Psychologist Says State And Federal Budget Cuts May Reflect New Forms of Racism

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- "Modern racism" may in some cases be behind proposed cuts in social and education programs at the federal and state levels, according to a clinical associate professor of psychology at the University at Buffalo.

Charles Behling defines "modern racism" as a set of repressed and conflicting attitudes about race that allows some individuals to believe that they want the best for economically disadvantaged minorities (toward whom they may or may not harbor unconscious prejudices) while at the same time supporting social policies that are ruinous to them.

"This kind of racism is genuinely unrecognized by afflicted persons," he says. "It is nevertheless extremely destructive to social justice and progress."

Behling says that as a group, modern racists may act out their repressed negative feelings about minorities by attacking the efficacy or cost of programs that help them. They demonize individuals, he says, by accusing them of lacking "personal responsibility." And, he says, regardless of the actual consequences of these policies, the policymakers believe that they are both justified and non-racist.

Behling points out that some psychologists believe that modern forms of racism developed in the United States after the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and Œ60s. This racism is fueled by a tendency for human beings to erase shameful attitudes from their awareness, even when behaving in ways induced by those attitudes.

He discusses these theories in new graduate and undergraduate courses he developed at UB, where he directs undergraduate programs in psychology.

"Where once it was common for many white Americans to talk in unabashedly racist terms," he says, "today most enlightened persons not only wouldn't defend racial inequity, they would express sincere objections to it. Enlightened white Americans have learned many genuinely democratic attitudes toward race.

"On the other hand, we also have learned and retained all the old stereotypes, fears, ignorances and aversions that produce racism," he added. "So we have two sets of attitudes -- one democratic and one racist -- at war within us."

We don't want to have the racist attitudes we've learned, and we're ashamed of them. Rather than confronting them honestly and controlling them, however, Behling says we may push them below our level of awareness.

"By keeping ourselves unaware of our biases," he says, "we continue to benefit from the oppression of others without confronting the shame of our bigotry and the institutionalized racism that nurtures it."

Behling says the result is that we really don't see our own racism anymore and we become outraged when someone points it out. We continue to think that we're being fair, even when the evidence -- that is, the outcome for the affected groups -- strongly points in another direction.

He thinks that this may be one reason that current proposals to eliminate programs for the economically disadvantaged are couched in language that suggests that the budget reductions will actually benefit their victims.

"We talk of 'breaking dependence' rather than acknowledging our prejudice and guilt toward persons who are poor and suffering in this society," Behling argues.

Another example, the psychologist says, may be the proposed elimination from New York State's 1995-96 budget of funding for the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP), one of the most successful college programs in the country for educating economically and educationally disadvantaged students.

Behling points to social psychologists Thomas Pettigrew of the University of California, Santa Cruz; John Dovidio of Colgate University, and Samuel Gaertner of the University of Delaware as just a few of the scholars who have researched "new forms" of racism to explain racist policies and behavior that persist, despite overt attitude changes.

In a speech given at the University at Buffalo, Pettigrew cited the following characteristics of modern racism: 1) emphatic denial of one's own prejudice and discrimination; 2) compliance in formal terms with post-Civil Rights Movement norms; 3) ambivalence toward African Americans fed by little contact with them, and 4) extreme conceptions of individual opportunity.

"As a white man, there are messages in the theory of modern racism for me," says Behling. "One is that I shouldn't trust my labeling of myself because I and people like me will try to believe the very best about ourselves. We must look instead at our behavior and its consequences for those we claim we want to help."