During one of his first days at Penn State, Lawrence Young, director of the Paul Robeson Cultural Center, entered a downtown store to apply for a credit card. As part of the registration, Young told the store's clerk he was an employee of the University.

"The clerk responded, 'Oh, what do you do for Penn State? Are you a janitor?'

"The person had no idea how much I wanted to burn the store down to the ground," Young said.

Young spoke about this personal encounter and the problem of racism in general at a panel discussion sponsored by the Undergraduate Student Government Feb. 23 in the HUB Fishbowl. The panel was intended to better define the white community's role in combating racism in light of recent protests by black students.

The panelists included Young, Gloria Hampton, co-director of the USG's Political Action Committee, Robert Corrington, assistant professor of philosophy, and USG Executive Assistant Travis Parchman.

Hampton, who participated in some of the recent protests against racial incidents on campus and downtown, said she wanted to answer questions the white community might have as a result of those protests.

Early in the morning of Feb. 12, five black women were reportedly accosted by 10 white males. Racial flyers deriding USG President Seth Williams were also found both on and off campus Feb. 13.

Hampton said many white students have asked her why the black students felt the need to protest. The black community did not take the decision to protest lightly, she added.

"We protested because we had to, although I'm resentful that we must," she said. "I didn't come here to protest; I came here to get an education."

Hampton said the black protesters hoped to make the white community aware of what black students and community members experience daily.

"Don't be reactionary to our protests. It's important for individuals to make an everyday effort to end racism by talking to a member of our community, do some reading or sign-up for a black studies course," she said.

Black people encounter "passive racism" daily, Young said, adding that this type of racism does not involve overt racist actions.

Passive racism is not an individual's conscious reaction, but rather the product of the engines of society, he said.

"What does the average student of today value?" Young asked. "Getting a high paying job, a BMW and a condo."

In a society with such values, Young added, people are reluctant to change the wrongs and would rather reap the rewards of the system.

"They ignore the hypocrisies," he added.

Because these values are ingrained within the society, an individual must pursue an unlearning process to dispell passive racism, Young said. A person is not born a racist, he said.

Director of Religious Affairs Thomas Poole and former co-director of USG Department of Women's Concerns Julie Parr were originally scheduled to be panelists but were unable to attend due to unexpected conflicts.