Political Philosophy and Ethics discussion
Both Pol. and Ethical Philosophy
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Education; Public Libraries
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The first of my questions is evidently answered by this article: https://www.academia.edu/44782863/CRI.... That article appears to have been written by a professor at Mankato State University in Mankato, Minnesota. He seems to be generally sympathetic to critical race theory. I will not take a position regarding the theory at this time, as my knowledge of it is mostly limited to this article. I do, however, have a number of questions about some of the details. Like every other theory, I think “critical race theory” needs to be subjected to “critical thinking” of the “informal logic” variety. There are several premises in the theory that might be questioned, especially those that implicitly rely on inductive reasoning. The question in my mind is whether the evidence supports those premises. I don’t know the answer to that question, because I have not studied the evidence, and the author of the linked article doesn’t supply it.
My second question remains entirely unanswered: is critical race theory being taught in public elementary and secondary schools? I doubt it, but I don’t really know. If someone is aware of any empirical data on this question, I would appreciate their providing it in the present thread.
I wrote elementary and secondary social science textbooks (primarily in the fields of history and government) from 1972 to 1978. My employer, a textbook-writing company, and its outside publisher made every effort to expose elementary and secondary students to the facts about oppression of Native Americans, African Americans, and other disadvantaged groups. To my knowledge and recollection, we did not whitewash anything. That said, I doubt that our presentations were perfect by the standards of what we know today. But we tried our best. We also presented some of the good things about US history and government. To my mind, this is the way to proceed in elementary and secondary history education: to present all the relevant facts, without distortions from either the political Left or the political Right.
Buy One Get One Free! Purchase one critical race theory today, take home a free sexual dimorphism theory or a behavioral economics theory for the same price!To answer your first question Alan: my shorthand mnemonic for CRT is: 'fish don't know they're in water'. I've had this jeered at me at least once (online); and it's a maddening and diabolical argument which one can not refute. See below as to why.
Second question: yes, teachers I've been acquainted with in the past five years or so would probably affirm CRT concepts are being taught in K-12. I can't say for sure because I'm no longer in contact with them.
Summary-level assessment of CRT from yours truly: I feel it's insidious for the same reasons I feel post-modernism is insidious: these are taffy-pulls which turn all questions back on the mind doing the enquiring. They create an 'us' vs 'them' environment where nothing can ever be answered satisfactorily. No one is pure enough. Once you acquire this sensibility, you trust very few of your fellows anymore because ...well, after all ...they could unknowingly be infected with racism. They could be 'one of them' instead of 'one of us'.
Post-modernism, CRT, witch-trials, and Red-scares all identify some tenebrous, shifting trend in our midst and label it with a (usually) latin-sounding name or as a Critical Theory. From that point forward, whatever-it-is can never be eradicated because it is a disease. It is latent in us ever and anon, like cancer.
I'm ag'in it.
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To answer your first question Alan: my..."
Thanks, Feliks. I agree that it seems to overlap or be an offshoot of postmodernism. I'm surprised to learn that is taught in K-12. Were the teachers with whom you communicated all in NYC? I would guess it's different in the sticks (which New Yorkers define as everything west of them--per what they told me when I went to the University of Chicago).
Mostly in NYC, but also some in 'Pennsyltucky' which yes is how New York slurs the rest of the Mid-Atlantic Region.In PA, was briefly affiliated with an early childhood education program called 'Keystone Stars' (?) or something like that. The project had a lucrative funding stream to 'teach the teachers'. Catchphrase upon catchphrase here.
In general the program was much admired because of the tight purse which generally exists in PA; it rewarded teachers for getting advanced degrees in their fields.
Can't say for sure but I'd bet that this kind of topic (CRT) would have been touted as part of that initiative.
You probably already know this but "performance of one's child" in New York, is a fiercely-contested battle for status fought at the neighborhood level, parent vs parent. Many areas of this city are rife with specialty schools and elite, private institutions. Bragging rights are swung like cutlasses.
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In PA, was briefly affiliated with an early childhood education program called '..."
Thanks, Feliks, for your erudite and wry comments. You have just out-Mahered Bill Maher ("Real Time" on HBO), who constantly rails against CRT, postmodernism, etc. from his stance as a traditional liberal/progressive. He and others think that the identification of the Democratic Party with such lefty cults will doom the party in the 2022 (and perhaps) 2024 elections. He sees the electoral results last week in Virginia and NJ as evidence of that.
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McWhorter, like Bill Maher (on whose program McWhorter recently appeared), is a progressive liberal who takes issue with the postmodernist left. I have not yet read this book, but it is my understanding that it constitutes a critique of critical race theory.
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(Although this is a Washington Post article, I understand that it is available free of charge by clicking the above link.)
On a broader plane than just the topic of racism studies, what disturbs me most about our K-12 school system is the ongoing reality of shooting sprees. Inconveniently for America's grown-ups, this horrible trend has not gone away. Over three thousand such slayings since Columbine. Classroom violence climbs upward with all our wise, super-smart initiatives like a vine. I can't understand why it doesn't scream a louder indictment of our culture. All our remedies for today's social ills, clearly yield the opposite effect. All the bright ideas we think so correct and appropriate and astute, are repudiated by the inherent falseness they hold when we instill them in the young. Continuing K-12 bloodbaths attest to this.
I pass by three middle schools to-and-from my workplace downtown. The schoolkids are picked-up and dropped off by parents driving SUVs. The schoolgrounds are hung with banners, slogans, marketing, and placards. The school building is monitored by security cameras inside and out. The kids themselves wear designer clothes covered with brand-marketing.
