This Post Has 13 Comments

1. 

   Bill Heath June 23, 2021 Reply

   I believe I would enjoy reading Andrew Sullivan. I haven’t wittingly done so to date, and suspect I’m missing out. He is correct IMO, don’t ban CRT. Shine a spotlight on it so that its character is seen and judged by all. It’s the way Hillarycare was dispatched in the mid-1990s; the more people knew about it, the more they opposed it. The same thing happened with the ACA. The problem was never with people opposing healthcare for the needy, or not understanding the benefits. It was rejection of the specifics. The more people knew about specifics, the less they supported the plans.

   The same holds for Critical Race Theory. I learned in elementary school about slavery and the difficult plight of blacks in America, in a segregated school. I learned in high school and college the evils of Jim Crow and the burden placed on black Americans, in partially-integrated schools. Mostly, I learned by marching against segregation.

   Looks like it’s time to break out the old anti-segregation banners. I can’t march, but my wheelchair rolls nicely. Won’t that be a great visual, siccing the dogs on a man in a wheel chair.

2. 

   Erich Vieth June 26, 2021 Reply

   The claim that CRT is simply an effort to “teach history” is rapidly morphing into cheap signaling by many on the far left. They know that most of us want schools to vigorously teach history, including the sad history of the U.S. pertaining to racism and slavery. But they claim otherwise, in a coordinated lie that is as bold as the claim by the mid and far right that Trump won the most recent election. Here’s the lie, as well as links showing how widespread the lie is. https://www.nationalreview.com/the-weekend-jolt/resetting-the-honesty-meter-in-the-critical-race-theory-debate/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20210626_Weekend_Jolt&utm_term=Jolt-Smart

   This article sets forth many overlapping approaches for defining Critical Race theory. This post shows where is has been taught, based on many sources of evidence. https://dangerousintersection.org/2021/06/20/but-where-is-critical-race-theory-actually-being-taught/

3. 

   Erich Vieth July 25, 2021 Reply

   John McWhorter joins Firing Line’s Margaret Hoover on PBS to discuss “Critical Race Theory.”

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2UORLoCAZI

4. 

   Erich Vieth August 6, 2021 Reply

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wplt3RpyKoc&t=1465s

   I created a transcript from a portion of the above discussion between Glenn Loury and John McWhorter:
   
   John McWhorter
   
   One of the stupidest debates I’ve ever seen in my time watching these things is happening right now where critical race theory refers to certain weird, but interesting articles written 40 and 30 and 35 years ago, that argue for a recasting of what we think of as Justice on the basis of what it means to be non white or non various other things in this country. All of it is, you know, it’s kind of deconstruction meets legal theory and nothing wrong with it, and fine.
   
   Glenn Loury: The writings of the Derrick Bells of the world and the Kimberley Crenshaws.
   
   John McWhorter;
   
   It used to be that you had only heard of it if you were people like us. And now critical race theory. And you know, it’s an acronymed to CRT–I never thought that would happen–now, is something that is in the schools. And it has to do with you know, putting the white kids on one side of the room and the black kids on the other and teaching certain lessons. And in a teaching that white is wrong, teaching that black is to not be precise. Teaching that whites are the oppressors. Teaching black kids to start being wary of their victimhood early on. This is happening across the country in many classrooms to varying extents, but it’s there. That’s referred to as “critical race theory” too because the people who promulgate this educational philosophy call themselves inheriting basic principles of critical race theory, which says among other things, that, for example, black people, our narrative as victims of white oppression, is what defines us and is more important than the details of individual stories such as success stories, and the like. So all of this balkanization of white from black in particular, it traces to those writings, even though Kimberly Crenshaw and Derrick Bell, were not thinking about what you do to six and seven year olds in the classroom. It was a different time. They were different people. They weren’t classroom pedagogues.
   
