Alex Haley's son says racism still pervasive in U.S.

It's been 30 years since Alex Haley's "Roots" became the top-rated television event of its time, drawing 130 million Americans' eyes to racial issues and enticing African-Americans to uncover their own complex genealogical histories.

But racially, according to Haley's son, little has changed since the author shared his story of African-born Kunta Kinte, his daughter, Kizzie, and her son, Chicken George -- the first freed slave in Haley's family.

"There has been a change as far as what 'Roots' did," said William Alexan der Haley, the chief operations officer of Carolina Pinnacle Studios in Yanceyville, N.C. "It changed the impression of people about how the African-American people came through that period. They had values, they had a culture, and both black and white people identified with that culture."

Despite the attention paid to African-American life and cultural history, racial bias is still one of America's most pressing issues, and both blacks and whites are responsible, William Haley said in a phone interview from his home in North Carolina.

"There's that impression, that feeling, that idea that it's now ended. But show me a place in America today where a black man can go and not be discriminated against," he said. "And what's sad about it is that blacks by and large accommodate that behavior.