Author offers his views on racism

The room of about 50 students, faculty members and guests was silent as Nathan Rutstein described his personal encounter with racism. "I discovered one day that I had negative racist feelings against people of color," Rutstein said. "Intellectually I knew they were wrong, but the feelings still came. I was ashamed of myself." The event, entitled "Healing Racism in America: A Prescription for the Disease," was held last night in Steinberg-Dietrich Hall. A college educator, author and former network news journalist, Rutstein has devoted himself to studying and combatting racism. He has lectured at numerous universities promoting Institutes for the Healing of Racism, an organization which he founded that now boasts more than 150 chapters nationwide. "I wish I did not have to talk about racism," Rutstein said. "I wish it didn't exist, but it does." Organized by the Global Village and the International Affairs Association, the forum was intended to raise awareness of the misunderstanding of racism and promote integration and cooperation among the diverse University population. "The Global Village is very fortunate to have a famous and experienced speaker share with us his ideas on racism and how we can go about the healing process," said Wharton freshman Neysan Rassekh, the organization's founder and chairperson. Rutstein declared the problem of racism to be "a psychological disorder" and likened it to physical disease. Now that Rutstein has been "liberated from this disease," he said he is able to see things he never saw before. Rutstein insisted that the disease of racism plagues everyone, because "we live in a fundamentally racist society." He added, however, that racism "doesn't make people evil." He admitted that when his parents first came to America, they "bought into American racism -- they realized it is a powerful part of the American collective conscious." "Racism is as American as apple pie," he said. Rutstein recounted the history of American racism, from the first European settlers and the impressions of those they encountered, to present-day personal experiences. He gave details of how Jesuits in Maryland in the late 1600s used slaves to produce offspring to be sold to southern plantations. He described how slaves were made to chant derogatory catechisms with forced enthusiasm for fear of being whipped or deprived of food. "You don't learn this is public school," Rutstein said. "Shooting a slave was like butchering a pig in those days." He quoted the late tennis star Arthur Ashe, who said near the end of his life that "being an African American in America is more difficult to endure than having AIDS." If famous people are tormented by racism, then what must normal people endure in everyday life, Rutstein asked. "I got a glimpse of what it must be like to be an African American in America," he said. "It scared me to death." Rutstein promoted a theory suggesting that everyone in the world was essentially related to everyone else. "There is no such thing as a pure race because it would constitute a separate species," he said. "We are all mixed." Rutstein developed the Institutes for the Healing of Racism under his premise that racism is a disease that needs to be cured. These institutions have two goals -- for participants to struggle against racism while undergoing treatment themselves, and for these healers to be an influential force in their community, promoting the "oneness of humankind." "We need to internalize oneness to promote unity," Rutstein said. He outlined the steps of the healing process. The first is "an understanding of oneness." The second is to gain an understanding of the history of racism and how racism influences society. Healers should then create a forum to promote these ideas in an environment of equality. Finally, they should seek to inspire social action to cure racism. "We are members of one family, and this family has to come together, we are meant to love each other," Rutstein said. "The situation in the U.S. is close to the explosion point." After his 90-minute presentation, students and visitors were invited to dine with Rutstein at Hill College House. "I think, in general, listening to somebody speak about their personal experience with racism brings to light a lot of the issues that I have to deal with," said Engineering freshman Vessal Dini.