The Inert Affects of Legal Education
According to a new book to be published by the ABA — Visible Invisibility: Women of Color in Law Firms — an axiom of progressive thought is erroneous: education does not affect negative stereotypes. Well educated attorneys, according to the book, are as racist and as sexist as high school drop-outs — perhaps more so.
The book is based on research by the ABA Commission on Women in the Profession and on surveys and focus group analyses by the University of Chicago’s National Opinion Research Center.
Among the most notable of the book’s many statistics is this: four out of five women attorneys of color (to use the ABA’s oblique phraseology) leave those large law firms that advertise their strong Commitment to Diversity within five years because of the professional bigotry they find at those firms.
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I don’t think the axiom is mistaken. I believe that a well educated person can see right through stereotypes (either negative or positive) and see individuals for who they are — unique individuals. But I don’t know that Harvard Law School produces well educated people. According to this new book, it doesn’t. Graduates may leave there book-smart, but they maintain the impression that colored women just can’t be intelligent and articulate, creative and resourceful. They certainly can’t be expected to handle significant responsibilities.
So . . . here’s an idea for the partners at major law firms to consider. Rather than have a law student whose last name is Winthrop III spend the summer doing document review or legal research at the firm, have that student spend the summer busing tables at a restaurant in Harlem or a coffee shop in Oakland. Make sure he gets the real-life experiences you say he’ll need to be successful in an increasingly diverse society.
And forget about wasting time on diversity seminars and retreats. This book says they don’t work, and that’s no surprise. You can’t expect a medical student to learn how to perform open-heart surgery by attending a lecture on the subject, and you can’t expect someone whom Winthrop III thinks is beneath him to alter his basic beliefs by expounding on hers.