   But still, critical race theory infected ideas are now being put into operation in whole schools–I’ve been writing about this on Substack–turning upside down and being made these anti-racist academies, where work by for example, Robin D’Angelo and Ibrahm Kendi is put forth as basic texts. And a great many people find something wrong with what’s happening in the schools, including some legislators who don’t know a whole lot about legal theory, big surprise, don’t know a whole lot about educational philosophy, big surprise, they’re professional politicians. That’s what they know about. These bills that are saying no teaching critical race theory in the schools. And this is where the dumb stuff comes in. There’s this whole stream of people who are saying, You can’t say that you don’t want critical race theory in the schools because nobody’s teaching Richard Delgado and Kimberly Crenshaw in fifth grade, which is just such a debate team nonsense tactic. Or more people are saying, because critical race theory is calling attention to the basic racist nature of our society–and you can say that that is there–the issue is its extent but there. Because critical race theory is teaching America to be honest about itself, if you don’t want critical race theory to be taught in schools, what you’re saying is you don’t want anybody to be taught about racism. You don’t want them to be taught about slavery. You don’t want them to learn about Sojourner Truth. And no one has said that or, if anything from what I know, one of the state’s bills clumsily written could be interpreted as saying that, but that’s not what anybody means.
   
   It’s clear. And yet, mobile, people are arguing all over the place that if you say you don’t want these anti racist Academy philosophies in a classroom that your child is in, what you’re saying is that you want American history to be taught the way it was in 1925. With a waving flag, slavery not mentioned and everything is just fine and hunky dory. That is utter smoking hot bullshit. And yet, there’s this whole debate going on now, where the left avoids acknowledging what’s going on in these classrooms. They won’t admit that all of these news reports tell us something. Whereas frankly, if there were two news reports of a black boy being shot by the cops, that would be considered an indictment of our whole national fabric and reflecting things going on in 50 states 24 hours a day. It is the most frustrating dialogue, because no one knows what they’re talking about.
   
   Glenn Loury:
   
   I’m just gonna say they’re intellectually dishonest. They’re lying. I think they know they’re lying. I think they know A) who are they? They are the left. They are the activist anti-racist pedagogues in the schools, in the universities, in the journalism profession. We’re trying to shape the way that people think about race in this country, including children in public schools. They know what they want. They want to teach that America was born in slavery and genocide. They want to question the people who want to hold up the flag on the Fourth of July and say they love their country and say the United States is a great beacon of liberty in the last three centuries of human political experience. They don’t like that narrative. They hate the narrative that America is a good country. They don’t like capitalism. They’re deeply skeptical about the foundations of American civilization. They know what they’re doing and they know what they want. And when called on it, they lie. Oh, it’s a bugaboo. Oh, for example, like, nine or 10,000 homicides with black victims a year can go completely undiscussed by some of these people. Wow. Any incident involving a white police officer and a black criminal, in which the criminal end up ends up losing his life because of his behavior can become a cause celeb, say their names, say their names. They know exactly what they’re doing.
   
   So, you know, they don’t play fair. You know, they’re looking for a hook, or a clever turn of phrase, they say, oh, “defund the police.” And then they say, Oh, no, but nobody really wants to defund the police. We’re not against police. Yes, you are. You know. They say diversity and inclusion. They don’t say lower the standards, because people can’t compete when you draw the line the way that you’re drawing it. So we’re going to define the line differently. They’re going to say Asians are not non white. They’re going to talk about people of color and omit Asians whenever it’s convenient to do so. So why would I trust them with something really important, like reporting on the political news, like reporting on what goes on in elections? Like, like, reporting on business news, like reporting on what’s going on in the economy? Why would I trust these people? Sorry for the rant, but they know exactly what they’re doing. That’s my point. This is not a mistake. They’re liars.
   
   John McWhorter:
   
   I invite people to watch a debate I did last week to assess this. It was with Gloria Ladson Billings. And it was about whether critical race theory should be taught in K through 12.
   
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4pikerUu6o

5. 

