THAT GATHERING at the Apollo Theatre a couple of Saturdays ago was not about the widow of Malcolm X reconciling with Louis Farrakhan, the man she believes at least partly responsible for her husband's death. And it was most assuredly not about the unification of all of us black Americans who supposedly have been divided into competing Shabazz and Farrakhan camps. But, then, it's typical of the news media to miss the story when it comes to blacks and it's typical of activists to manipulate the media's stupidity.

"It was an extraordinary sight," a CNN correspondent breathlessly reported. Well, excuse me, but I seem to recall Shabazz and Farrakhan meeting, with almost as much cordiality, at a well-publicized leadership summit in Baltimore last June. How quickly we forget! Hundreds packed the Apollo, and thousands more apparently watched via satellite broadcast. They were waiting, waiting, waiting. . . . Well, by the time Farrakhan walked over to Shabazz and shook her hand several hours into the rally, the audience had been primed to see something that did not happen what a Washington Post correspondent described as "a bid to end one of the oldest and deepest rifts in the black community."

The Amsterdam News trumpeted "SOLIDARITY REIGNS!" and "Min. Farrakhan and Betty Shabazz restore unity to African-Americans." At the risk of giving away state secrets, I've got to say that just ain't so. The relationship between Betty Shabazz and Louis Farrakhan is just about as big a deal among black folks as the rift between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois. In other words, it's not exactly at the top of anyone's list of everyday concerns. We should not delude ourselves: Black America is no more united today than it was last month or last year or 130 years ago, when freedmen held state and national conventions to develop a common agenda for advancing the black cause. One might even say that blacks are less united today than we were 50 years ago, when there was some consensus about seeking basic civil rights.

We are no more united than we were in 1972, when thousands gathered in Gary, Ind., for the National Black Political Convention. And we are certainly no more united than we were after Benjamin Chavis' first Baltimore summit, where he told a gullible press corps: "There is going to be dancing in the streets of black America because we have defied the forces that want to divide us." Or after his second summit, held the day after he was fired as executive director of the NAACP. "This is unity time," he said.

Don't fear differences

The dream of unity dies hard. But even as skin color may bind us, economics, education and lifestyle become points of divergence. We shouldn't be afraid of that. Nor should we fret that all of us aren't marching toward a single goal in lockstep behind a single leader, whether that leader is Farrakhan or Chavis or Myrlie Evers-Williams, who sounded the unity theme last weekend at her inauguration as the NAACP's new chairwoman.

Back at the Apollo, Betty Shabazz seemed to want to be anywhere but there. But she was there because of her daughter Qubilah, who had been involved in a plot to kill Farrakhan. Caught on tape, Qubilah had referred to him as "a slimy pig." While the case was settled out of court, Betty Shabazz and her advisers feared that one of Farrakhan's followers might retaliate against the family. They remembered the violence that followed Malcolm X' death as various Muslim factions sought to settle the score. What better way to stave off any zealots who might want to harm Qubilah than to have a love-in with Farrakhan as keynote speaker, pledging his support for the entire Shabazz family?

"I would like to thank Mr. Louis Farrakhan you know him as Minister Farrakhan," she said rather coolly before thanking him for his "gentle words of assurance" after her daughter's arrest. For Betty Shabazz, it was not unity day or reconciliation day or forgiveness day. It was Mother's Day.