Students’ Dismay Over Riot Surfaces : Conference: For six hours, Valley middle-school students vent their feelings over issues underscored during the recent unrest.

When San Fernando Valley teen-agers gathered Wednesday to discuss racial and ethnic relations, nervous conference organizers feared they wouldn’t be able to get them to open up.

But it soon became obvious that the students wouldn’t keep quiet--even when they were supposed to. In the wake of the Los Angeles riots that followed the verdicts in the Rodney G. King beating case, the 100 or so middle-school students let loose a torrent of anger and dismay that no one expected.

For six hours, the students talked, listened, argued and pleaded for understanding about subjects their parents and teachers often avoid--subjects such as racial rifts among blacks, whites and Asians and other issues that were underscored during the recent civil unrest.

“The verdict was wrong, but so was taking a white person out of a car and beating the living crap out of them,” Aleanthea Cooks, 16, of Fulton Middle School in Van Nuys, told the crowded roomful of students. “This hurts all of us. If you all take a pin and stick it in your arm, the same blood is going to come out.”

Many of the students said they had always felt pain after being discriminated against, or embarrassment at harboring prejudices against others. But all of those feelings came rushing to the surface in the wake of the rioting, looting and arson that rocked the city three weeks ago.

Even during an early intermission, when they were told to relax, two dozen participants exchanged heated views about the civil unrest, and who started it and why. Some asked how they could possibly look at the world the same way again. And others responded that they never could.

“If we don’t break through the wall of discrimination and stop hating each other, one day this state is going to be a war zone,” said Esmeralda Flanagan, 13, of Mulholland Middle School in Van Nuys.

The Human Relations Conference was held at the Los Angeles Police Academy, where the gunfire of police target shooters could be heard. It had been planned months before the riots, but the unrest added a sense of urgency and purpose for the many human relations experts present, and gave the students a way to open themselves up in a way that most said they never have before.

“Many of these kids are emotionally distraught,” said Ken Castro, director of development for the San Fernando Valley Interfaith Council, which organized the conference. “They need answers, and this seems to be a catharsis for them, a chance to show they can work together.”

It also gave them a chance to meet Willie L. Williams, incoming Los Angeles police chief.

After working the crowd, Williams asked the students to go back to their schools and spread racial harmony and understanding--and keep their friends away from gangs and drugs.

Then came the questions.

“How do you feel about the rioting?” asked Tiffoney Pipersburg. “Was taking the National Guard out right, and is the city safe?” another queried. And 13-year-old Carmen Parada of North Hollywood asked, “What are you going to do to help?”

Williams recommended seizing the opportunity, which many of the students later vowed to do.

“What we need to do now is take a horrible, ugly, disturbing process and learn some lessons from it,” Williams said.

Those words--horrible, ugly and disturbing--were used often by students too, not just to describe the riots, but the police beating of Rodney G. King that helped set them off.

Cooks said she was “hurt” when she saw other blacks rioting and looting. She feared it would perpetuate negative stereotypes. Kristy Torres, 15, who attends school in Reseda, said she was embarrassed when her Latino friends broke into a store and stole guns.

And Karen Morse, 11, said she was sickened by the whole thing. “This isn’t about Rodney King,” she told the group. “That was wrong. But is it right to go out and act like animals?”

While the students talked in one room, their teachers and parents did the same in another.

“People don’t realize how multiracial the Valley is,” said Rhonda Mitchell, dean of students at Byrd Middle School in Sun Valley. “There are a lot of problems here.”

Indeed, students of every race and ethnic background were present. Many said they had felt the sting of discrimination long before the riots.

For Jesus Ortiz, it comes every time he walks down the street. “People see me, and automatically they think I’m a gangster,” said Ortiz, 14, of Sepulveda Middle School in North Hills.

When Tina Sek sits down at lunch, the Cambodian native said, she still gets laughed at. “They call me names,” she said. “They make fun of me.”

When asked if anyone had suffered physical punishment because of their race, a bashful Kenya Smoke slowly raised his hand. “Being black--sometimes it’s not easy,” he said, fidgeting in his chair. “People treat you differently.”

There were students who admitted having bigoted parents and friends, and some said they now realize some of the feelings had rubbed off on them. In a moment of rage several years ago, Tiffoney Pipersburg said she hated all Mexicans and whites.

“I now know that isn’t true,” she told her fellow students. “I really wish I hadn’t said that.”

Prodded by teachers and Interfaith Council members, the students spent hours confronting themselves and the issues of prejudice and bias. It made some of them uncomfortable. But by the end, the talk had shifted to what to do next.

The participants were asked to come up with ways to spread the message of racial and ethnic understanding to their fellow students and parents. Carmen Parada, the girl who challenged incoming chief Williams, plans to get started right away.

“I promise to go back and make a difference,” she said. “I promise to talk to people and make them wipe prejudice from their heads, to forget what happened and start from the beginning.”