Don2 (Don1 Revised)
Contributor
A quick review--the Juneteenth thread, meant to discuss celebration and positive things quickly got derailed several times, one time including an attack on Joy Reid for mentioning anti-anti-racist legislation across some dozen of states. The legislation chills teaching in states like Texas and Oklahoma because the legislation goes too far and has terrible wording. The purported intent is to go after Critical Race Theory that the right-wing is propagandizing but the true effect is to remove teaching about modern racism, which in some instances can only be seen through a lens of counter-whitesplaining back at teachers and professors. In one case, nothing can be taught that might make a white person uncomfortable. In another case, nothing can be taught that might use a concept of one race being superior in a current event...so you can't talk about racism producing George Floyd's murder, for example.
Conservatives are free to argue with me on any of these points, but the reason I have put this review in is because of a recent news story.
To be clear, the class does NOT teach critical race theory, does NOT teach white people that they are guilty of crimes against humanity, does NOT use the phrase critical race theory, but DID teach about racism and discrimination.
Emphasis added.
BUT, the new law states:
There are too many conservatives who will make the jump that any mention of a concept of privilege or white privilege is there to make all white people bad or to create white guilt. And the fact that it may make some students uncomfortable, even if the idea of privilege is taught factually, creates tremendous financial risk to the school.
Therefore, this school is taking an innocuous course offline to see how things play out and what the resolutions will be. So much for "free speech advocates."
Conservatives are free to argue with me on any of these points, but the reason I have put this review in is because of a recent news story.
[Professor Melissa] Smith learned her fully enrolled class at Oklahoma City Community College was canceled for the summer. It’s been her primary course for several years.
“[After] learning more about HB/SB 1775 and how it essentially revokes any ability to teach critical race theory, including discussions of white privilege, from required courses in Oklahoma … we recognized that HB/SB 1775 would require substantial changes to the curriculum for this class particularly,” Erick Worrell, a spokesman for the college, wrote in an email Friday to The Washington Post.
Worrell said the course is not gone, but “paused.” The college believes in teaching about racism, he said. But administrators wanted “more time to get this right — or to let the legal issues play out with other universities and colleges before we teach it again in its current form.”
To be clear, the class does NOT teach critical race theory, does NOT teach white people that they are guilty of crimes against humanity, does NOT use the phrase critical race theory, but DID teach about racism and discrimination.
[The former] syllabus DID ask students to learn about racial inequality in the United States — from health to criminal justice to housing — and to “recognize the extent of privilege, prejudice, and discrimination in our society.”
Emphasis added.
...Smith, who is White, said Friday it is “just ridiculous” that her course apparently cannot teach about White privilege if Oklahoma’s law remains in place.
She said she typically tackles the subject with lots of questions: “What is your definition of privilege? What does that mean?” She also remembered giving students example of privilege from her own life and seeing “the lightbulb go off.”
“That is what I’m sad won’t be happening,” she said.
BUT, the new law states:
No teacher, administrator or other employee of a school district, charter school or virtual charter school shall require or make part of a course the following concepts:
... any individual should feel discomfort, guilt, anguish or any other form of psychological distress on account of his or her race or sex, ...
There are too many conservatives who will make the jump that any mention of a concept of privilege or white privilege is there to make all white people bad or to create white guilt. And the fact that it may make some students uncomfortable, even if the idea of privilege is taught factually, creates tremendous financial risk to the school.
Therefore, this school is taking an innocuous course offline to see how things play out and what the resolutions will be. So much for "free speech advocates."