lecture with Phil Hutchings

This week, we had a special guest, Phil Hutchings, visit our class and talk about his experiences in the civil rights movement. Here are some points from his talk:

-that the Nixon of the 60's was more 'left' than the Clinton of the 90's...

-that people see news as fact, and tend to act on it (example...the media portrayal of racial tensions between Koreans and Blacks around the time of the Rodney King beating, and how both groups acted on that portrayal, e.g. spread of racial violence to other cities)

-that there was a fundamental shift in the civil rights movement in the mid-60's. Up until the early 60's, both the government and the press were viewed as part of the solution in bringing about change. But this changed in the mid-60's, when the government and the press became seen as more part of the problem than the solution. It's important to note that the government and the press are linked here, not seperate, which says something important about their relationship...

-that black acceptance/inclusion into the Democratic party (1964 campaign) came with certain conditions, or pre-requisites (e.g. that blacks be college educated, light-skinned, middle-class, express upward mobility, loyal to party policy (e.g. pro-Vietnam))

-early SNCC received a lot of funding from white liberals, which necessarliy placed constraints on what they could and could not do; this produced a kind of schizophrenic relationship between the politics and the fund-raising base of the movement

-in its later years, SNCC was put into the position of having to use the white corporate media to reach the black community, an inherently ironic and flawed endeavor

-that regarding social movements, there has been a shift away from mass organizing, grassroots/community style, to more of an event-driven s.m. environment (linked to the rise of NGO/NPO's, the labor-intensive nature of g-r approach (hard work, no pay), increased negativity and apathy in populace ?)

-that today's problem is how to create a sense of 'community' in an urban setting

-that an important goal of a social movement is to bring people out of isolation and into a community (Tom Haden)