ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, November 17, 1996 TAG: 9611180076
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: Associated Press
From radio talk shows to water coolers, Americans have expressed shock and astonishment at allegations of overt racism inside the Texaco oil and Avis car rental companies.
But those who are amazed aren't black.
As sordid stories seep out that some Avis Rent-A-Car locations rebuffed prospective black customers for no good reason, and that senior Texaco officials derided black employees as ``black jelly beans'' and worse, many blacks are left with an ``I told you so'' feeling.
``This demonstrates that we aren't just paranoid about the country we live in,'' said Todd Boyd, associate professor of popular culture at the University of Southern California. ``I didn't need the managers at Texaco to confirm that for me, but that's what they did.''
Lawrence Otis Graham, whose White Plains, N.Y., consulting firm tracks the progress of minorities and women in corporate America, said he wished the cases at Texaco and Avis were aberrations. He doubts they are.
``Many companies have no idea how bad a job they are doing,'' Graham said. ``They might give a contribution to La Raza or the NAACP, but being generous doesn't make them a good or fair employer.''
Charges of racism are nothing new for police and courts, but the Avis and Texaco cases gave the public rare glimpses of how attitudes about race can collide with big business.
In the same way videotaped evidence of Rodney King's beating in Los Angeles lent credence to longtime claims by minorities of widespread police brutality, Graham said, the Texaco and Avis cases will cement forever the image of racist corporate executives for many blacks.
``When popular culture deals with racism, we deal with Archie Bunker or redneck stereotypes, never Texaco executives,'' said Joe Feagin, a University of Florida sociology professor who has researched America's race relations for 30 years.
``But upper-and middle-class whites can cause the greatest harm because they have the power. They can keep corporate boardrooms all white or exclude blacks from living in a neighborhood,'' Feagin said.
Civil rights lawyers in North Carolina filed a class-action lawsuit in federal court against Avis and the owner of five Avis outlets in North Carolina and South Carolina for refusing to rent cars to blacks.
The lawyers representing would-be customers said corporate officials did nothing to stop it. A former manager for Avis Rent-A-Car says franchises in the Carolinas denied rentals to blacks over the past few years ``if there was any way out of it.''
A tape of a secretly recorded Texaco board meeting depicted executives using racial slurs and speaking of destroying documents sought by plaintiffs in a discrimination lawsuit.
Feagin said that outside of the rare public disclosure of racism from sports executives such as Cincinnati Reds owner Marge Schott and former General Manager Al Campanis of the Los Angeles Dodgers, corporate officials generally keep incendiary issues of race at arm's length.
``Corporate executives usually cover their tracks so well,'' Feagin said. ``For me, the most chilling aspect is no other person in the [Texaco] meeting spoke out against the language or destroying evidence. There wasn't one anti-racist at the meeting.''
Feagin, who is white, said he thinks no one objected because many whites' racist attitudes are far more extreme than commonly perceived.
He cited a 1992 Anti-Defamation League national survey that listed eight stereotypes for people on intelligence, criminality and desire to work. More than 75 percent of respondents said one or more of the negative stereotypes were true for blacks; 55 percent said two or more were true; and almost one-third, 30 percent, said all the characteristics were true, Feagin said.
``We whites are in denial,'' Feagin said. ``Our top political leaders, scholars and commentators all tell themselves and the general public racism is dead or dying, and it's a great white lie. Racism is very much alive, as studies demonstrate.''
The Texaco and Avis cases create even greater angst for blacks when viewed against a wave of public sentiment against affirmative action.
In trend-setting California, voters overwhelmingly approved Proposition 209 banning many affirmative action programs in public hiring, contracting and college enrollments.
``What came out of Texaco is a textbook case of why we need affirmative action,'' Graham said. Graham, who since 1991 has tracked 600 companies in 10 industries, said consumer product firms generally provide the best work environments for women and minorities.
LENGTH: Medium: 85 linesby CNB