Just Sociology Tings: critical race theory

As of now, 18 states have passed some form of legislation that has banned the teaching of critical race theory  —  CRT for short — in public schools. For years now, the discussion surrounding CRT has been a very contentious one, with most of the arguments criticizing it relying heavily on inaccurate analysis and data. 

I firmly believe that education is one of the most powerful tools available. So in order to help people understand that CRT is oftentimes misrepresented by the critics attacking it, it’s important to fully dissect what CRT actually entails. 

CRT is not a new concept and originated in the 1970s and 80s. With the theory championing the idea that race is a social construct, it places a lot of emphasis on the idea that race is embedded in our nation's foundation and inner workings as well as the mundane interactions and interpersonal connections we share everyday. 

I wouldn’t be so quick to dismiss this theory either. America was expanded upon at the expense of the genocide of Indigenous people by the millions. On top of that, millions more of my ancestors were forcibly taken from their homes and brought to this nation, only to be subjected to a life of servitude and inhumane treatment. All of the men at the Constitutional Convention were white, and 17 out of the 55 delegates owned slaves. 

This nation was formed by men who viewed my people as property.  While many of the founders acknowledged slavery as a necessary evil and anticipated emancipation  — Thomas Jefferson went as far as to describe it as a "hideous blot" —  they refused to include our freedom in their fight for independence and ultimately upheld the institution of slavery rather than tearing it down. 

Despite there being so much evidence that points towards this nation having racist rudiments, so many people will avoid having any sort of productive conversation about race, largely due to white fragility. 

While I have not read Robin DiAngelo’s book titled “White Fragility” — I have to pay for the book and I don’t trust my attention span enough to make such a purchase — I will be explaining some of the ideas that she presents in her book. I also want to acknowledge that, while the origin of the term “white fragility” is often attributed to DiAngelo, the concepts and ideas that she expands upon are all things that Black scholars and activists have been preaching for years. 

DiAngelo explains white fragility as white people’s tendency to get uncomfortable whenever the topic of race is brought to the forefront of a conversation. Rather than trying to figure out the ways in which racism impacts every aspect of our lives, many white people dance around the issue as a means of preserving their morally upright self-image. 

The conclusion that I came to about why this is, deals very heavily with America’s obsession with individualism. Generally speaking, we have this tendency to conflate racism to just an institutional problem rather than both an institutional and interpersonal issue. This, coupled with many people’s tendency to deny the existence of systemic racism, leaves us with the inability to recognize that interpersonal relationships affect our institutions and vice versa.

A lot of white people detest the idea that they may be inadvertently contributing to a racist system of oppression. In a society where being seen as a racist is considered socially unacceptable, white people will separate themselves from the possibility of harboring racist beliefs by claiming that the issue is much bigger than them or that their personal connection to — insert random Black person here — prevents them from being racist. 

On the flipside, there are many others that will view racism as a few isolated incidents rather than a much bigger societal issue. I think this falls into the category of individualism better known as the “self-made man.” myth. This belief stems from the idea that people are the sole proprietors of their own socioeconomic circumstances. Racial profiling, disproportionate mass incarceration, generational poverty, and a lack of resources don’t matter, as long as the individual works hard enough to make it out of their unfortunate situation. 

To coincide this, there are many people that believe that success is a matter of an individual's work, rather than the privileges and resources they might have had access to which gave them a much better advantage over others. Whenever white people are faced with the prospect that their whiteness puts them in closer proximity to certain privileges that most people of color don’t have, they take it as devaluing whatever challenges and struggles they had personally experienced. 

Whether it's the belief that racism is a larger issue than any one person can contribute to, or the belief that racism doesn’t exist on a mass scale — and that Black people are responsible for their own plight — both viewpoints are heavily rooted in the individualism that is fundamental to American culture. And this all contributes to White people’s aversion to talking about race. 

The refusal to implement CRT into public schools and college curricula only further reinforces these ideas — as they pertain to race — and continues to uphold the notion that racism is a thing of the past. This couldn’t be further from the truth.  

One important element of CRT is the discussion of American history and its impact on modern society. Not being taught the historical context behind many social issues leaves people with a lack of understanding on how everything is connected.  

In the past few decades, America has moved toward a society that deems racism as socially unacceptable, and while I don’t think the lack of CRT is to blame for the spike in harassment and hate crimes we’ve been seeing for the past few years, I feel as though our nation's refusal to teach about our history in full is a major contributing factor. If we don’t learn from the mistakes of our past we are bound to repeat them. 

Another aspect of CRT that I think is crucial for us to understand is the effects of implicit bias. A lot of people cannot conceptualize just how much their subconscious biases influence their interactions with other people. Because it is subconscious, most people don’t realize that what they’re saying could be offensive or just outright racist. 

So to wrap it all up, CRT is so much more than just the idea that everything is inherently racist. It’s an explanation for why so much of our society is influenced by race as well as a framework for gradually deconstructing and unlearning all the biases we’ve become accustomed to. 

I’m not saying the theory is perfect — due to its suppression I don’t really think it’s had much of an opportunity to grow — but teaching it on a mass scale has the potential to open up people’s minds to the ways in which our history shapes present circumstances. The absence of it only allows for more racism and biases to go unchecked, furthering the oppressive systems that make millions of people’s lives unnecessarily harder.