Mixed-race student brings lawsuit against charter school for mandatory CRT content.

[Politesse]

Your points about the origins of CRT are informative, and I accept them.

It may be that of late especially, either CRT has morphed somewhat, or other ideas which are not strictly-speaking 'CRT proper' have become attached and mingled with them.

It was never a unified whole, more a paradigm. Especially after Bell retired and passed on, eight years ago.

Just out of curiosity, where did Whiteness Studies originate? From the same black guys, or from different black guys?

ps I can only hope you read my appallingly belated edits when I'm replying to you.

All my best nuggets of insight are late arrivals. Or so I like to delude myself. Lol.

For me to complain about ninja edits would be the height of hypocrisy.

I would describe those two paradigms as separate but permeable, as they both arose around the same time (the early 1980s), but in different places and in different home disciplines. Certain works would surely be read by someone studying under either aegis- Baldwin, Allen, Bell himself. Unlike CRT, Whiteness studies were not meant to primarily address the situation in the US, being centered in part at British universities from the beginning and capturing a more global sense of "whiteness" and "blackness" that go beyond the questions of American politics. They tend to focus on cultural construction of whiteness and white identity more so than social construction of racist insitutions as per CRT. It is invariably asking questions about personal identity in a way that critical theory (of anything) purposefully does not. But, there is plenty of overlap and shared projects I am also certain.

 

[ruby sparks]

Just out of curiosity, where did Whiteness Studies originate? From the same black guys, or from different black guys?

ps I can only hope you read my appallingly belated edits when I'm replying to you.

All my best nuggets of insight are late arrivals. Or so I like to delude myself. Lol.

Maybe from the white passing Jewish guy Noel Ignatiev:

https://www.latimes.com/obituaries/story/2019-11-11/noel-ignatiev-dies-race-whiteness

View attachment 31019

I see he wrote a book in which he claimed that Immigrant (to America) Irish were not initially considered 'white', until the mid 19th C.

That sounds more than a bit dubious. I think 3 of them (who had been born in Ireland) were signatories to the Declaration of Independence.

 

[ruby sparks]

Just out of curiosity, where did Whiteness Studies originate? From the same black guys, or from different black guys?

ps I can only hope you read my appallingly belated edits when I'm replying to you.

All my best nuggets of insight are late arrivals. Or so I like to delude myself. Lol.

For me to complain about ninja edits would be the height of hypocrisy.

I would describe those two paradigms as separate but permeable, as they both arose around the same time (the early 1980s), but in different places and in different home disciplines. Certain works would surely be read by someone studying under either aegis- Baldwin, Allen, Bell himself. Unlike CRT, Whiteness studies were not meant to primarily address the situation in the US, being centered in part at British universities from the beginning and capturing a more global sense of "whiteness" and "blackness" that go beyond the questions of American politics. They tend to focus on cultural construction of whiteness and white identity more so than social construction of racist insitutions as per CRT. It is invariably asking questions about personal identity in a way that critical theory (of anything) purposefully does not. But, there is plenty of overlap and shared projects I am also certain.

Thanks. Noted.

I was in the interim trying to think of historical counter-examples to the idea that it was unrealistic to expect white people to be the main instigators of racial change.......and I thought of the Quakers and abolitionism.

Now, don't get me wrong, Im certainly not saying that African Americans nowadays should just wait for whitey to go all Jesus about the issue.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The problem is that it's all but impossible to fix background. Blaming racism provides an "easy" fix whose costs are supposedly borne only by the evildoers and thus don't matter.

Definitely not what an expert in critical race theory would recommend. The whole point of shifting the direction of study away from individual culpability is to understand how racist institutions function as whole structures. "Fault" is irrelevant, the system needs to be documented and challeneged as a communal social production in which all actors are relevant. Indeed, I think most writers in this genre see people of color, explicitly not whites, as the parties most able to change the way the system functions. The king can't dissolve the monarchy, that's the job of the proletariat.

