Pr Makes A Cozy Cover For Racism

I’ve been trying to work up a head of steam over this Texaco story, trying to give ‘em hell, as the saying goes. But I find I haven’t much hell to give.

You want the truth? This story bores me. I read it and want to curl up on the couch for a nap.

I know it’s serious stuff. Discrimination lawsuit. Texaco officials recorded making indiscreet comments about blacks and Jews. Then Chairman Peter Bijur swings into action. He punishes the guilty, preaches equality, promises investigation. Observers praise his cool handling of a public relations nightmare.

Which is when I begin to nod off.

Because I’ve heard it all before. Revelations of institutional racism all seem to work off the same script, making it difficult to know if a man like Bijur really feels the outrage he professes or is simply practicing artifice for the cameras.

I suspect - perhaps unfairly - the latter. And that makes me miss a singular trait from the old days of institutional racism. The honesty.

Meaning that you knew where you stood with the good ol’ boys. There was no pussyfooting around, no guessing at true intention. They spoke with prideful ignorance the hatreds they felt. I’ll bet Bull Connor, scourge of Birmingham in 1963, couldn’t even spell public relations.

Yet that’s precisely what institutional bigotry has become in the ‘90s. A PR problem. Companies draw up contingency plans just in case: grovel a little, cough up some dough, pronounce yourself cleansed of sin, move on.

It worked for Denny’s, and it’s about to work for Texaco.

You know why? Because we, the people, don’t want to see what we see or know what we know. When a corporate citizen gets caught in the wrong, we are eager and willing to pronounce it an aberration from the prevailing state of grace.

But that state itself is a delusion. The old racists never went away, they simply went out of style, their hatefulness becoming socially unacceptable. Those who would get ahead learned to speak the language of inclusion, to talk the talk of tolerance with honeyed voices and sincere eyes.

“Inequities? What inequities? Surely you’re mistaken. Surely we can explain. Racism? What racism? Why, we are shocked and stunned, sickened and saddened, to learn that such a thing goes on here at Globaltech, Inc., the world’s largest manufacturer of widgets. Discrimination in the workplace will not be tolerated, period.”

You’ve heard that one before, haven’t you? Of course you have; they’ve got it down to a science. Indeed, if institutional America put half as much effort into the walk as the talk, we wouldn’t be having this discussion. But they don’t and we are. And to be an African American walking white corporate corridors is still to find yourself flailing at a half-glimpsed dragon.

You know it’s there - mama didn’t raise no fools - but you never know where. Does the dragon - bigotry - explain the raise you didn’t get or the promotions you missed? Should you work harder, come in earlier, or does that not make a bit of difference?

You’ll never know, because the dragon is wily. Every time you try to grab it and drag it into the light for a look-see, it disappears into the mist of that which is socially acceptable.

And so you walk through your days on guard. More, you walk through expecting your worst fears to be realized.

Not that it matters when they are, not even if CNN itself confirms you. The same old thing still happens: A system that needs an overhaul gets a patch job.

So who cares about Texaco? Tomorrow it’ll be some other corporate giant. And the day after that, still another. Each time, we will react with fresh shock to this aberration while corporate officers offer practiced apologies in sonorous voices.

And no one will say what needs to be said - often and loudly. That it’s not just this company over here or that one over there. It’s companies, period. It’s black employees who find fewer opportunities for advancement, lower pay for equal work and an environment that is hostile by design to people like them.

It’s the dragon. No one sees it, but everyone knows it’s there.

xxxx