Rainbow/PUSH Wall Street Conference to Feature Session on Culture, Race and
Violence in Sports

Was the brawl between the Detroit Piston and the Indianapolis Pacers an anomaly or a sign of the times? That is one of the questions that will be asked and hopefully answered during a featured session during the Rainbow/PUSH Wall Street Project Annual Conference, January 11-13, 2005 The Rainbow/PUSH Wall Street Project Annual Conference will be held January 11-13, 2005 at the Hilton Hotel and Towers, Sixth Avenue and 53rd Street. The conference theme, "Beyond Diversity, Equity and Parity:" A New Covenant," reflects continuing efforts to promote economic cooperation and expansion.

The session called "Culture, Race and Violence in Sports" will take place January 13 from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. Invited participants include former NBA player Charles Barkley, author Michael Eric Dyson, New York Knicks President Isiah Thomas, and former National Basketball Players Association Executive Director Charles Grantham.

"We, as a society, must take a look at recent violence at sporting events and the culture and times that have produced them," said Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. "People go to sporting events to escape the violence that permeates the world. It is incomprehensible that people pay to escape violence only be caught up in more violence. We must look at the root causes."

For a complete updated schedule of the entire Wall Street Project Conference please visit our website.

The Wall Street Project is the outgrowth of Rev. Jackson's nearly 40 years of work in increasing economic opportunities for minorities. Rev. Jackson has long maintained that access to capital is the fourth stage of the civil rights movement, after the abolition of slavery, the end of legal segregation and the right to vote.

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