CRT is starting with the assumption that racism is the cause, thus it can't be used to prove anything about racism.

There are some true racists and I have no problem with punishing them but disparate results is a hopelessly inadequate way to find them.

Accepting injury without protest is a completely inadequate way to challenge the common belief that such offenses are acceptable, earned, or "trivial". Again, this obsession with guilt and personal culpability is distracting from the actual problems, preventing true inequlaities from being addressed by derailing the conversation into a discussion about the aggrieved feelings of the accused, in which it is assumed but never stated that the feelings of the accused should be considered more important or more justified than those of their original victim. This was literally the central thesis of White Fragility, the book all the conservatives are so afraid of but haven't read.

You are still assuming without proof.

I'm reminded of the woman I used to know who was diagnosed as an alcoholic. Her denials were taken as evidence she was in denial rather than the reality that she didn't drink.

(The problem: A screening question "Have you ever lost friends due to alcohol?" She answered yes. Note that the question does not ask whose alcohol use--she had lost friends due to them becoming alcoholics.)

 

[Trausti]

CRT is starting with the assumption that racism is the cause, thus it can't be used to prove anything about racism.

 Cargo_cult_science

 

[Toni]

CRT is starting with the assumption that racism is the cause, thus it can't be used to prove anything about racism.

There are some true racists and I have no problem with punishing them but disparate results is a hopelessly inadequate way to find them.

Accepting injury without protest is a completely inadequate way to challenge the common belief that such offenses are acceptable, earned, or "trivial". Again, this obsession with guilt and personal culpability is distracting from the actual problems, preventing true inequlaities from being addressed by derailing the conversation into a discussion about the aggrieved feelings of the accused, in which it is assumed but never stated that the feelings of the accused should be considered more important or more justified than those of their original victim. This was literally the central thesis of White Fragility, the book all the conservatives are so afraid of but haven't read.

You are still assuming without proof.

I'm reminded of the woman I used to know who was diagnosed as an alcoholic. Her denials were taken as evidence she was in denial rather than the reality that she didn't drink.

(The problem: A screening question "Have you ever lost friends due to alcohol?" She answered yes. Note that the question does not ask whose alcohol use--she had lost friends due to them becoming alcoholics.)

You are assuming without proof.

In fact, there are multiple studies that back up Politesse's position.

 

[Politesse]

Wasn't aware I had a position. I've been trying to be relatively in outlining the school and its history.

 

[Bomb#20]

Definitely not what an expert in critical race theory would recommend. The whole point of shifting the direction of study away from individual culpability is to understand how racist institutions function as whole structures. "Fault" is irrelevant, the system needs to be documented and challeneged as a communal social production in which all actors are relevant.
...
Again, this obsession with guilt and personal culpability is distracting from the actual problems, preventing true inequlaities from being addressed by derailing the conversation into a discussion about the aggrieved feelings of the accused, in which it is assumed but never stated that the feelings of the accused should be considered more important or more justified than those of

Nice theory; but it's completely disingenuous. Fault is totally relevant, because the very people insisting it's irrelevant are in point of fact obsessed with fault and are basing their entire case on it. All this talk of "the aggrieved feelings of the accused", all this criticizing the accused for assuming their feelings are important, is nothing but a schoolyard bully saying "Oh, is poor baby going to cry now?" after he beats you up. The bullies who push this garbage always give themselves away...

their[sic] original victim.

...like that.

If you truly thought personal culpability was irrelevant, you wouldn't have made a point of claiming the people aggrieved about being accused are in fact personally culpable.