Their chat is clipped; impersonal; cold; filled with acronyms. They're self-centered and materialist. Waiting for the class bell, tykes slouch against the doorway gazing at news feeds on their smart-phones; keeping one eye on their back-packs containing their valuables. They 'stay hydrated' with bottled water; some of them have six-pack stomachs.
Each day is organized for them into programs adults design: 'sports track', 'music track', 'theater track'. These kids are politicized; sexualized; commercialized; technologized. They're impatient; short-tempered, snide. They practice time-management; nutrition-management; money-management.
They don't 'play'; they 'email'. They 'check-in with their parents' every hour; they have Facebook profiles; and social media accounts. These aren't kids at all: just miniature adults. They're expected to produce. We monitor their performance and chart their achievements. At the same time we tell them "there's no wrong answers" and "everyone counts".
Although each one is isolated by adult oversight, they're not allowed to experience any of the pain which builds strong individuals. We don't let them fail, make mistakes, band together, suffer, or lose. No individual humiliation, embarrassment, or shame. 'Solo' curiosity, exploring, and wandering is forbidden. Invention and experimentation is restricted to safe 'zones' where they can't cause any costly damage. We don't let modern children create or enjoy a separate landscape, a "kid's world" unpolluted by ours.
No wonder the whole thing has gone wrong. There's no more true childhood.
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It's a world away from my childhood and teen experiences growing up (1950s and 1960s) in a small town in the rural Midwest.
I believe it! You probably had a lot of fun roaming the farms and countryside out there. A sight I still can't adjust to in the city: kids shuffling down the street with headphones in their ears. As if their lives are so busy that they need to relax, as if their world is so stressful that they need to get away from it all by "tuning it out".
As a working adult with a high-pressure career, sure --I listen to music with a pair of tiny, mini-headphones. But I'm an adult, and I have 'favorite' music built up over many years. I can't figure out what the heck a kid aged nine, could possibly be listening to on his headphones. Or, who they might need to talk to on a phone!
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Well, my age contemporaries in elementary and secondary school had their own conformist ways--especially their ingroups and outgroups. I was never in the "in-crowd." It's true that we didn't have the same physical restrictions as the present generations. I recall riding all over town on my bike during the summers, and my parents never worried about me (other than some concern about a car hitting me on the street). I rode my bike to school every day, weather permitting, and walked when there was snow on the ground. Only when the temperature got well below zero (-20 degree F temps were not uncommon in those winters) would my mother drive my sisters and me to school. But I was very bored as a child. Only when I went to high school did I find any interest in life (debate and drama in my case). However, I must acknowledge that some (not all) of my teachers were very good, notwithstanding that we were out in the boonies.
We didn't have headphones in those days, but the boys played marbles or "chicken" with pocketknives (don't ask), and the girls played jacks. I guess that was somewhat more sociable than individuals isolated off from the rest of the world with their headphones.
During the winters, we had snowball fights. I recall at least one kid packing a snowball around a rock before throwing it. These "games" could be quite vicious. When I read Lord of the Flies, it all came back to me.
Yep. I've put these same kinds of sentiments in my various reviews of kids' books on Goodreads. I won't burden this thread or this group with them, but here's just one: The Mad Scientists' Club. Suffice to say I think it's very valuable for kids to be allowed to create havoc and make mistakes, and then take responsibility for their mistakes. But maybe I can wend my remarks back around to the topic of freedom, which is certainly a topic we're keen on around here.
Seems to me that raising children requires allowing them freedom, even if doing so has unpredictable effects. Children in America used to be given chemistry sets to play with, remember that? They were allowed to build their own tree-forts and race-cars (usually from orange-crates and whatnot). That's freedom, and very unlike giving your child a 'kid-safe' website to play on.
Kids in my neighborhood were often told (any given saturday afternoon) "go on, get lost, go do something until supper". And we did. No tracking, no checking in. 'Unstructured' time. We were responsible for whatever mess we created: 'getting lost' is an important freedom. Learning lessons on one's own; including all manner of cuts, bruises, and scrapes from pocketknives and slingshots.
'The wilder the colt, the better the horse'
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It has occurred to me that I would not allow kids to do a few of the things I did as a child--playing with knives, for example. Here's a cautionary tale: one of my classmates in junior high was killed when he and his friends played Russian roulette with his father's gun, not realizing it was loaded. Of course, your freedom wouldn't extend to playing with guns.
Alan, wanted to ask you this (since this is an education thread).If you were explaining to a very young person "how to apply critical thinking" to a controversial news story they'd seen on TV, what might you instruct them?
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If you were explaining to a very young person "how to apply critical thinking" to a controversial news story they'd seen on TV, what might you instruct them?"
I’m not sure what you mean by “a very young person,” but the following should be intelligible to high school students. It is similar (though obviously not identical) to what I learned when I began participating in high school debate in the early 1960s. I don’t have enough knowledge or experience in early education to make recommendations for children of elementary school age. I suppose a good teacher of such children could adapt the following to something that their students could understand and use.
