The disingenuous of the wokeniks on this issue is stunning. They talk about this as if it were a matter of something being "taught." It's not. It's about power and the issue is who gets it. You know, academic freedom developed from the assumption that academics would be academic, and not use their positions in the service of their political will to power. When we allowed whole departments and disciplines to define themselves as political agents, it was inevitable that outside political forces would rise to combat them. Academic freedom? Road kill.
Just what we need: let's go hat in hand to the Biden Dept. of Education with a civil rights complaint against the 'struggle for equity'. Yeah, that's really going to get fast action, and from those we trust most to monitor our children's education: woke bureaucrats. The sloppiness of many bills put forth in the attempt to protect our children from race hatred stinks, of course, but nothing in those bills can match the putrid stench eminating from critical race theory. Sachs' criticisms should help legislators do a better job with their rewrites.
When I looked at the TX, OK, TN, IA, ID bills a week or so ago, the same issues stood out in the TN bill. The "promoting division" language has made my chilling-effects alarm go off, and there were other overdrawn formulations as well.
I still am not convinced I'd call the other bills a "mistake". It's far from obvious that the "make part of a course" wording should include sources that are critically evaluated in a course; at least in the case of the TX bill, it should be easy to argue in court that this cannot have been the law's intent (the very same bill requires teaching "the first Lincoln-Douglas debate"!). Ultimately, even if there are temporary chilling effects until the language is clarified, how do they compare with the counterfactual of the laws' absence?
"First, you can talk to the teachers and administrators at your local school. These people want to help, and they have an incentive to avoid controversy."
Pfft. Teachers and administrators don't care what parents think. They see their job as *rescuing* America's children from their bigoted and benighted households—preparing them to lead a virtuous revolution, or whatever. And the "incentive to avoid controversy" is precisely what leads to critical theory's implantation in the first place. Once there's a critical mass of woke teachers, counselors, and administrators (which isn't difficult to achieve in any semi-affluent school district), these teachers, counselors, and administrators appeal to the school board and—ahem—*strongly encourage* them to adopt official DEI policy, which they always do, since they're either in agreement or are deathly afraid of being accused of racism, bigotry, or whatever -phobia or -ism is in vogue.
The problem isn't just critical race theory; the problem is applied critical theory, period: the weird, partway-abusive, partway-therapeutic cult ideology built on the notion that all norms, all traditions, and all artifacts represent arbitrary assertions of power by some dominant group, and that justice demands "liberation" from these norms, traditions, and artifacts. Implicit bias, intersectionality, systemic racism, whiteness, white privilege, power structures, oppression, microaggressions, patriarchy, ableism, Latinx, “spaces,” “centering,” “voices,” the panoply of “queer” identities, etc., etc. — these are all concepts which have trickled from the revolutionary academic fringe into the educational mainstream. I don't want my kids filling their heads with this bilge, which is why I'd never, ever send them to public school.
Laws Aimed at Banning Critical Race Theory in K-12 Schools Are a Poorly Written, Misguided Mess
The disingenuous of the wokeniks on this issue is stunning. They talk about this as if it were a matter of something being "taught." It's not. It's about power and the issue is who gets it. You know, academic freedom developed from the assumption that academics would be academic, and not use their positions in the service of their political will to power. When we allowed whole departments and disciplines to define themselves as political agents, it was inevitable that outside political forces would rise to combat them. Academic freedom? Road kill.
Any time you mention Rufo, you need to remind your readers that he's intentionally running a disinformation campaign on the branding of CRT and openly admits to it: https://twitter.com/realchrisrufo/status/1371540368714428416?s=19
https://twitter.com/realchrisrufo/status/1371541044592996352?s=19
Just what we need: let's go hat in hand to the Biden Dept. of Education with a civil rights complaint against the 'struggle for equity'. Yeah, that's really going to get fast action, and from those we trust most to monitor our children's education: woke bureaucrats. The sloppiness of many bills put forth in the attempt to protect our children from race hatred stinks, of course, but nothing in those bills can match the putrid stench eminating from critical race theory. Sachs' criticisms should help legislators do a better job with their rewrites.
When I looked at the TX, OK, TN, IA, ID bills a week or so ago, the same issues stood out in the TN bill. The "promoting division" language has made my chilling-effects alarm go off, and there were other overdrawn formulations as well.
I still am not convinced I'd call the other bills a "mistake". It's far from obvious that the "make part of a course" wording should include sources that are critically evaluated in a course; at least in the case of the TX bill, it should be easy to argue in court that this cannot have been the law's intent (the very same bill requires teaching "the first Lincoln-Douglas debate"!). Ultimately, even if there are temporary chilling effects until the language is clarified, how do they compare with the counterfactual of the laws' absence?
https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2021/07/13/we-need-facts-not-critical-race-theory-teach-history/7890610002/
I most certainly concur. This is why everything that deals with the legacy of race in America is being labeled as CRT.
(Article can be viewed in FB News without having to subscribe)
Thank you for not including Florida's new law. It's a better written law IMO
"First, you can talk to the teachers and administrators at your local school. These people want to help, and they have an incentive to avoid controversy."
Pfft. Teachers and administrators don't care what parents think. They see their job as *rescuing* America's children from their bigoted and benighted households—preparing them to lead a virtuous revolution, or whatever. And the "incentive to avoid controversy" is precisely what leads to critical theory's implantation in the first place. Once there's a critical mass of woke teachers, counselors, and administrators (which isn't difficult to achieve in any semi-affluent school district), these teachers, counselors, and administrators appeal to the school board and—ahem—*strongly encourage* them to adopt official DEI policy, which they always do, since they're either in agreement or are deathly afraid of being accused of racism, bigotry, or whatever -phobia or -ism is in vogue.
The problem isn't just critical race theory; the problem is applied critical theory, period: the weird, partway-abusive, partway-therapeutic cult ideology built on the notion that all norms, all traditions, and all artifacts represent arbitrary assertions of power by some dominant group, and that justice demands "liberation" from these norms, traditions, and artifacts. Implicit bias, intersectionality, systemic racism, whiteness, white privilege, power structures, oppression, microaggressions, patriarchy, ableism, Latinx, “spaces,” “centering,” “voices,” the panoply of “queer” identities, etc., etc. — these are all concepts which have trickled from the revolutionary academic fringe into the educational mainstream. I don't want my kids filling their heads with this bilge, which is why I'd never, ever send them to public school.