 

[Jokodo]

Definitely not what an expert in critical race theory would recommend. The whole point of shifting the direction of study away from individual culpability is to understand how racist institutions function as whole structures. "Fault" is irrelevant, the system needs to be documented and challeneged as a communal social production in which all actors are relevant.
...
Again, this obsession with guilt and personal culpability is distracting from the actual problems, preventing true inequlaities from being addressed by derailing the conversation into a discussion about the aggrieved feelings of the accused, in which it is assumed but never stated that the feelings of the accused should be considered more important or more justified than those of

Nice theory; but it's completely disingenuous. Fault is totally relevant, because the very people insisting it's irrelevant are in point of fact obsessed with fault and are basing their entire case on it. All this talk of "the aggrieved feelings of the accused", all this criticizing the accused for assuming their feelings are important, is nothing but a schoolyard bully saying "Oh, is poor baby going to cry now?" after he beats you up. The bullies who push this garbage always give themselves away...

their[sic] original victim.

...like that.

If you truly thought personal culpability was irrelevant, you wouldn't have made a point of claiming the people aggrieved about being accused are in fact personally culpable.

What's diaengineous is the way you twist words to mean what you want them to mean without regard for the author's clear intention and explanation.

 

[ruby sparks]

Personally, I thought it was very good catch by Bomb#20.

That doesn't mean I go along with the bullying analogy though. I wouldn't. I just mean the selling of the 'it's not about fault' thing, which to me was obviously a bit.....hard to buy.

Note that I am still able to agree that CRT is perhaps somewhat less, relatively speaking, about personal fault than some other approaches.

And I think poli has a point about the conversation in some cases being (inappropriately) switched to having the wrong emphasis (the aggrieved feelings of the accused).

But imo the cat did nonetheless come out of the bag regarding blame.

 

[Politesse]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists, not whether individual actors within the system feel personally guilty/aggrieved/sad/angry about it except insofar as those feelings play a role in reproducing and reinforcing racist institutions (which they do). You do have the power to create consicous changes to the patterns of social interaction if you and others apply yourselves to the project, but it's not as simple as "feeling like" you are doing so or wanting to do so; the fundamental ideas of your culture must be critically considered and rejected, and the material circumstances that drive inequalities forcibly reversed. This is not impossible, but is much harder and therefore less likely, for the recipient of social privilege to do as it is against human nature to strive consistently against one's own wellbeing, or even to risk it. It is easier to cultivate a feeling of anti-racism than to truly challenge empirically observeable material bases of inequalities.

I note that "Critical Theory" in the social sciences has always meant the same fundamental thing: the holistic study of the power structures constructed within social institutions, inclusive of but not defined by the actions and thoughts of individual actors. Critical Race Theory is an application of this general methodology, not, as some here would seem to have it, a challenge to its most basic tenet.

 

[Toni]

Just out of curiosity, where did Whiteness Studies originate? From the same black guys, or from different black guys?

ps I can only hope you read my appallingly belated edits when I'm replying to you.

All my best nuggets of insight are late arrivals. Or so I like to delude myself. Lol.

For me to complain about ninja edits would be the height of hypocrisy.

I would describe those two paradigms as separate but permeable, as they both arose around the same time (the early 1980s), but in different places and in different home disciplines. Certain works would surely be read by someone studying under either aegis- Baldwin, Allen, Bell himself. Unlike CRT, Whiteness studies were not meant to primarily address the situation in the US, being centered in part at British universities from the beginning and capturing a more global sense of "whiteness" and "blackness" that go beyond the questions of American politics. They tend to focus on cultural construction of whiteness and white identity more so than social construction of racist insitutions as per CRT. It is invariably asking questions about personal identity in a way that critical theory (of anything) purposefully does not. But, there is plenty of overlap and shared projects I am also certain.

Thanks. Noted.

I was in the interim trying to think of historical counter-examples to the idea that it was unrealistic to expect white people to be the main instigators of racial change.......and I thought of the Quakers and abolitionism.

Now, don't get me wrong, Im certainly not saying that African Americans nowadays should just wait for whitey to go all Jesus about the issue.

Quakers and abolitionists did not start the anti-slavery movement. There had been slave rebellions as well as freed slaves and never slave blacks in the US since very early on and perhaps before the US was the US. But the abolitionist movement required the buy in of whites in order to progress just as the Civil Rights movement required the buy in of whites in order to progress and todays' civil rights still and will always require the buy in of at least some white people. After all, white (male) people have been the ones in power for centuries. End to injustice requires at least a partial buy in of those who benefit from the injustice. This, btw, is NOT about how nothing works until white people give their approval and agree. It's about the need for those in power to wake up and acknowledge and be willing to change what has unfairly given them the advantages and the off group disadvantages.