   Erich Vieth October 18, 2021 Reply

   What is “Critical Race Theory” (CRT)? James Lindsay, who has done immense research in this area (see his website, New Discourses and Cynical Theories, the book he authored with Helen Pluckrose in 2020. Here is a two-minute version Lindsay posted on Twitter today:

   

6. 

   Erich Vieth November 7, 2021 Reply

   Christopher Rufo’s advice regarding nomenclature:

   

7. 

   Erich Vieth November 9, 2021 Reply

   

   https://twitter.com/MythinformedMKE/status/1457844121096253443

   According to James Lindsay: “Critical Race Theory” is “Race Marxism.” According to Lindsay, here are basic tenets of CRT

   • “Race” was constructed by “white” people originally from Europe so that they could exercise privilege and power and maintain it over people of color.
   • “Race” remains the fundamental construct for understanding how people are divided or stratified.
   • People of the two “races” are in conflict with each other, which makes this a conflict theory.
   • The purpose of CRT is to understand racial inequalities so that these can be redressed by redistribution of resources (“racial equity”).
   • Therefore, CRT is a Marxian Theory based on “Race.”
8. 

   Erich Vieth December 1, 2021 Reply

   Peter Boghossian defines “Critical Race Theory”?

   

   Boghossian defines CRT and many other Woke terms at his website, Beyond Woke.

9. 

   Erich Vieth December 15, 2021 Reply

   Manhattan institute Offers this Definition of Critical Race Theory:

   The term “Critical Race Theory” was coined by a small group of legal academics who gathered in 1989 for a workshop at the University of Wisconsin, titled “New Developments in Critical Race Theory.” [31] The Critical Race Theory movement was an offshoot of, and a reaction to, an earlier legal-academic movement, Critical Legal Studies, which was, in the words of its founders, a “peripheral corner of legal academia.” Its adherents, known as “crits,” were engaged in a “struggle to create a more humane, egalitarian, and democratic society.” [32] Critical Legal Studies drew inspiration from the “legal realist” movement, which emerged at Yale and Columbia Law Schools in the 1920s and 1930s and disdained the “formalisms” of the law in lieu of an outcome-driven jurisprudence consistent with Progressive principles. [33] The crits also drew from the eponymous “critical theory,” another interwar school of thought centered at the Marxist Institute for Social Research at the University of Frankfurt, which rejected “detachment” and “neutral” scholarly principles and sought instead “to hasten developments which will lead to a society without injustice.” [34]
   The Critical Race Theory scholars departed from their progenitors in centering their discussion on race. [35] (Some of them even accused the other crits of behaving in “imperial” fashion and “silencing” minority scholars’ views.) [36]
   Although scholars who have embraced the Critical Race Theory moniker are not monolithic, they are broadly committed to reinterpreting civil rights law “in light of its ineffectuality.” Certain tenets are common among scholars in the field:
   

   Racism is ordinary, ubiquitous, and “endemic” to American life;
   Racism explains all observed disparities among contemporary racial groups;
   Cultural norms such as “legal neutrality, objectivity, color-blindness, and meritocracy” perpetuate inequality and group dominance; and thus “race liberalism” must be rejected in favor of “race consciousness”;
   An “insistence on subjectivity” because true insight into the real operation of American life is gained through the “lived experience” of racism by “people of color”; and
   White people are necessarily complicit in racism by way of their adherence to, and benefit from, dominant cultural norms that invest them with sociopolitical capital (“whiteness”).

   [37]
   
   Initially, Critical Race Theory was confined to the niche circles of legal academia from which it originated. [38] More recently, its core ideas have been applied and expanded to an array of disciplines, including education. Professors Gloria Ladson-Billings and William F. Tate IV at the University of Wisconsin–Madison wrote a seminal article in the field in 1995, titled “Toward a Critical Race Theory in Education.” [39] Ladson-Billings applied the precepts developed by legal Critical Race Theory scholars to attack “colorblindness, meritocracy, deficit thinking, linguicism, and other forms of subordination” in the education context. [40] Those who have applied Critical Race Theory to education also draw heavily on “critical pedagogy,” a distinct school of academia that itself borrowed heavily from Critical Race Theory scholars. [41] Critical pedagogy views “curriculum as a form of cultural politics” and argues that “knowledge should be analyzed on the basis of whether it is oppressive or exploitative, and not on the basis of whether it is ‘true.’ ” [42]
   
