Comments on Racism & Anti-Semitism, www.nuatc.org/blog

October 15, 2007: 

 

So what are we to make of the ubiquitous signs of  racism and anti-Semitism?  Nooses on a professor's door at Columbia University's Teachers College, on a police officer's locker, and postal worker's as well, a white Queens woman arrested recently for throwing a noose around a tree and threatening to hang her black neighbor's children from it, and of course there is the noose hung on a tree in Jena, Louisiana, which launched the Jena 6 movement and the number of copy-cats just waiting for an excuse -- unleashing their virulent antipathy.  We can trace the recent outbursts of racism to statements made by celebrities such as Michael Richards who used the N-word in a comedy routine gone sadly awry.  He has been joined by other celebrities reflecting racist attitudes such as Don Imus, Bill O'Reilly and the anti-Semitic drunken ravings of Mel Gibson. More recently we have the image of Ann Coulter, who seemingly used anti-Semitism as a way to sell books by claiming that if Jews were "'perfected,' that is, became Christians, [America] would be a better place."  And then there was the blatant positioning of former Mayor Rudy Guiliani, running for the Republican's party's nominee for president, appearing in the state house of Montgomery, Alabama, declaring that the issue of flying the symbolically racist Confederate flag, displayed prominently next to the Stars and Stripes, should be decided by the state of Alabama -- not Washington, D.C. 

 

This political positioning is not new for politicians in America.  One can trace Ronald Reagan's pandering to Southern whites by kicking off his campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, the city where African and Jewish Americans were murdered because of their involvement in the civil rights movement.  And more recently we had the specter of President George W. Bush kicking off his 2000 campaign at the racist Bob Jones University.  History continues to suggest the strategy works. The climate for racism 2007 has been consistently framed and supported in our nation. And then there was Katrina and the bleak realities of black Americans, challenged by poverty, many dying and pleading furtively for help from the flooded streets and wards of New Orleans, as the nation watched in disbelief on their television sets and computers, removed, safe and secure. 

 

Fueling emergent tensions, The New York Times reported that "a more complex and relevant contemporary tale may be the tensions between blacks, Hispanics and Orthodox Jews in Lakewood, New Jersey, where a rabbi was recently badly beaten.  These are the latest and more blatant examples of a climate of racism and anti-Semitism in America. 

 

So what are we to make of the examples of conflicts cited above?  The philosopher John Dewey suggests that "...the mark of moral decline is the loss of an ability to perceive aspects of good and evil not previously noted, and [that this decline is also] the loss of an ability to make such distinctions..."  Dewey goes on to state there are at least three independent variables in moral action, "good, right, and virtue."  Dewey argues:

 

"Uncertainty and conflict are inherent in morals; it is characteristic of any situation properly called moral that one is ignorant of the end and of the good consequences, of the right and just approach, of the direction of the virtuous conduct, and that one must search for them.  The essence of the moral situation is an internal and intrinsic conflict; the necessity for judgment and choice comes from the fact that one has to manage forces with no common denominator" 

 

Princeton's Eddie Glaude, Jr. writes: "In situations the correct choice is rarely apparent. We stand somewhat ignorant of the end and the consequences that may follow from whatever choice we make.  Nevertheless, we must choose, knowing not that our choice is based in some fixed, universal principle but that our choice is the best, most intelligent choice we can make in a particular problematic situation."

 

Twenty thousand march in Jena, Louisiana, demanding the end of racism.  500 rally at Columbia University in support of an African-American professor.  Professors and students appear on television stations decrying the spate of racist and anti-Semitic behaviors.  Important sightings to be sure, and yet, what action is required to reinforce, build and sustain the American values and vision of tolerance, and equal opportunity in our diverse nation? 

