Violence Next Door

This is a preliminary report on a study of white reactions to the Watts Riots of August 1965, based on a sample of 583 respondents from six Los Angeles communities. A wide variety of indices of antagonism toward Negroes was related to values and to amount and kind of contact with Negroes. Findings are presented showing that egoism is related to high antagonism, altruism to low antagonism; that lack of intimate social contact with Negroes is related to high antagonism; that the combined effect of egoism and lack of contact is the best predictor of antagonism, as measured by social distance. All these relationships hold when controlled for occupation, education and age. T his is a preliminary report of some of the findings from a study of white reactions to the disturbances which took place in Watts in August 1965. The interviews were carried out in six Los Angeles communities, chosen to represent all-white and integrated areas at three socioeconomic levels.1 The in* Revision of a paper read at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, September 1966. 1 Socioeconomic status was indexed by occupation, education and income based on 1960 census figures according to a system devised by Marchia Meeker and Joan R. Harris, Background for Planning, 1963 (Los Angeles: Research Department, Welfare Planning Council, 1964), pp. 80-84. The same source was used to determine the degree of integration, i.e., the percentage of Negroes and whites. The three integrated communities had between ten percent and 29 percent Negroes, and less than ten percent Spanish-American. The three all-white communities had less than five percent Negroes, and less than ten percent Spanish-American. The ten to 29 percent 1960 census proportion of Negroes in the integrated communities actually represents 40 percent to 60 percent Negroes at the present time due to the fact that there has been a steady inflow of Negroes into the three communities since 1960. Within each community, 12 random starting blocks were chosen from census block lists. Interviews began at a specified point on the starting block and continued around that block and five specified continuation blocks until the quota for that area was completed. (For each quota of eight interviews there was one male age 20-24, two males age 24-54, one male 55 and over. The four This content downloaded from 207.46.13.124 on Sun, 11 Sep 2016 05:01:38 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms VIOLENCE NEXT DOOR 353 terviewing period lasted fromn November 1965, until early February 1966, and resulted in the collection of 583 usable schedules. One of the very interesting things about a rebellion of this magnitude and duration was that it did not erupt into a full-scale race riot with the white and Negro community equally involved in the destruction of life and property. The white community in the main did not involve itself or take direct action. Despite the fact that there was a considerable amount of fear aroused in the whites (23 percent said they felt "a great deal of fear" for themselves and their family's safety during the time of the disturbance, and 32 percent more said they felt some fear), and that a sizeable proportion (57%) approved of white people buying guns to protect themselves or actually considered using them (20%), only a very small proportion actually bought firearms or ammunition (5%) or already had them (7%). As far as can be determined, most, if not all, the Negroes killed or wounded during the period were fired upon by police or soldiers, or hit by stray bullets. It is important to understand this low incidence of violence on the part of a fearful, aroused majority. WHITE REACTIONS TO THE REBELLION First of all, our study shows that large numbers of whites were in some degree sympathetic to the rebellion. The answers to questions asking for perceived causes of the rebellion and possible ways to prevent further disturbances were coded as sympathetic, neutral or antagonistic. About a third of our sample spoke of the causes of the disturbance in sympathetic terms ("unfair treatment of Negroes," "a history of injustices," etc.), another third were neutral in their assignment of cause ("the heat," "just blew up," "any spark could set it off," etc.) and a final third were antagonistic ("trouble-makers," "gangsters," "communists," etc.). Almost half the respondents felt that improvement of Negro living conditions and the reduction of prejudice were the best ways to prevent further outbreaks, while only one in five recommended punitive or more restrictive measures. In response to another question on the effects of the outbreak, about a third of the sample felt that whites in general were more sympathetic to Negro problems since the disturbance, another third thought whites were less sympathetic, and a final third thought there was no change. Despite, or perhaps because of this sympathy with the causes and nature of the rebellion, the majority of whites felt it would have a bad effect upon the Negro cause and upon Negrowhite relations. Some 70 percent felt the outbreak would increase the gap between the races while 13 percent thought it would decrease the gap. Seventy-four percent thought the rebellion hurt the Negro's cause, while 19 percent felt that it helped. In this paper we will attempt to discover what lies behind these unexpectedly sympathetic albeit pessimistic, perceptions of the nature and results of the rebellion. ANTAGONISM TOWARD NEGROES It was our hypothesis that perceptions of the rebellion, its nature, causes, and outcomes, were strongly influenced by the general feeling of antagonism or sympathy toward Negroes in everyday social situations. Antagonism is defined as a set of attitudes toward a particular group involving sentiments such as avoidance, incompatibility, opposition, mistrust, dislike or hatred. The concept includes stereotyping and prejudice to the extent that they are expressions of negative attitudes, but its meaning is not limited to distorted or fixed perceptions.2 females had the same age quotas. There were no call-backs.) The sampling technique was developed in consultation with Professor Gene N. Levine at U.C.L.A. and approximates the NORC block-sampling technique. See also Frederick F. Stephan and Phillip J. McCarthy, Sarnpling Opinions (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1963), pp. 195-198. 2 For example, Simpson and Yinger define prejudice as an "emotional" rigid attitude (a predisposition to respond to a certain stimulus in a certain way) toward a group of people . . . Prejudices are thus attitudes, but not all attitudes are prejudices," George E. Simpson and J. Milton Yinger, Racial a;d Cultural Mintorities (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), p. 10. When speaking of antagonism, we include prejudice in Simpson and Yinger's sense; we also include the whole range of negative attitudes toward other groups such as stereotypes, certain biological theories of racial inferiority, dislike, distrust, This content downloaded from 207.46.13.124 on Sun, 11 Sep 2016 05:01:38 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms