Critical Race Theory
- Thread starter acri1
- Start date
Democrats can never figure out that optics matter. All some people will ever know about an issue is the headline.
DrBanneker
Space is the Place
Interesting article (though it is a journal article not popular press so it can take a good 20 minutes to read). It compares the culture wars in schools today to the Red Scare against schools in the 1950s. I realize they aren't making this up, just rehashing an old playbook that kinda worked back then.
Some key gems from the article:
The most notable ‘red scare’ critic arguably was Allen A. Zoll who venomously used his
organization, the National Council for American Education (NCAE), to assail public
education (Hulburd, 1951; Skaife, 1953; Morris, 1976). By appeals to the patriotic
loyalties of many influential politicians and wealthy businessmen, Zoll operated a well-
financed and strikingly effective organization in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Employing revealing titles such as, ‘How Red are the Schools?’ ‘Progressive Education
Increases Delinquency,’ ‘They Want Your Child,’ and ‘Awake, America, Awake, and Pray!’
Zoll’s organization circulated in massive quantity publications critical of public education
throughout the United States.
---
Little doubt remains that, directly or indirectly, right-wing groups had a profound impact
on all aspects of American public education (Caute, 1978; Zilversmit, 1993; Fariello, 1995;
Foster, 1997, 2000; Beineke, 1998). As a result of nationwide educational purges and state
and congressional investigating committees, hundreds of teachers lost their jobs. Others
lived in a state of constant anxiety through fear of dismissal or worried for loss of their
professional integrity and their status in the local community. For many, the trauma and
uncertainty of the times strained personal and family relations, led to marriage break-ups
and, in some cases, prompted suicides (Caute, 1978; Iversen, 1959; Schrecker, 1986;
Kransdorf, 1994).
Although these teacher dismissals remain dramatic, arguably the most troublesome aspect
of the period was the political and educational climate that they induced. As University of
Chicago Chancellor Robert Maynard Hutchins noted in 1954, ‘The question is not how
many teachers have been fired, but how many think they might be . . . You don’t have to fire
many teachers to intimidate them all. The entire teaching profession of the US is
intimidated’ (Hutchins, 1954, p. 2). A survey of teachers in Houston, Texas, for example,
revealed an alarming atmosphere of fear and intimidation among these members of the
teaching profession. Indeed, 58% of the Houston teachers sampled indicated that political
groups had exerted intense pressure on them to slant the curriculum toward a certain
political belief and more than 40% of Houston teachers expected to lose their job for
expressing their personal political views (National Commission for the Defense of
Democracy Through Education, 1954; Craig, 2002).
----
By 1950, for example, state legislatures passed
more than 300 laws dealing with subversive practices, thirty states mandated loyalty oaths
for teachers and many conducted invasive investigations into alleged communist activities in
the schools (Iversen, 1959; Caute, 1978; Schrecker, 1986; Kransdorf, 1994).
Some key gems from the article:
The most notable ‘red scare’ critic arguably was Allen A. Zoll who venomously used his
organization, the National Council for American Education (NCAE), to assail public
education (Hulburd, 1951; Skaife, 1953; Morris, 1976). By appeals to the patriotic
loyalties of many influential politicians and wealthy businessmen, Zoll operated a well-
financed and strikingly effective organization in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
Employing revealing titles such as, ‘How Red are the Schools?’ ‘Progressive Education
Increases Delinquency,’ ‘They Want Your Child,’ and ‘Awake, America, Awake, and Pray!’
Zoll’s organization circulated in massive quantity publications critical of public education
throughout the United States.
---
Little doubt remains that, directly or indirectly, right-wing groups had a profound impact
on all aspects of American public education (Caute, 1978; Zilversmit, 1993; Fariello, 1995;
Foster, 1997, 2000; Beineke, 1998). As a result of nationwide educational purges and state
and congressional investigating committees, hundreds of teachers lost their jobs. Others
lived in a state of constant anxiety through fear of dismissal or worried for loss of their
professional integrity and their status in the local community. For many, the trauma and
uncertainty of the times strained personal and family relations, led to marriage break-ups
and, in some cases, prompted suicides (Caute, 1978; Iversen, 1959; Schrecker, 1986;
Kransdorf, 1994).
Although these teacher dismissals remain dramatic, arguably the most troublesome aspect
of the period was the political and educational climate that they induced. As University of
Chicago Chancellor Robert Maynard Hutchins noted in 1954, ‘The question is not how
many teachers have been fired, but how many think they might be . . . You don’t have to fire
many teachers to intimidate them all. The entire teaching profession of the US is
intimidated’ (Hutchins, 1954, p. 2). A survey of teachers in Houston, Texas, for example,
revealed an alarming atmosphere of fear and intimidation among these members of the
teaching profession. Indeed, 58% of the Houston teachers sampled indicated that political
groups had exerted intense pressure on them to slant the curriculum toward a certain
political belief and more than 40% of Houston teachers expected to lose their job for
expressing their personal political views (National Commission for the Defense of
Democracy Through Education, 1954; Craig, 2002).
----
By 1950, for example, state legislatures passed
more than 300 laws dealing with subversive practices, thirty states mandated loyalty oaths
for teachers and many conducted invasive investigations into alleged communist activities in
the schools (Iversen, 1959; Caute, 1978; Schrecker, 1986; Kransdorf, 1994).
The more I learn about it the more I support it. Derrick bell had the world shook.
Json
Superstar
It’s just a game to get in power and stagnant actual issues
Secure Da Bag
Veteran
A Lesson on Critical Race Theory
Coined by legal scholar Kimberlé Crenshaw, Critical Race Theory is the practice of interrogating race and racism in society that emerged in the legal academy and spread to other fields of scholarship.