DEBRA E. JAMES,
Sir, - The "forced mandatory integration of all schools'" by law that took place in the Southern states of the USA did not require a "policy of forced integration of housing at the same time" (Tom Cooper, July 5th). Black students were bussed to white schools.
I am living proof that it worked: my parents were white supremacists, proud to be racists. Because I attended an integrated high school and associated with black students, I did not acquire my parents' attitudes.
The experience of difference is not the same as being told to respect it. There is ample evidence that racism in the deep South was significantly reduced by the compulsory desegregation of schools and this example should be followed in the whole of Ireland if the authorities are serious about eliminating xenophobia and sectarianism here. - Yours, etc.,
DEBRA E. JAMES, Cummerduff, Gorey, Co Wexford.