First, I would advise students to consider the news source for possible (not necessarily inevitable) bias. For example, Fox News is a right-wing source that can be expected to be biased in that direction, and MSNBC is a left-wing source that can be expected to be biased in the opposite direction. Accordingly, each might leave out (perhaps in some cases not even be aware of) facts that don’t support their particular perspectives. Similarly, each side may twist the facts or put a particular spin on them. On occasion, they might inadvertently or purposely distort or even invent “facts.” That does not necessarily mean that all news emanating from such sources is biased and unreliable. Sometimes factual information—including factual information that the other side ignores or distorts—is presented by one of such sources that is not generally presented by the mainstream media. Note that the foregoing attention to possible bias is not the same as an ad hominem argument. Being aware of possible bias is not the same as the blanket denunciation of the source without further inquiry. That said, there are some media outlets that specialize in blatant lies and fabrication of baseless conspiracy theories. One must be careful not to be sucked in to such propaganda. Most of the latter disinformation sites are home-grown. However, Russia, Iran, and other foreign sources have been caught perpetrating such disinformation (in the United States and elsewhere) in order to advance their specific policy goals.
While being aware of the possible bias of the news source, one should examine the statements they make as carefully as possible. On what evidence, if any, do they rely? How reliable is that evidence? What evidence do they ignore or distort? Do they commit common fallacies in presenting their news or opinions? See the “Informal Fallacy” list at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of..., though I do not necessarily agree with everything stated in that Wikipedia article.
Use fact-checkers: see, e.g., https://www.factcheck.org/2016/11/how....
I have only scratched the surface, but the foregoing should be helpful to someone who is trying to distinguish between fact and fiction and between informed opinion and crackpot notions.
The bottom line is that one should use reason, not emotion, in evaluating political news. Although emotion is important (indeed, inevitable) in some areas of human life, it should be, to the extent possible (and with the exception of an appropriate degree of empathy), set aside when one is analyzing political, philosophical, and academic subjects.
Regarding McWhorter:His book before his most recent one is Nine Nasty Words: English in the Gutter: Then, Now, and Forever. He discussed it on the Maher show. I heard him give an overview of the history he charts in that book but I can't remember if I heard it on the Maher show or Book-TV.
In any case, he breaks down his history into three main stages:
First stage: Profanity centered on words that in any way dishonored God. Such words provoked outrage, but over time these words lost their sting.
Second stage: Profanity shifted to the body. Words like "asshole" and "fuck" provoked outrage, but these words too lost their sting over time. I've experience this with the word "fuck" in my lifetime. This word is now used commonly in ways that were unimaginable in my youth. Every time I hear it I still feel a bit of this string and I can't imagine myself using it it ways that have become common for many.
Third stage: A paradigmatic example of profanity today is the "N-word." Words like that now provoke the outrage of what is considered genuine profanity.
re: msg #16 thanks Alan E, I like what you had to say there by way of advice.When I put the question to myself (imagining myself advising a hypothetical 9 or 10 yr old) I thought that I would point them to a good list of logical fallacies, as you did too.
They'd probably be too impatient at that age to read a primer such as Talbot's Critical Reasoning: A Romp Through the Foothills of Logic for Complete Beginners but I think they could handle an introduction to fallacies such as some websites offer. Short definition of each one, with an example.
Other than that I might only be able to pass on some of my favorite quotes from Aristotle or Plato; or find some short example of Socratic method to convey. Try to make it fun for them with some anecdotes, to get them into the new 'mode'.
Anyway I'm glad I posted the question, maybe others will chime in.
This is interesting and relevant to me as my grandson has just entered middle school at the 6th grade and is being exposed to a range of topics and conversations that he wasn’t at his small Christian elementary school - the first was his amusement at the request (requirement ?) to address identify. Pronouns and such. His reaction was simple and profound - yes amusement but that was probably cloaking a very simple why? Asking questions about any information he receives from whatever source, including 6th grade English and social studies teachers is a starting point for critical thinking. It’s my duty to encourage such development and curiosity.
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Thanks, Charles. I would appreciate it if you could let us know whether such things as "critical race theory" and other "woke" desiderata are being taught to your middle schooler. I don't mean to put you in the position of being a spy, but it would help educate me and others who are long out of touch with public schools to learn what is happening these days in those venues.
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Before the pandemic, the local library here began offering courses on the internet. In classes, a librarian would put an internet posting on a screen for all to see, then show ways to use resources on the internet to see if the posting was true or false. We would all have computers so that we could follow the librarian step-by-step. After doing this a number of times, the librarian would put up another posting and let us see what we could do on our own. I believe education of this sort should be introduced in the schools at an early grade. Kids are going to get on the internet whether we like it or not, so education should give them skills to "read" what they find there.
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Good idea. The problem right now is that some places, especially in rural areas, do not have broadband. This may be alleviated to some extent by the recent infrastructure law: see https://www.consumerreports.org/inter....
Alan - I am on the lookout for evidence of that. I have no problem at all with him learning about the sins of our past as I believe those sins, reflected on and mainly addressed over the decades gives a shine to the American experiment. Understanding the central role of slavery in the American historical context is critical as it touches on our entire history. What it does not do, and this is where I draw the line, is define this nation as the 1619 Project attempts to do - We live in a mixed up world - and my experience just this evening on Twitter discussing a basic element of American history exemplifies it. The general feeling on the discussion if I can define it that way was the the Progressive Era of 1900-1915 was a black spot on our nations history. I tried to bring Herb Croly into the discussion but no one was taking it - that’s the attitude I’m on the watch out for. I hope my grandsons school doesn’t take the social justice bait and make identity and white guilt a thing as that would not be cool -
But I’m an optimist so we’ll see
Hi Charles, good to see you posting here. I enjoy reading your remarks.Just wondering if I maybe misunderstood your post above. Who exactly (today) is styling the Progressive Era a mistake? I found your replay slightly hard to follow (double-negative sentences, etc)
What is the '1619 Project'? Who are these men and what do they want?