   Some have claimed that Critical Race Theory has nothing to do with the racially charged curricula and trainings that are becoming commonplace in public schools. For example, Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers union, insists that “critical race theory is not taught in elementary schools or high schools.” [43] To be sure, that statement is broadly true in a literal sense: it would be the rare secondary school, indeed, that would assign to its students the writings of Critical Race Theory scholars such as Derrick Bell, Richard Delgado, Charles Lawrence, Kimberlé Crenshaw, or Mari Matsuda—or their education-field heirs like Ladson-Billings and Tate. But the ideas developed and espoused in Critical Race Theory scholarship certainly do inform modern educational pedagogy. And belying Weingarten’s claim, the national meeting of the other large teachers’ union, the National Education Association, recently passed a resolution affirming its commitment to a “curriculum . . . informed by academic frameworks for understanding and interpreting the impact of the past on current society, including critical race theory”; and allocating significant new union resources to providing “an already-created, in-depth, study that critiques empire, white supremacy, anti-Blackness, anti-Indigeneity, racism, patriarchy, cisheteropatriarchy, capitalism, ableism, anthropocentrism, and other forms of power and oppression at the intersections of our society.” [44]
   
   To be sure, the teachers and administrators implementing racialized curricula, initiatives, and training programs are more likely to have read popular modern books by Boston University history professor Ibram X. Kendi [45] or diversity trainer Robin DiAngelo [46] than they are the writings of law professors associated with Critical Race Theory. But “pop antiracism” authors themselves derive many of their premises from congruent Critical Race Theory scholarship. [47] Unambiguously, the principles developed by Critical Race Theory and critical pedagogy scholars have infused many public schools. A 2019 study [48] by the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal found that the most assigned author at the education schools at three leading public universities—the University of Michigan–Ann Arbor, the University of North Carolina–Chapel Hill, and the University of Wisconsin–Madison—was the aforementioned Gloria Ladson-Billings, who is “known for her groundbreaking work in the fields of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy and Critical Race Theory.”[49] Other Critical Race and critical pedagogy scholars dominated the most assigned reading lists at these schools.
   
   As noted in a Manhattan Institute issue brief, “Woke Schooling: A Toolkit for Concerned Parents,” using the term “Critical Race Theory” to describe what’s happening in the publiceducation context is perhaps both underinclusive (not everything parents are objecting to in the school context derives directly or indirectly from Critical Race Theory scholarship) and overinclusive (as a body of scholarship originating in law schools, Critical Race Theory certainly includes concepts not used in public school settings). [50]
   In any event, the debate over whether Critical Race Theory is the appropriate moniker for what has been happening in many public schools is something of a sideshow. Almost 20 years ago, Kimberlé Crenshaw, a founder of the movement, suggested that Critical Race Theory was “now used as interchangeably for race scholarship as Kleenex is used for tissue.” [51] The exact academic pedigree vehicle of various curricula, initiatives, and training programs observed at public schools and other public institutions matters less than their substance. The fundamental question involves not what we call these ideas and programs, or their origins, but their appropriateness—and the appropriateness of the legislative responses being promulgated in response.

10. 

    Erich Vieth December 15, 2021 Reply

    Christopher Rufo and the Manhattan Institute are proposing model legislation to prohibit the teaching of certain aspects of Critical Race Theory in K-12. Here is Rufo’s summary of that model legislation:
    
    Substance. In terms of substance, the model legislation focuses on the principles previously articulated: transparency, compelled speech, and curricular content. The proposed transparency requirements are relatively narrow and precise, in order to avoid undue compliance burdens on already-pressed school administrators and staff.
    The content prescriptions in the proposed legislation are also narrow. The bill focuses on four core concepts or beliefs, distilled from various state bills on the subject:
    
    That the United States or the state is “fundamentally and irredeemably racist or sexist”;
    That individuals are “inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive” by virtue of “race” or other intrinsic characteristics;
    That individuals are personally “responsible for actions committed in the past by other members of the same” race or other intrinsic characteristics; and
    That individuals’ “moral character is necessarily determined” by race or other intrinsic characteristics.
    
