convenient
road to the delusion that racial
differences create an inherent superiority
of a specific race. White people control
the judicial system, so the theory goes,
and thus people of color will suffer
disproportionately. This is a gross
simplification of a complex issue but it
does illustrate how racism interferes
with the normal processes of logic and
rational choice.
F.S.U. is my first exposure to
and experience with a historically black
institution. Until now I had no true idea
of the obstacles such institutions most
confront, particularly in terms of public
reputation as it is affected by racism. I
doubt that, even now, my appreciation
of the racial status quo is accurate.
There are tides and subtle undercurrents
of racism that I do not fully understand.
I am fortunate, for example, to works
with colleagues from all points of the
globe. That is a distinct fringe benefit
of the job. Yet I have heard remarks to
the effect that F.S.U. should hire new
professors on the basis of color rather
than credentials. It seems reasonable.
however, to assume that students are
entitled to the best qualified professor.
To use skin color as a determining
standard for employment is racist; it
draws a distinction among people that is
not based on scientific proof. 1 reject
the notion that anyone should be given
special entitlements by virtue of race.
Yet obviously this is precisely
what does happen, in a decidedly
negative manner, on college campuses
and in the judicial system,if the
statistical evidence is to bis believed
(twice as many black males are
incarcerated as are currently in college).
My students confront racism from the
cultural perspective of being victimized;
my colleagues are models of success for
these students to emulate. If I therefore
resent affirmative actions or racial
quotas I may minimize the prospects of
success for my students. The question,
therefore, that most concerns me is -
when can we abandon the issue of
racism without fear of creating another
generation of disadvantaged citizens?
Unfortunately, racism thrives
because it appeals to our sense of
disenfranchisement. When one feels
disconnected from the momentum of
progress and the rewards of humanism,
racism offer a convenient exit away
from compassion and love and makes
our own thwarted lives or dreams cause
for hating others. Racism, like other
form of discrimination based on age.
STORY
gender, sexual identity, physical
appearance, or religious views, cannot
be eliminated entirely at any university
until it is first eradicated within the
communal settings outside campuses.
I expect great things of my
students because the potential to change
the judicial system and the social order
lies within their grasp. However, I shall
always believe, in spite of contrary
opinions, that their success in life is due
to who they are rather than the color of
their skin.
- Dr. Daniel Campagna, Assistant
Professor, Criminal Justice
The white man writes his history for Ui
to study, makes his scenario with his he
roes and heroines for us to admire and
supplies our newspapers. Through these
instrumentalities, he almost controls our
thought. .If we believe that we come from
nowhere and have no history but that of a
slave, or substance will be the charity of
ouroppressors and our future handicapped
by doubts and fears.
Prospectus of Ancient Order of
Ethiopian Princes, Chicago, 1921
Dr. Manning Marable
Along the Color Line:
The Factors Behind Black-Jewish Tensions
Several weeks ago, student
groups debated more than five hours
whether African-American activist
Kwame Ture, known previously as
Stokely Carmichael, should be invited to
speak at the University of Colorado.
Ture’s statements critical of Israel were
characterized as "anti-Semitic" by
Jewish students and advisers, who
insisted that he should not receive
university funds. The university’s
cultural events board finally voted to
support Ture’s visit. But the debate
between black and Jewish students was
symbolic of the tensions which now
divide both groups across the country.
Earlier this summer, a
controversy was sparked by professor
Leonard Jeffries, chairperson of the
African-American Studies Department at
New York’s City College. In a public
address at the Empire State Black Arts
and Cultural Festival in Albany, Jeffries
asserted that blacks were the victims of
a conspiracy "planned and plotted" by
people called "Greenberg and Weisberg
and Trigliani." Public officials and
educators condemned Jeffries’s remarks
as anti-Semitic, and New York Senator
Daniel P. Moynihan called for his
resignation. Conversely, many blacks
rallied behind Jeffries, and argued that
attacks against him were racially
motivated.
The next firestorm erupted in
Brooklyn’s Crown Heights
neighborhood, where blacks and Hasidic
Jews lived in uneasy coexistence. On
one August evening, Yosef Lifsh, an
Hasidic Jew, lost control of his
automobile and smashed into several
black children on the sidewalk, killing
one seven year old youth. Witnesses
reported to the police that Lifsh had run
a red light and was speeding. Others
spread the rumor that he appeared to
have been drinking. Outraged, hundreds
of young blacks took to the streets,
hurling rocks and bottles at police and
Jewish residents. Apparently in
retaliation, a visiting Jewish scholar
fi'om Australia was killed.
For many African-Americans,
both deaths were seen as homicides. For
the Jewish community and most whites,
the deaths were perceived as being
entirely different, the first a regrettable
accident and the second a deliberate
murder. Many black activists were
troubled when attCMney Barry Slotnick,
who had previously represented subway
murderer Bernhard H. Goetz, stepped
forward as a spokesperson for Lifsh.
When Brooklyn District Attorney
Charles Hynes announced that no
charges of criminally negligent homicide
would be filed against Lifsh, the grief
and resentment of thousands of blacks
turned into deep outrage.
Instead of understanding the
origins of black anger and violence,
linked to poverty and a sense of
powerlessness, many whites leaped to
the conclusion that anti-Semitism and
pro-violence sentiments had acquired a
mass base of support among the
majority of blacks. Few white
commentators were more vehement on
this erroneous theme than New York
Times columnist A.M. Rosenthal.
Blaming the recent upsurgence of racial
violence on "the black political and
emotional bridges between blacks and
non-blacks." Rosenthal linked the Crown
Heights incident with the earlier Jeffries
controversy, which was characterized as
"weirdo speeches of a Jew-baiting
professor on the public payroll and by
bigotry’s apologists, supporters and
conveyor belts in the black press and
radio." Rosenthal offered his own self-
fulfilling prophesy and warning lo New
York Mayor David Dinkins and other
black elected officials, wondering aloud
whether "any black will be chosen
mayor for a long time," because "so
many non-blacks have been
antagonized."
Nowhere in Rosenthal’s
emotional diatribe was the recognition
that many black politicians, and
especially Dinkins, had taken a
principled, public stance against anti-
Semitism throughout their careers, and
to blame them for the actions of a small
minority was, in effect, a conce.'sion to
the worst form of racist bigotry.
Nowhere in this not-too-subtle linkage
of Dinkins with Jeffries was the point
made that Jewish political behavior in
recent years has grown more
conservative ideologically, and
specifically opposed to blacks’ interests
on issues such as affirmative action.
The real roots of black-Jewish
tensions cannot be attributed to Louis
Farrakhan, Jeffries, the Crown Heights
Black-Jewish continued on p. 18