Don’t let political divisions destroy American education
Critical Race Theory (CRT), Project 1619, and ethnic studies are being incorporated in public school curriculums all over America. It’s another outcome of social justice advocacy. Those that object to any of the content, which oddly tends to be conservatives, are branded racists or even fascists. It’s odd because there should be some things that all Americans agree on -- like not teaching hatred of other Americans or America.
Something else Americans should agree on is that America today is not America yesterday. One giant change is increasing diversity. The estimated white population in 1700 was 95%, in 1863 87%, 1989 76%, and 2020 60% non-Hispanic white. In more than half of American cities and six states, there is no white majority. California and Texas, the two most populated states, have minority majorities. For this America, must be congratulated. There is no nation in the world where the majority population has encouraged the dilution of its presence to the point of losing it. Another big change is the transformation of America from a racist nation before 1964 to a leading anti-racist nation with the most successful minorities in the world. No nation has transformed so quickly. Indeed, most nations haven’t transformed at all. They see discrimination as a useful way to order societies. For this too, America must be congratulated.
Americans should also agree that if America’s public education system hasn’t kept up with the needs of an increasingly diverse population, this needs to change. But new curriculums should not be based on untested theories, like CRT, verified erroneous history like Project 1619, and ethnic studies that exclude some marginalized groups.
Introduced in 1989, CRT is anti-American and anti-white. It is a conspiracy theory advancing that whites are obsessed with maintaining a superior position in society to ensure the inferiority of non-whites. It has strong ties to Marxism. CRT is used to predict and explain racism. Explaining and predicting is something all tested theories can do. The problem for CRT is that it is not tested. The validation of CRT is done by telling selected stories. We are a nation that believes is science, but not when it comes to this extremely important subject. But the uber stories in America disprove CRT. If whites are ensuring the inferiority of non-whites, why are Asian-Americans the most educated and prosperous ethnic group in America. How could Latino GDP be higher than every Latino nation, including Brazil with three times the population? How could blacks be the most educated and prosperous black population in the world? How could there be a two-term black president, a black and Asian female vice president, fifty-seven current black Congress people, and black mayors running 1/3rd of the 100 largest American cities. Because CRT is a canard. In history, it may have explained some behaviors much as analog theories for Chinese, Russian, Muslim, Arab, and the Ashanti would.
Project 1619 is based on CRT. As such, this history curriculum is based on selected stories that often play fast and loose with the truth. The 1619 goal is to make slavery the centerpiece of American history, comparable to the Germans making the Holocaust the centerpiece of their history, or China the Cultural Revolution. The architect of America’s new history is a NY Times journalist. This explains the unusual approach to America’s new history. Some of America’s most prestigious historians have pointed to over 100 falsities, exaggerations, outright lies, salient omissions, and the complete absence of context. Some of them are real whoppers, like America inventing chattel slavery, America being founded in 1619, and the American Revolution not being fought for democracy but rather for slavocracy.
Ethnic studies per the newly approved California curriculum is similarly based on CRT and shares the notion of white and conditionally white people (“acting white),” as a perpetual enemy of those who are not. It focuses on the selected historically marginalized people of African Americans, Chicano/Latinos, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders and Native Americans. There is room for modification, but attention to those grouped in the amorphous blob of white, like Irish, Polish, Italian, and other indigent white groups isn’t mentioned. They may have faced horrendous oppression, but per ethnic studies they are white oppressors, colonizers, privileged, hegemonic, and genocidaires. Someone would be hard pressed to come up with a more damning and harmful and false stereotype for white people.
Multiple ancillary outcomes should be anticipated from all of the above. Marginalization is hardly a white to non-white phenomenon. The stated goal of liberalizing non-whites will fall dramatically short for females who can instinctively attribute discrimination to racism when it is ethnic-blind sexism. Why is there no gender-studies mandate? Finally, there will be a rise in anti-Americanism here and in the world if there is no mandate for a course on discrimination around the world that offers comparative context.
CRT, Project 1619, and some ethnic studies programs ostensibly want to address America’s Eurocentric teaching and history. That’s a good goal, but why foment racism toward white and anti-Americanism? A war on white people? There are no white kids going to school that had anything to do with slavery, Jim Crow, the Chinese Exclusion Act, or any other objectionable historical acts, and they never would have supported them. White kids are people too, and America’s security, like every nation relies on patriotism. Schools shouldn’t be in cahoots with Chinese and Russian propagandists to destroy patriotism that risks national security.
American power was essential to ending white supremacy in the world and to securing commitments from all nations to end discrimination. White Americans uniquely voluntarily gave up their lock on power and supported the rise of a diverse equality-oriented leading anti-racist nation. This should be part of any revised curriculums in history or ethnic studies, because this has never been taught either. Including this promotes unity and patriotism rather than division and anti-Americanism. Building unity among all children in America will translate into national unity. This has to be something else we can all agree on.