 

[Toni]

Personally, I thought it was very good catch by Bomb#20.

That doesn't mean I go along with the bullying analogy though. I wouldn't. I just mean the selling of the 'it's not about fault' thing, which to me was obviously a bit.....hard to buy.

Note that I am still able to agree that CRT is perhaps somewhat less, relatively speaking, about personal fault than some other approaches.

And I think poli has a point about the conversation in some cases being (inappropriately) switched to having the wrong emphasis (the aggrieved feelings of the accused).

But imo the cat did nonetheless come out of the bag regarding blame.

I didn't think it was any kind of 'catch' at all.

Politesse does an excellent job of describing and elucidating the points in his posts throughout. See especially #71.

 

[Trausti]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists

CRT assumes racism is the cause of all inequality and cannot be falsified. Thus, it’s not science.

 

[ZiprHead]

I dunno.

My schools had requirements I didn't like. Part of education is learning that sometimes you have to do things you really really don't want to do in order to achieve a goal.
Tom

Yeah, people have to deal with that in the workplace too. Every year, having to fill out the evaluation form. Where do you see yourself in five years? What are your goals for the upcoming year? 90 percent of the workers can't answer honestly because "Do my job, get my pay, go home at five." isn't a career enhancing statement.

Oh, I see.

So, if your workplace sent you on compulsory courses saying that people from certain groups were inherently corrupt, that'd be a-okay with you?

Good thing that's not what's happening here.

 

[Politesse]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists

CRT assumes racism is the cause of all inequality and cannot be falsified. Thus, it’s not science.

??? That's definitely not the case. That doesn't even make sense. How would racism create, for instance, gender inequalities?

 

[repoman]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists, not whether individual actors within the system feel personally guilty/aggrieved/sad/angry about it except insofar as those feelings play a role in reproducing and reinforcing racist institutions (which they do). You do have the power to create consicous changes to the patterns of social interaction if you and others apply yourselves to the project, but it's not as simple as "feeling like" you are doing so or wanting to do so; the fundamental ideas of your culture must be critically considered and rejected, and the material circumstances that drive inequalities forcibly reversed. This is not impossible, but is much harder and therefore less likely, for the recipient of social privilege to do as it is against human nature to strive consistently against one's own wellbeing, or even to risk it. It is easier to cultivate a feeling of anti-racism than to truly challenge empirically observeable material bases of inequalities.

I note that "Critical Theory" in the social sciences has always meant the same fundamental thing: the holistic study of the power structures constructed within social institutions, inclusive of but not defined by the actions and thoughts of individual actors. Critical Race Theory is an application of this general methodology, not, as some here would seem to have it, a challenge to its most basic tenet.

So bring in CRT advisors for a large company that fucks over its employees and the general public on a non racial basis.

This is both public relations and a new form of buying indulgences.

 

[Trausti]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists, not whether individual actors within the system feel personally guilty/aggrieved/sad/angry about it except insofar as those feelings play a role in reproducing and reinforcing racist institutions (which they do). You do have the power to create consicous changes to the patterns of social interaction if you and others apply yourselves to the project, but it's not as simple as "feeling like" you are doing so or wanting to do so; the fundamental ideas of your culture must be critically considered and rejected, and the material circumstances that drive inequalities forcibly reversed. This is not impossible, but is much harder and therefore less likely, for the recipient of social privilege to do as it is against human nature to strive consistently against one's own wellbeing, or even to risk it. It is easier to cultivate a feeling of anti-racism than to truly challenge empirically observeable material bases of inequalities.