Me, I don't feel it's a symptom of cowardly 'white guilt' to recognize the cost in human lives, which the discovery of the New World has so sadly brought about. I'm not embarrassed by sorrow.
I'm proud of our pioneers, but to me it is a sign of mature, adult responsibility --these, our better angels --to acknowledge our very grievous mistakes. Conscience elevates; makes us a nobler people. The American is honest. We steal our way back into heaven knowing how much we must answer for. Let us answer, then --with full heart --and not slink away.
I actually find the current discussion about critical race theory in schools interesting because it acts as a shield for the policy discussions going on in Washington that have far more of an effect on people's lives.For example, I was interested to discover that conservative populists as a group tend to support higher taxes on the ulta-rich. If we can get the Democrats and Republicans to engage in these dramatic culture war battles on whether to teach Robin Diangelo in schools, that means less scrutiny on fiscal and monetary policy. It means that politicians will have more room to horse trade and pass reforms while the public is debating critical race theory.
I've read Herbert Croly's book a while ago and only discovered recently while reading David Graeber's Debt: The First 5000 Years how much Comtism had an influence on Croly. Not surprising, since Croly's father admired Comte, although it only became apparent to me how much an influence Comtism had on Croly when I learned more about it. Graeber doesn't touch on Croly, but he does discuss Comtism, so I found his book insightful.
It seems to me that today's identitarian debates have relegated Croly's concerns into the background. The left does not like to say good things about America as a nation, while the right's current brand of ethnic and religious nationalism is so unlike what Croly called nationalism that we can only be resigned to how much the political conversation has changed from a hundred years ago.
In the meantime, I do not see the identitarian left as a genuine threat to America's liberal institutions when we are currently seeing such a great debate about wokeism in no less than the pages of the New York Times, that supposed bastion of wokeist groupthink. Monocultures of thought are always a threat, but when people in the US have so many ways to seek out different opinions and challenge their own preconceptions, I'm not really worried.
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I am familiar with the argument that traditional business conservatives have deliberately stoked populist fury about culture issues in order to hide their agenda that is less than favorable to the culture warriors on the right. I understand that this was the thesis of Thomas Frank's What's the Matter with Kansas?, though I haven't read that book and don't know for sure whether that was his argument. In any event, if this theory is correct, it appears to have worked, to some extent, in the Trump administration, though right-wing populism sometimes turns back to bite neoliberal conservatives, e.g., on the issue of free trade.
Also, to answer Alan's original question, my understanding is that Critical Race Theory is in fact being taught in K-12 education, despite some claims to the contrary in the media.For example, there was this article I encountered first by a critical race theorist. It says Critical Race Theory is not being taught in K-12 education.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazin...
I was later informed that the article is incorrect. Because I now agree that the article is wrong, I can only conclude that the original author who wrote the article was either deceived or lying, I'm not sure which.
My source for that statement is a transgender activist I met online who is well-read in this area and assures me that the anti-racism curricula being taught in K-12 education right now does count as Critical Race Theory. The Politico article wants to reduce Critical Race Theory to the specialty of what is often described as Critical Legal Studies. However, Critical Race Theory is much broader than this, and to illustrate, I would recommend reading the article "Whose culture has capital? A critical race theory discussion of community cultural wealth" by Tara J. Yosso. It's an overview of Critical Race Theory that has been cited 8000 times, so I think it has the necessary heft to be described as authoritative in the field. The article was shared with me by the activist I mentioned above, who says the the views in the article are widely held in the field. Since the article can be found online through a Google search, I will not share it here. Nevertheless, I do recommend it for everyone interested in this subject.
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https://studentaffairs.ucmerced.edu/s......"
Allen, I have skimmed through this article, but I see no statement that CRT is being taught in elementary and secondary public schools. In fact, it seems to be saying, if anything, the opposite.
The article was written in 2005 and outlines a form of anti-racist education that has been taken up in K-12 education since the article was written. Based on news articles I have read and discussions I have had online with people who teach at K-12 institutions, it is undeniable that anti-racist curricula has started to be taught in K-12 education. The main talking point among liberal pundits a few months ago was not to deny this anti-racist education was taking place, but to deny it counted as Critical Race Theory. This is in fact mistaken, as a reading of the article shows. The subject matter of systemic racism, implicit bias, and white supremacy does count as Critical Race Theory and is not limited to a legal theory at the intersection of race and law. That was what I was trying to show.
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Politically, it seems that everything turns on a semantic issue: what is "critical race theory"? I would like to see concrete evidence of what is actually being taught in public elementary and secondary classrooms. That information is difficult to find, as public education is highly decentralized in this country. What is being taught in San Francisco is probably different from what is being taught in Dallas. Perhaps social scientists will do a thorough quantitative study of this question at some point. They would have to identify various strains of CRT and then figure out to what extent each of these strains is being taught in public schools across the country. Since "critical race theory" means different things to different people, the social scientists would have to focus on specific teaching points rather than the overall catchphrase "critical race theory."
Those of us without children in public school (my son is in his forties) are at a disadvantage here. According to Bill Maher, parents are learning what their children are being taught in school and are reacting furiously against it. But then he doesn't have any kids and isn't really privy to what's going on. He is quite concerned that the right-wing political backlash against CRT will doom Democrats in the 2022 and 2024 elections. That is a reason to get the facts right, but, as I indicated above, it is difficult to discern what is happening across the country due to the decentralization of the public school system.
