CAR Protesters Attack Alleged Harvard Racism

Firing what one member called "the opening shot in a spring campaign against racism," forty members of the Boston and Harvard chapters of the Committee Against Racism (CAR) demonstrated at Holyoke Center Saturday afternoon.

The group staged the demonstration to voice opposition to the University's involvement with "racist policies" and to gain more support for CAR, Nancy Bancroft '63, Harvard CAR leader, said Saturday.

Members assembled to protest the "racist sociobiological statements of Harvard professors like Herrnstein, James Q. and E.O. Wilson, Glazer and Bernard" Davis, who assert that the poor and minorities are culturally and genetically inferior," Steven Rosenthal, Boston CAR organizer, said in a speech Saturday.

Rosenthal also attacked Harvard's investments in multinational companies such as IBM, AT&T, and Exxon, which have holdings in South Africa. Association with that country's apartheid system "will encourage racist doctrines and the stifling of affirmative action at Harvard," Rosenthal said.

The demonstration, which began in Holyoke Center at 11 a.m., culminated in what its organizers called "a walking tour of racism at Harvard." Leaders pointed out buildings where allegedly racist professors teach, and led the crowd in chanting slogans like "Asian, Latin, Black and White, against racism we'll unite."

Several students at the demonstration said they think student apathy will hamper CAR's future efforts. "The students here are more interested in power than revolution," Scott Blumberg '79 said Saturday.

Bancroft expressed optimism however. "I've learned that these things always start small. Sure, it's not the same as in the '60s, but people are still concerned and warm to our issues," she said.