I note that "Critical Theory" in the social sciences has always meant the same fundamental thing: the holistic study of the power structures constructed within social institutions, inclusive of but not defined by the actions and thoughts of individual actors. Critical Race Theory is an application of this general methodology, not, as some here would seem to have it, a challenge to its most basic tenet.

So bring in CRT advisors for a large company that fucks over its employees and the general public on a non racial basis.

This is both public relations and a new form of buying indulgences.

It’s sad that those who push CRT fail to appreciate how similar to religion it is.

 

[Politesse]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists, not whether individual actors within the system feel personally guilty/aggrieved/sad/angry about it except insofar as those feelings play a role in reproducing and reinforcing racist institutions (which they do). You do have the power to create consicous changes to the patterns of social interaction if you and others apply yourselves to the project, but it's not as simple as "feeling like" you are doing so or wanting to do so; the fundamental ideas of your culture must be critically considered and rejected, and the material circumstances that drive inequalities forcibly reversed. This is not impossible, but is much harder and therefore less likely, for the recipient of social privilege to do as it is against human nature to strive consistently against one's own wellbeing, or even to risk it. It is easier to cultivate a feeling of anti-racism than to truly challenge empirically observeable material bases of inequalities.

I note that "Critical Theory" in the social sciences has always meant the same fundamental thing: the holistic study of the power structures constructed within social institutions, inclusive of but not defined by the actions and thoughts of individual actors. Critical Race Theory is an application of this general methodology, not, as some here would seem to have it, a challenge to its most basic tenet.

So bring in CRT advisors for a large company that fucks over its employees and the general public on a non racial basis.

This is both public relations and a new form of buying indulgences.

Well, I do agree with the last five words of that post. I don't think large corporations are necessarily acting in good faith when they bring in diversity coaches and the like. That's not the fault of Critical Race Theory, though, which never proposed in the first place that mandatory diversity trainings would ameliorate racism. A corporation in a substantive position to genuinely address racial inequalities, but doing so is much more expensive than hiring some popular self-help author to come and preach for the weekend, so CRT would in fact predict that they would prefer to do the latter rather than the former, thus actually perpetuating the system that the training is supposedly combating by giving the policymakers involved the comforting feeling that they have "done something" and their investors comfortable insurance against credible claims of intentional racism that might drive away consumers (or potential students, in this case), without taking actions that would, for instance, insure wage equality or guarantee that their beneficial products made it to all markets at an affordable price regardless of whether racialized inequities would make doing so unprofitable.

Wow, that's a long ass sentence. I probably should have put a period in there somewhere.

 

[ruby sparks]

If your thesis is that racism is a communal product of an unequal society, people can be victimized by others without those others consciously intending to harm anyone per se, and if they do intend harm that isn't ncessarily the only or even most important factor producing inequality. From a CRT perspective, the question to determine is whether a structural inequality exists, not whether individual actors within the system feel personally guilty/aggrieved/sad/angry about it except insofar as those feelings play a role in reproducing and reinforcing racist institutions (which they do). You do have the power to create consicous changes to the patterns of social interaction if you and others apply yourselves to the project, but it's not as simple as "feeling like" you are doing so or wanting to do so; the fundamental ideas of your culture must be critically considered and rejected, and the material circumstances that drive inequalities forcibly reversed. This is not impossible, but is much harder and therefore less likely, for the recipient of social privilege to do as it is against human nature to strive consistently against one's own wellbeing, or even to risk it. It is easier to cultivate a feeling of anti-racism than to truly challenge empirically observeable material bases of inequalities.

I note that "Critical Theory" in the social sciences has always meant the same fundamental thing: the holistic study of the power structures constructed within social institutions, inclusive of but not defined by the actions and thoughts of individual actors. Critical Race Theory is an application of this general methodology, not, as some here would seem to have it, a challenge to its most basic tenet.

Fair enough. But the largely missing ingredient in CRT and the like, as far as I can see, is criticism (or critical analysis) of non-whites.

I earlier asked if something like John McWhorter's critiques, for example, had been integrated into CRT yet. I was only half-joking.