I'm sort of doing a mental balancing act on "Critical Race Theory" as such, which term seems to have been stretched to describe a whole lot of things some parents just don't want their children to know -- or who don't believe it themselves, because they were never taught it in school.(Some have commented that this seems to have been the case with Trump, but given his attitude toward facts in general, that may not be particularly relevant. Not to mention his callousness towards the suffering of others.)
Back in the early 1960s, a Catholic priest wrote a book on "The Anguish of the Jews" (still in print in a revised edition) in which he observed that the pages of history that concern Jews were mostly missing from the textbooks everyone else read.
He could have extended that to a great many other groups.
The need for teaching something about the legal and institutional mistreatment of minorities -- racial, religious, national -- and the "less privileged" (read: poor) of any description, seems to me to be imperative.
The problem, of course, is how to do it responsibly.
As for the need: I've encountered plenty of people who somehow went through school without, apparently, learning anything about slavery and/or segregation -- or managed to filter it out, since it didn't jibe with the perceptions they got at home. Or about Japanese internment camps, and anything else that didn't fit some preconceived idea of a perfect, i.e., white Christians only, and benevolent, America.
Not to mention teachers who are Holocaust-deniers (although the documented case of that that I recall was Canadian), and some who buy in to the "Jewish Conspiracy" view of everything they dislike.
There was a history teacher in a school I attended who somehow, on a regular basis, never found time to teach anything about the American Civil War, dwelling on the Colonial Period, the Revolution, and the framing of the Constitution until there was no time left in the semester. There was a suspicion among some students that this reflected her discomfort with raising the whole thing about slavery, and race. Or, charitably, maybe her just her time-management skills.......
However, I'm not too happy about "Critical Race Theory" in some hands -- there are proponents who are openly anti-Jewish, for example. And the problems of "white" minorities (Irish, Italian, Polish, etc.) may be excluded by definition.
And "racially" based immigration restrictions aimed at Asians and Southern and Eastern Europeans (and, of course, Jews) may or may not be part of what it covers.
I'm not sure from the descriptions I have found if American Indians are given a place in it, either.
I read Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American most days of the week. Professor Richardson teaches history at Boston College. Some months ago, she shared that “critical race theory” has a technical definition known to experts. It is regarded as a theory, not a set of facts or a dogma. And that it is never taught in grade schools because it is beyond the understanding of children.
Her discussion is now behind a paywall. I am not a paying subscriber. So I cannot search for it. And i do not remember the technical definition that she shared.
But her dismissal of the notion that CRT is being taught to grade schoolers seemed reasonable to me.
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Some months ago, she shared that “critical race theory” has..."
Thanks, Brad. If any members of this group have children in elementary or secondary school and can confirm or disconfirm what is being said in school about this subject (as a result of what your children or their teachers have told you or as a result of inspecting textbooks being used in class), please let us know. In this connection, the teacher probably would not say "Now about critical race theory," but would rather say specific things that may or may not fit into someone's definition of the concept. I am interested in what teachers or textbooks are saying that some are construing to be critical race theory. For example, if students are being exposed to the facts about slavery and (later) segregation, that is one thing (and it is perfectly consistent with what I learned in school in the 1950s and 1960s). If, however, the students are being told that all White people are racists, whether they know it or not, that's another thing--and may give rise to some legitimate concern by parents. There may be many other scenarios as well. I want to know specifically what the right wing is complaining about. In this connection, if anyone is complaining about critical race theory being taught in the schools, they should be interrogated as to (1) what exactly is being taught (in specific, not general terms) and (2) how they know this. Such an interrogation would be an exercise in critical thinking for all concerned.
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The interrogation that I advocate would be like Socrates's examination of individuals who are asserting one thing or another. It need not be hostile. The initial purpose is to gather information. If such information is provided, then the questioner can proceed to the question whether or not such teaching is appropriate for the grade level at issue or, indeed, whether it is ever appropriate. The second stage cannot/should not be done without the first stage as a predicate. Otherwise, it’s just a shouting match.
It is unfortunate, but most of the coverage I read in the news I cannot locate now. I follow the news using Google News, which I check multiple times per day, and there has been a lot of coverage on this topic over the last few months. There were anecdotes about exact details of the curriculum that I cannot recall now. But I do remember reading this article from Andrew Sullivan's Substack, which I largely agree with about its analysis of the media response and the stakes of the battle, but not what to do about it: https://andrewsullivan.substack.com/p...I don't read her Substack, but Bari Weiss also posted some attention-grabbing anecdotes about what material is being covered in K-12 education as part of the new anti-racist curriculum. I only know this because she was later cited in other downstream discussions.
I am not 100% sure to what extant anti-racism is being taught in public schools, but when I shared in a philosophy Discord server an opinion article that opined this was mainly a phenomena confined to elite private schools, I was contradicted by a school teacher at a public school that she had seen reading assignments for kids taken from Robin Diangelo's White Fragility. So these views are circulating out there, in public schools. And I have seen further articles just by casually searching on Google that show a wide variety of teachers' associations throwing their support behind anti-racist education. I strongly suspect that by the standards of the Yosso article I posted these efforts can be classified as Critical Race Theory. And remember, that article has been cited thousands of times in the literature according to Google Scholar. And the left-wing activist who shared that article with me has a law school degree and is currently doing her masters in education. She says the article represents a consensus in certain corners of academia about how to apply Critical Race Theory in K-12 education.
I think part of the problem is that the use of the term "Critical Race Theory" in academia itself is not uniform. Some use it to refer to Critical Legal Studies, while others use it the way the Yosso article I shared does.
