A nationalistic orientation does not necessarily involve radical approaches to problems, however. Often it helps in defining goals, and in avoiding what many Negroes consider to be defeatist attitudes. This statement, made by the student who proposed the plan above, is a good example:

"Roxbury Negroes, the people who go to BAG [Boston Action Group] meetings are not for integration. They're identity-conscious. If they could get as good or better education without whites in the school, they would prefer it. I think it contributes to the myth of white superiority to say you can't get a good education without having whites going to school with you. It's just that you can't get the white officials to improve the schools cnless there are whites attending them."

Many young Negroes in the civil rights movement are frustrated with Martin Luther King's patience and Roy Wilkin's caution, and nationalism is not necessarily the reason for similar feelings among Negroes at Harvard. But nationalism is certainly evident in such statements as "The blacks have to be able to run their organizations--why is the president of NAACP white?"

And it is present, too, in the recent attempts of William Stickland '58, head of the Northern Student Movement, to bar white volunteers from work in the ghettos--an attempt with which many Harvard Negroes are in essential sympathy.

Harvard Negroes talk very little of brotherhood; they speak in terms of color. For some the central fact of their existence seems to be not their humanity but their blackness. They are losing their faith in the good will of whites, even in the existence of altruism. Some consider that "a polarization of blacks and whites is coming--and is necessary."

"Good vs. Bad"

Although few are thoroughly pessimistic, many are "realistic." They find the naivete of most white students amusing at best: "Liberals at Harvard tend to think in terms of good vs. bad. Every Negro at Harvard thinks in terms of power." And those who avoid such statements do so not because they disagree, but, generally, "because they think the whole thing is so futile."

Most of those who do not belong to AAAAS reportedly stay out for the same reason, and not because they disapprove. (Just as many spurn civil rights groups because they are "disillusioned," and not because they are satisfied with the rate of social change.)

Even the most ardent black nationalists at Harvard deny that they are racists. As one active member of AAAAS put it, "I will stand on the firing line with anyone who will stand on the firing line with me." But again, few believe that any white person really will stand on the firing line. And if he will, they distrust his motives. Whites, they say, are attracted to the civil rights movement because they feel guilty, and will leave when that sense of guilt is alleviated.

This distrust of white motives is behind statements like that of the Negro at the House seminar. What he was saying, in part, was that whites have no real stake in the movement, and so will not go beyond the "obviously moral" methods of non-violent protest. But there was more to his statement. There was also a deep-seated suspicion of paternalism on the part of many white volunteers.

At another time this particular student described what he called the "white liberal syndrome." Many white liberals, he said, tend to suggest academic solutions to complex problems, and so make the Negroes they are working with, who feel the problems more acutely, feel inferior. They also have a tendency, he said, to see Negroes not as people, but as problems. And he suggested that some enter the movement because "they cannot come to grips with white society. They go where their color makes them naturally superior."

Emotional Basis

The desire to be left alone with one's problems is the reason for the AAAAS membership clause. Originally the Association wanted to specify that only blacks would be admitted, but the University refused to officially recognize the group on those terms. The by-invitation-only clause that was eventually substituted allows the Association to discriminate against whites just as do the final clubs against Negroes.

White students have occasionally indicated interest in attending AAAAS meetings. A standard response is that the personal and particular difficulties of Negroes are under discussion and that whites would be in the way. To most members this seems a reasonable answer--and perhaps it is. But it does reveal the emotional basis of black nationalism at Harvard. The AAAAS was formed, whether or not rightly so, for more than intellectual reasons. One member explained it by quoting James Badwin: "I'm not just interested. I'm hung up."

Like the white undergraduates who argue on the basis of their own feelings, Harvard Negroes have embraced nationalism not because they think it is necessarily right, not because they think it is good policy, but because it is emotionally satisfying. "When Malcolm X cusses out white people you feel relieved. You can identify with him."