    Our model bill purposely focuses on value-laden judgments, particularly those involving individual identity. Moreover, in keeping with the “light touch” of the proposed model legislation, the bill would not directly proscribe the teaching of even these concepts. Rather, the model bill would prevent public schools from compelling students, faculty, and staff to affirm these ideas; and would allow students, faculty, and staff the right to opt out of any “training, seminar, continuing education, orientation, or therapy” requirements imparting these ideas—whether or not such activities involve compelled speech. The model bill does offer some suggested language for state legislatures that wish to embrace a more proscriptive approach.
    
    The model legislation also prohibits schools from requiring or rewarding specific political, policy, or social activism as a substitute for or adjunct to teaching and learning. While there certainly may be value in “hands-on” applications of various social-studies instruction, we question whether K–12 education is the appropriate nexus for the same, particularly in light of the fact that student attendance is compulsory, student minds are yet unformed, and there is the potential for teachers and administrators to co-opt scarce student time for their own political, policy, or social-reform objectives.
    Finally, the model legislation prohibits end runs around its requirements through outside contracts, by preventing schools from using public funds to “contract with, hire, or otherwise engage” outside consultants and trainers for purposes of political and social advocacy or to compel students, faculty, or staff to affirm the four core concepts or beliefs outlined in the legislation. Schools could hire consultants and trainers to impart such concepts if they expressly clarified that the ideas were not school-sponsored or supported and if students, faculty, and staff had the right to opt out of such programs.
    
    The model bill purposely avoids proscribing the teaching of concepts based on the subjective perceptions of students, faculty, or staff. The elevation of so-called lived experience over objective deductive and inductive analysis is a hallmark of Critical Race Theory; it should not be embraced by its critics. [64] That said, much of the public commentary suggesting that enacted CRT legislation has, in fact, hinged on individuals’ subjective perceptions has simply misrepresented the statutory text in question. For example, an opinion piece in the New York Times authored by Kmele Foster, David French, Jason Stanley, and Thomas Chatterton Williams claims that Tennessee’s law bans “any teaching that could lead an individual to ‘feel discomfort, guilt, anguish or another form of psychological distress solely because of the individual’s race or sex.’ ” [65] But that is not what the Tennessee legislation does; rather, the law prohibits public schools from promoting the idea that an “individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish, or another form of psychological distress solely because of the individual’s race or sex” [66]—something quite different indeed. [67] Similarly, although certain states’ CRT legislation has prohibited public schools or other state institutions from promoting “divisive concepts,” the actually enacted bills have expressly defined that term to include only normative-laden judgments premised on identity—similar to those articulated in the model legislation presented here [68]—rather than relying on listeners’ subjective perspectives.
    
    The model bill does not prohibit any particular textbook, document, or course of study, beyond the prohibitions previously described. This omission should not be read to imply that such a provision would be legally problematic in the K–12 context; states have broad leeway to select and reject materials and curricula, and most such prohibitions would pass constitutional muster. [69] Although a comprehensive review of alternative school curricula is beyond the scope of this issue brief, it is hardly surprising that some state bills have specifically singled out for exclusion the Pulitzer Center’s 1619 Project study materials,[70] based on the New York Times’ controversial series of essays, [71] which have already been adopted by a reported 4,500 schools less than a year after its introduction. [72]
    
    Enforcement. The proposed model legislation relies on state attorneys general and local district and county attorneys to enforce its provisions. [73] Some state legislatures may prefer also to create discrete mechanisms for private enforcement through civil litigation brought by parents, students, or employees, beyond those available as existing remedies under state or federal law—particularly when legislators lack confidence that executive-branch officials will actually enforce the law. Legislatures that decide to create an express private right of enforcement action should be exceedingly careful not to create the potential for “shakedown” lawsuits that could overly tax local school districts or, if filed against individual public employees, unduly interfere with government-employee contracting. Legislatures should be aware that in the absence of express language clarifying otherwise, some courts will infer an implied private right of enforcement action, regardless of legislative intent.