Again, I would recommend the Yosso article I posted so people can understand that Christopher Rufo, the conservative activist who made Critical Race Theory a right-wing talking point, has fairly described it, at least as it is taught as an approach to K-12 education in certain corners of academia. The left-wing activist I spoke to believes, and her fellow left-wing activists who are equally well-read on this topic believe, that Critical Race Theory can be taught to schoolchildren, and is being taught to children right now. That was my conclusion after discussing this issue on a left-wing philosophy Discord server.
I don't want to spend time gathering all the news articles I've read in the last few months, but I do agree with John McWhorter's analysis of anti-racism in its present form. But once purged of its problematic aspects, I think the current spate of anti-racist education is a sign of progress that people are involving children in this difficult national conversation. However, my personal interest in this topic has waned since this started being discussed several months ago, so I may not reply to every response to this thread, even ones directed at me. However, I wish you every advantage that is to be gained by discussing this topic with strangers.
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I can assure all here that this is perhaps the most civilized discussion of these topics that anyone can find anywhere. The Twitter verse is incoherent and the right - well - nuff said. As I see it - having examined this issue for the past year - the problem is not the teaching of CRT, rather it’s the use of its language and underlying assumptions that in fact color and impact grade and middle school curriculums .
I just remembered my buddy's wife has been teaching in public and catholic schools in NYC for twenty years. Stand by ....ach! Inconclusive. She teaches pre-K and special ed. Too young.
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School boards across the country are forcing teachers and administrators to waste time on “antiracist” infusions into their curricula that make no more sense than anything proposed under China’s Cultural Revolution. Did you know that objectivity, being on time, and the written word are “white” things? Did you know that if that seems off to you, then you are one with George Wallace, Bull Connor, and David Duke?He cites no primary or secondary source(s) for these assertions. Similarly (again with no source references), he states on page 22: “Make no mistake: These people are coming after your kids.”
McWhorter’s principal thesis is that woke antiracism is a religion, arguing that it has many of the characteristics of religion, especially the doctrine of original sin in Christianity (original sin, in this case, being born White). He calls the practitioners of this new religion “the Elect,” in obvious reference to seventeenth-century Puritan predestinarianism. He states on page 31 (again without any source references with regard to elementary and secondary school children):
But the issue here is not whether I or anyone else thinks white privilege is real, but what we consider the proper response to it. The Elect are to ritually “acknowledge” that they possess white privilege, with an awareness that they can never be absolved of it. Classes, seminars, and teach-ins are devoted to corralling whites into this approach to the matter. The Elect seek to inculcate white kids with their responsibility to acknowledge their privilege from as early an age as possible; as I write this, religion is being preached in one school after another nationwide, even to children who aren’t even reading chapter books yet. In other words, the Elect are founding the equivalent of Sunday school—except that, because they have penetrated actual schools, they get to preach at our children five days a week. (Italics in the original)I have read only to page 50 in this book. So far, McWhorter has not adduced any evidence regarding the extent of teaching of critical race theory in the elementary and secondary schools.
McWhorter’s book, so far, impresses me as more polemical than scholarly. After reading the entire book, I may yet be convinced of his arguments. But, so far, it is disappointing from a critical thinking perspective. McWhorter does provide some documentation of the influence of critical race theory in academia and in the media. But up to page 50 in the book, he provides no evidence, other than his bare assertions, of the extent of teaching of critical race theory in pubic elementary and secondary schools.
I am currently writing the chapter on reason and critical thinking in my forthcoming book Reason and Human Ethics. I am trying to practice what I preach. It is an interesting, albeit sometimes laborious, process. I have concluded that critical thinking is a habit of mind. It gets easier as one engages in it, but it is something of a lifelong endeavor.
Note: I deleted my original comment at this location and have now substituted the foregoing post. AEJ, November 26, 2021, 4:55 p.m. US Eastern Standard Time.
December 24, 2021 Note: See also my post 72 (December 24, 2021) here.
Alan wrote: "Brad wrote: "I read Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American most days of the week. Professor Richardson teaches history at Boston College. Some months ago, she shared that “critical rac..."
The point of critical race "theorizing" is not that all white people are racist, but that all people are naturally predisposed to racism, and to blindness regarding systemic expressions and extension of such racism in law, microeconomic choices (including housing segregation) and cultural organization (church, school, sport, etc.). The effect of this tendency in the USA, which was advantaged and largely built by slaves prior to the major European migration, and built on the confiscated land and chattels of indigenous Americans, necessarily centers on European treatments of slavery, Jim Crow and systemic exclusion of minorities throughout its brief history. As such, quibbles about how racism is introduced in schools, educational curricula and public media are increasingly obvious examples of continued systemic racism. It pains me to see so much ink spilled in the delusion that it is a disservice to teach children that a part of their success is owed to past (and potentially present) oppression, all in an attempt to bolster the obvious lie that systemic racism is not a present danger. I am of the opinion that the tempest in this teapot is more than a little addle-pated and symptomatic of Caucasians' actual joint and several discomfort in learning that American exceptionalism is just as likely to be exceptionally evil as exceptionally ethical. It is interesting to note that no black, red, yellow or brown children seem to be afflicted or disaffected by any introduction of "critical race theory" into a lesson plan. All this debate seems to show is that American conservatives writing on the subject have a very superficial and brittle sense of themselves as the beneficiaries of privilege.
Helen's introduction and treatment of this is available on Facebook for any that follow her.
