Well, I dont have it in front of me, but I'm pretty sure that criticizing an entire group of people based on the actions of a few people in that group IS the textbook definition of bigotry.
FACING FACTS
Ellis Cose
A New Mission for the NAACP
The youngest president in association history leads at a time when many question the body's very necessity.
Published Feb 21, 2009
From the magazine issue dated Mar 2, 2009
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This February the NAACP marked its 100th anniversary. The venerable organization was on the front lines of some of the most important human-rights battles of the 20th century. But "venerable" is often a polite word for "passé." During the past several years, there have been times when even supporters have questioned the NAACP's role in the modern world.
The organization barely limped through the early 1990s after the board dismissed CEO Ben Chavis for improperly using NAACP funds to settle a sexual-harassment suit. Former congressman Kweisi Mfume nursed the NAACP back to financial health. Bruce Gordon was supposed to reenergize it. But instead of reinvigorating the association, it wore him down: the former Verizon executive resigned in 2007, less than two years into the job.
Benjamin Jealous, 36, named to the top job last May, is the youngest NAACP CEO ever. And he has taken over at a time when some Americans question the need for not just the NAACP but for all the civil-rights groups that came of age when blacks were denied the vote, lynching was commonplace and segregation was the proud cause of the South. This, of course, is a new day, with an African-American president who embodies the dream of the civil-rights generation (even if he may not share its preoccupations). "We're in completely new territory," Jealous told me recently.
With Jealous, the NAACP is also in completely new territory. He is the first post–baby boomer to head the association, and hopes his more activist bent will appeal to a much-needed new generation of supporters. Like Barack Obama, Jealous is an Ivy League graduate who began his career in community organizing. He also is biracial. Jealous's father, Fred, hailed from a prominent New England family that traced back its American roots to before the Revolution. Fred's decision to marry a black woman created a family scandal. "My father was disowned," says Jealous.
His parents, who met as graduate students at Antioch University, were steeped in the social movements of the times: "Mom desegregated her high school [in Baltimore] at age 14 … and she would spend her summers desegregating lunch counters in southern Virginia." His father was arrested at an antisegregation sit-in. "He was the only white guy in jail with a bunch of black activists," says Jealous. "As a child, he would take me to protests. He registered me as a conscientious objector at age 5."
Jealous grew up in Monterey, Calif., and came east to Columbia University. The draw was Jack Greenberg, then the undergraduate dean. A former head of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Greenberg had argued numerous cases before the Supreme Court, including Brown v. Board of Education. Jealous worshiped Greenberg, who arranged a work-study job for him at the NAACP-LDF. Jealous planned to become a lawyer and follow in Greenberg's footsteps. "And then Jack kicked me out of college for protests," recalls Jealous.
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