11. 

    Larry J. Carter January 30, 2022 Reply

    I must commend Mr. Vieth for this goldmine of understanding concerning CRT.

12. 

    Anonymous May 2, 2022 Reply

    Jessie Singal has read Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, Critical Race Theory: An Introduction (3rd Edition). He criticizes members of the news media who criticize those who are troubled by the teaching of CRT in American schools. In fact many left-leaning reporters are working hard to avoid some of the basic tenets of CRT. Singal accuses them of being uncurious cheerleaders for a cause instead of doing their jobs as reporters.

    I’ve read the book in question . . . and a lot of the radical claims seem perfunctory and half-baked. In some cases they boil down to fairly uncontroversial arguments about how the justice system has been used to uphold white supremacy, which of course it has. Perhaps most annoying — not just here but in so much progressive academic writing — is is/ought elision, where sentences that I think are supposed to say things like “the law pretends to be neutral but often isn’t” are written in a way where any reader will interpret them as “neutrality is a bad idea.” But the point is, right there, on page 3 of the foundational introductory CRT book, the authors say that CRT “questions the very foundations of the liberal order… Enlightenment rationalism, and neutral principles of constitutional law.” If a conservative says that CRT is a radical movement, they are, at least in a certain sense, correct. Trying to pretend otherwise is a fool’s errand.

    A lot of journalistic coverage of this has been obfuscatory. In an article rife with other issues, authors writing in Scientific American described CRT as a movement that “emphasizes the unique historical role that legal systems play in upholding and producing racial inequalities in the United States.” More recently, Greg Sargent described it in The Washington Post as a movement that “examines how racism gets baked into law.” This Slate article bites off a subset of reasonable-sounding ideas from CRT thinkers, but simply ignores the more radical stuff.

    And on and on and on — very little mainstream progressive coverage of this debate simply quotes the foundational definition of CRT two of its architects provide right at the start of perhaps the leading introductory book about it. If CRT merely “emphasized the unique historical role that legal systems play in upholding and producing racial inequalities in the United States,” or “examined how racism gets baked into law,” Rufo would have gained much less of a toehold. The radical-sounding quotes are out there and Rufo will always be able to point to them whenever there’s any sign that any school system anywhere has any connection to any CRT thinker — not a difficult task, even if K–12 instruction on CRT is (as it appears to be) exceptionally rare.

    The second reason not to attempt to derail or deflect here is going to come across as quaint, but: journalists have different jobs from activists. This feels like an increasingly futile point to make, but if our field is going to mean anything, our starting point shouldn’t be We must do anything we can to defeat Rufo’s efforts. After I approvingly tweeted Chait’s story, I got some guff from other journalists on Twitter who were furious that, in their eyes, we haven’t been harsher on Rufo, that we’re treating him as even a hypothetically good-faith interlocutor. What you’re supposed to do is see him as a fascist and spend your every last waking tweet denouncing him as such.

    I have to say that if the opinions they publicly express are any indication, a lot of current journalists should switch careers and do public relations for liberal advocacy groups instead.

13. 

    Erich Vieth December 30, 2022 Reply

    Wilfred Reilly offers this definition of Wokism (or Wokeness):

    Wokism is the belief that (1) all of society is currently and intentionally structured to oppress, (2) all gaps in performance between large groups illustrate this, and (3) the solution is ‘equity’ – proportional representation w/o regard to performance.

    https://www.city-journal.org/what-is-critical-race-theory-really