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Thank you, Peter, for your thoughtful comment. I agree that children need to be taught the historical facts about these matters. What John McWhorter seems to be complaining about is the irrationality of the more radical "woke" activists: their dedication to feelings and their rejection of reason, logic, and evidence. I am currently reading chapter 3 of his book, which (unlike earlier chapters) sets forth in some detail actual examples of what he is talking about. McWhorter seems to be objecting to postmodernism as such, though he only makes a couple of references to postmodernism. I recall, when reading Marcuse during the 1960s, that this hero of what was then called the New Left objected to "repressive reason" and proposed to substitute feelings and emotions for it. Like McWhorter, I also disagree with the substitution of emotion for reason and evidence. Now, to what extent such postmodernist doctrines are being taught in elementary and secondary schools is beyond my knowledge and experience. McWhorter claims they are being taught in those venues, but so far (I'm up to page 73), he hasn't offered any evidence of same. He is mostly objecting to the McCarthyite and even Stalinist actions of the extremists in attacking anyone who disagrees with them on the slightest thing as "racist" and then pressuring their employers to fire them. After discussing such episodes, McWhorter states (page 73): “Behind these big words and menacing phrases, as often as not, is logic as sloppy as anything you might hear from a spokesperson for Donald Trump.”
Regret that in my reading so far, including J. McW, I have seen nothing to indicate anything introduced in school texts, recommended lesson plans at any age level that is built on radical exclusion of facts in favor of ideology EXCEPT for the EXTREMIST RIGHT WING Hillsborough Schools curricula (K-12). I will advance my remonstrance more simply: virtually all objections to "CRT" I have read are unsubstantiated talking points of alarmist, anti-intellectual, non-factual propaganda of the first water. You are approaching this from the proper, discursive academic standpoint with the assumption that clarity and accuracy should have an effect on the debate, and your project is clearly sound. I have read enough to satisfy myself that, like so many other features of contemporary Republican positions, there is no possibility of discourse because there is no intent on the part of critics of "CRT" other than the rhetorical rousing of the usual, unreasoning and customary "rabble" that consumes right wing media palaver. [To those Biblically inclined, I cite Matthew 7:5. ] The sensitivity exhibited by the author to condemnation of positions differing with purported champions of "CRT" (however defined), seems quite cynical and indefensible in the face of the once and future systemic racism that belongs in the pedagogical treatment of History generally and American civics in particular. It might be profitable to express "CRT" influenced pedagogy in contrast to Hillsborough whitewashing to identify the cultural signaling that powers the rhetorical positions on either "side".
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I certainly agree that the right-wing attack on CRT is ridiculous and consistent with their evidence-free and logic-free thinking in general.
Professor McWhorter goes overboard in his rhetoric against CRT extremists and (as I've mentioned) cites no evidence (at least to the extent I've read so far in the book) regarding exactly what is taught in the public elementary and secondary schools. But he does cite a lot of examples of CRT extremism in the media and in academia, including the following Facebook response to a friend’s comment that the friend agreed with Black Lives Matter:
Wait a minute! You “agree” with them? That implies you get to disagree with them! That’s like saying you “agree” with the law of gravity! You as a white person don’t get to “agree” OR “disagree” when black people assert something! Saying you “agree” with them is EVERY bit as arrogant as disputing them! This isn’t an intellectual exercise! This is THEIR lives on the line! (page 55)McWhorter also gives many examples of how people’s careers have been ruined by similar minor misdemeanors.
I think the lesson here is that there are crazies at the extremes of all movements. What needs to be done is a careful examination of the evidence, historical and otherwise, followed by concrete proposals to remedy inequity. McWhorter claims that the critical race theory extremists are only interested in their feel-good virtue signaling, not in actual steps that can be taken to address the problems that remain after previous legislative efforts such as the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the 1965 Voting Rights Act, and so forth. That may be true at the extreme, but I don’t know whether he is correct that it accurately characterizes the movement as a whole. Since I have been out of academia for many decades, refuse to get on Twitter, and have no children still in school, my firsthand experience with these matters is nonexistent.
re: #42 and #44 are cogent and eloquent points. I admire --and agree with --Peter's first insight, towards racism being part of the human condition.
But as for me: I know I spent a heckuva long time in college. I dabbled in everything. Speaking from that experience, I myself believe that CRT is an advanced political theory unfit for K-12 age minds. What I'm saying is: I don't believe in politicizing the classroom. The classroom is for grooming and nurturing the mind, not programming it with agendas from either left or right; from either moderns or conservatives.
Strongly-felt though it may be, this outcry for 'historical redress' is still just one perspective. And it is not free from logical flaws. It is also not necessarily 'best practice' as far as early childhood education goes. The foundation of this house is still wet and still a little shaky.
Rightist reactions against CRT may be virulent and that's unfortunate. But there are adverse reactions towards CRT which may be entirely reasonable; and such reason deserves to be considered without insinuations that all whites are insecure about revisionism.
Europeans and European descendants in America actually have a proud tradition of reform, liberalism, progressiveness, and social uplift while the the nation was under construction. Often overlooked.
Additionally, this cold and uncaring nation expended 3/4 of a million white lives for the cause of abolition in the US Civil War.
I have been following the discussion with some interest, and I just want to say as someone who is Taiwanese-American/Chinese-American and center-left, I have been troubled by some of the news about this topic as I have been following it over the last few months. I believe America has a legacy of racism it needs to confront - some of the antiracism efforts just do it in a way I disagree with.I don't have the desire to go back-and-forth on this topic, qualifying my position in the way I would like, but I do want to push back on the idea that the right is baselessly pushing misinformation the way it did with election fraud claims during the 2020 election. There have been a string of stories in the news about antiracism education efforts that would make most moderates like me concerned.