 

We at the National Urban Alliance (NUA) understand that educators are uniquely positioned to lead a social justice movement.  Educators are 3.5 million strong -- the same number of those who serve gallantly in America's armed services.  In our numbers we influence tens of millions of students in our schools  -- a critical mass.  We have the trust of students and their parents.  We work in the most important and largest public and private institution of a community -- the school.  We have a moral responsibility to build curricula of social justice as we enable teachers and their students to address "the soft bigotry of low expectations," that President Bush uses to frame the No Child Left Behind legislation.

 

On August 28, 2007, NUA leadership went to the Israeli Parliament (Knesset) to sign an historical agreement between an Israeli-based organization called the International Center for Enhancement of Learning Potential (ICELP).  Among others, the leaders of ICELP and NUA indicated to the press and those assembled by M.K. Rabbi Michael Melchior, Chairman, Education, Culture & Sports Committee, that the Jewish struggle is similar to the black struggle, "...reflecting on the centuries of intolerance endured by Jews and African Americans alike (see B'Nail B'rith Magazine, Summer 2007)"  Unknown to NUA leadership was the historic significance of August 28.  This date in 1963 was when Dr. Martin Luther King delivered his "I have a dream speech."

 

The intent of the ICELP and NUA is based on "science, belief and charity" and the partnership will address the need for improved student achievement, in the context of improving how students make decisions and problem-solve in their lives.  ICEL has developed and executed programs to improve thinking and learning skills, all based on Professor Reuven Feuerstein's theories of Structural Cognitive Modifiability (SCM) and Mediated Learning Experience, for over four decades.  ICELP has recently contracted with the South African government and with Rwandan authorities to help adults and children end decades of low expectations that have plagued the African continent.  The SCM theory views the human organism as open, adaptive and amenable for change.  The aim of this approach is to modify the individual, emphasizing autonomous and self-regulated change.  Intelligence is viewed as propensity of the organism to modify itself when confronted with the need to do so.

 

Contemporary social upheavals in America demand that educators work to instill among the country's diverse populations the tolerance and respect for fellow citizens which enables improved life trajectories.  Education remains the only pathway toward middle class and social stability. The present economic climate is one which has 37 million Americans, many of them children who are officially classified as poor.  The "New York Times" reports that another 57 million are "...struggling just one notch above the poverty line," and that "...near-poor Americans live in households with annual incomes of $20,000 to $40,000 for a family of four."  This data suggests seeds for discontent.  If people struggle for financial and personal security, they are more susceptible to low-level thinking often manifested in over-generalizations, stereotyping, and prejudice.  People who are insecure internalize a self-fulfilling prophecy of inferiority. When they lack hope, nihilism may become a standard for defining one's adulthood (e.g., NYT's columnist Bob Herbert and 50 Cents' "Get Rich or Dye Trying" CD). 

 

David Brooks of the "Times," has written that "...today, the global information economy makes it hard for people without human capital to prosper and participate."  When human capital becomes scarce, when millions of students of color are locked into the "cradle to prison" syndrome, America's role in the world is diminished. When the nation's policies erect barriers associated with "urban reservations" of neglect and discrimination, social upheaval becomes prevalent, and America's Promise becomes empty rhetoric dimmed by hypocrisy.  As a nation how do we lead for a better world, when millions of Americans are denied equal opportunity?  We don't.  It is time to turn to the moral high ground of a movement.  Education as a civil right

is that movement.  Embrace renewed belief, hope, determination and confidence in America.

 

We return to Israel in late October to respond to a request and to bind a common historic relationship with the struggles of a Jewish nation and citizens, to those of historic references to America's civil rights movement and the labors of educators who recognize a common mission. In some very small way, we as educators have a responsibility to embrace social justice in our interventions that mirror the trips that MLK and Malcolm X made to Jerusalem for deeper understanding and extension. We travel for programmatic purposes that a social justice movement requires -- beyond rhetoric to sustained educational interventions that improve lives. 

 

Eric J. Cooper

President

National Urban Alliance for Effective Education (NUA)

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