Apartheid. USA 1988

February 2, 1987:

Time publishes a four-page essay; RACISM ON THE RISE. The magazine retold the ‘latter-day apartheid’ story of Forsyth County, Georgia and asked where ‘the amazing persistence of American racism came from, and why it was still so strong?’ Time said the number, which was not all

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inclusive, of racist attacks all over the US had increased from 99 in 1980 to 276 in 1986, according to the Justice Department community-relations service in Washington DC. Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, who issued the famous slogan that ‘violence is as American as apple pie’ when he still was known as H Rap Brown, told Time now: ‘Racism is the state religion. Racism is to America what Catholicism is to the Vatican. Racism is the religion, and violence is the lithurgy to carry it out.’ Thomas Pettigrew, professor of Psychology at the University of California at Santa Cruz told Time, ‘What causes racism is the most researched question in all of American social science in 80 years.’ He believes that one basic answer is that people still fear strangers or anyone who looks different, and many nations and ethnic groups (not excluding blacks) suffer the same disease in one form or other. Perhaps racism should be taught anew to each child, and the best way to teach it is through ignorance. ‘In the 1940's Howard Beach occurred every night of the week,’ said Professor Pettigrew. There has, of course, been progress.^38. There was a time when Marian Anderson was not allowed to sing at Constitution Hall, or when Jackie Robinson had to promise not to retaliate if spiked and spat upon as the only black in major league football. ‘But,’ observed Time, ‘paradoxically, these limited but real successes bring a new twist in racism.’ ‘We have more hatred now,’ says Benjamin Hooks, executive director of the NAACP^39., ‘because we've entered a new era, an era of competition for jobs, attention, power. Now we are the people who may get your (white) job, who may be living next to you, who may ask your daughter to marry us. We have come a long way, but it is like nibbling at the edges of darkness.’

Time conducted a survey among 871 white and 93 black adults between January 19-21, 1987, and found that half the

38. When attending Yale College (1948-1950) the editor vividly recalls the for-whites-only-signs in Washington DC and further south

39. National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

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whites who were questioned, feel that blacks are being singled out for discrimination. Only 35 percent of the whites, versus 51 percent of the blacks agree that ‘most white Americans do not like blacks’. Yet, 44 percent of whites and 45 percent of blacks agree that ‘most black Americans do not like whites’. Also, Time found that whites were more likely to be afraid of blacks. Only 30 percent of the black respondents said they would be afraid in an all-white neighborhood at night. Only 24 percent of blacks said they ever felt physically threatened by whites against 26 percent of whites who admitted to ever having felt ‘physically threatened by someone who was black’.^40.

40. Time magazine, pages 16-20