I did a little digging and found this example case:
https://www.fairforall.org/profiles-i...
There is a video on that page you can watch if like me you don't want to go through all the documents.
To repeat a point that Alan raised earlier, I am not sure to what extent stories like this reflect the underlying reality of K-12 education in America as a whole. It is possible the most extreme examples are only happening at a few select private schools, but that these examples manage to distort our understanding because of the attention that is brought on them.
Also, I am open to the idea that antiracism education in general should be even more extreme than the example I shared - I just currently don't believe that right now, given my current state of knowledge.
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Thank you, Allen, for your thoughtful comment and for the link. The teacher's resignation letter represents a model of what liberal education used to be and what it should be. I had no idea that this kind of thing was going on, and I hope it is not occurring in public as well as private schools. I find it ironic that the school's head, a White male, threatened to replace all the White teachers with minority teachers. By this logic, he himself should be replaced. Of course, logic, like evidence, has apparently been thrown out the window in the new way of thinking--postmodernism on steroids!
Alan wrote: "Allen wrote: "I have been following the discussion with some interest, and I just want to say as someone who is Taiwanese-American/Chinese-American and center-left, I have been troubled by some of ..."The general point made in Allen's great contribution is a clear warning that emotive, almost hysterical (often left wing) claims for extreme measures in addressing systemic racism in history and civics classes in public and private schools are at best inappropriate and bellicose at the expense of useful pedagogy.
But the association of this kind of fractious polemic with "CRT" remains without much evidence. A few extreme cases of sociopathic over-reach by anti-racist apologists does not provide a case against teaching about racism's systemic corruption of the teaching of history. I am reminded of the similar high-volume and emotive objections to all affirmative action in colleges of the 1980's. Many honest and caring citizens were then stating that since affirmative action was too often an attempt to legislate a "level playing field" of access to education at the expense of qualified Caucasian (and Asian-American!) through quotas that were unfair to innocent and worthy students otherwise qualified by standardized test scores and grade point averages.
In those cases, there was a real harm and cause of litigation by the clumsy and inhumane AA quotas to the interests of students of all racial profiles. It really did (and still does) taste of despotic social tinkering, and did not produce even the limited results looked for in advancing the cause of minority education. The underlying inequities that result from housing segregation, minority underemployment and poor family structure in inner city "penitentiaries without walls" are still not well addressed.
But with CRT, the perceived harm is the anecdotally supported threat against teachers for not teaching about the pernicious effects of systemic racism in poorly defined and poorly evidenced curricula. And the clamor for correction against this perceived (and poorly defined) injury is for the eradication not of teaching "CRT" (which is chimerical: there is no such thing), but for the silencing of curricula that presents the FACTS of systemic racism in the classroom as if (1) such racism does not exist; and (2) teaching such uncomfortable subjects would negatively affect the civic unity of American citizens in a way that injures the students.
While it is clear that extremism does not belong in the classroom (school should indoctrinate critical thinking, not obedience to any religious or political ideology per se), that is not the reason why the conservative public is enervated by the anti-CRT polemic in the media. We should be as disgusted with left-wing despotism just as much as by right-wing racist apologetics. But I find the incredibly poor and amnesiac history text books in prescribed use in public and private schools (e.g.: in Texas where all schools are obligated to use specific texts that obscure most issues regarding slavery, race, immigration, etc.) much more dangerous and worrisome than anything suggested or proposed by rational minds in light of the academic discussion of critical race theory. The entire project, and Mr. McWhorter's cautionary approach seems to me to echo childish fears of the thing under the bed. And that thing is the racism that we all must confront in ourselves no matter what our pigmentation. Not teaching about the pervasive and pernicious causes and effects of racism is far more dangerous than the discomfiture of children or their parents in revealing the pertinent history which has been for generations missing in textbooks.
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"The entire project, and Mr. McWhorter's cautionary approach seems to me to echo childish fears of the thing under the bed. And that thing is the racism that we all must confront in ourselves no matter what our pigmentation."
McWhorter is Black, by the way. He has no need to look under the bed to find racism.
We need to find out exactly what and where CRT is being taught in K-12. The Right Wing has become expert at misrepresenting ideas they don't like. On the other hand, I have felt the sting of being attacked on social media after asking a Black candidate a question that was perceived as racist. I apologized.
In part to atone for my sin, I attended an anti-racism seminar where the book "White Fragility" was discussed. According to the author, all Whites are guilty of racism, even if they lead exemplary lives, avoid microaggressions, and apologize when they have sinned. And don't cry for us (Blacks) by the way. We don't need your White tears. One White woman at the seminar, a Unitarian minister, confessed to crying about the George Floyd tragedy. She apologized for crying! I'm sorry, but this is a religion.
History must be taught accurately, warts and all, including the horrific racism that has dominated our history. There has to be a way to teach it without providing easy targets for Right Wing fear-mongering.
Political Philosophy and Ethics
Books mentioned in this topic
The Four Loves (other topics)The Four Loves (other topics)
The Reading Life: The Joy of Seeing New Worlds Through Others' Eyes (other topics)
The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting up a Generation for Failure (other topics)
White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism (other topics)
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https://www.wesa.fm/education/2021-11...
December 25, 2021 Note: For additional discussion of educational matters, see the topic “Civics and History Education”. I inadvertently created these two separate topics on education. Arguably, they should have been one topic, but it is too late now to consolidate them, as posts regarding education have been filed in each location.