I think these systems are rooted partially in CRT through the idea that strong discipline goes against racial equity.
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I hope this trainer is proud of itself. Is the juice worth the squeeze?
Such people think they are right, and smart, but actually there isnât much ability to respond to pushback besides crying âracist!â, as we see time and again
Labels and stereotypes are the weapon of choice, leading to ostrasization among peers.
âimplicitly referred to as a white supremacist by the trainer and berated in front of his colleaguesâ
Typical behavior of an individual targeted in a toxic or hostile work environment.
âThe claim alleges he started a sick leave after the training session and was diagnosed with anxiety secondary to a traumatic workplace event.â
Now thatâs progress.
Agree with just about everything youâve written. I think there are some proponents of it who are less ideologically and more pedagogically motivated, but it definitely has become a bit infotainment esque. I still think there are some extremely legitimate criticisms of history teaching in the US within it - later in the thread yâall talked about how itâs as if theyâre teaching only white people can slaughter others, but the entire way we teach about relations with native Americans is just messed up. I doubt any high school student knows how small and awful the reservations ended up being, not only because of poor federal legislation which basically doesnât trust the indians to do with their land as they see fit, but also by literally giving them what was at the time land valued as basically a desert and then not even giving them a particularly large chunk of said shitty valueless desert. The whole way we teach about the natives is always colored by Manifest Destiny - that the westward course of American Empire was inevitable, that the Indians were, well, just there, in the way. But then once weâve gone around being killed by and killing them, they go to the reservations and all is well, the end. But thatâs like, such an awful oversimplification of the situation, and that ignores the issues that created the even more awful modern reservation status and system. It barely gets a glance and I think thatâs just a goddamn shame.
Certainly weâve made progress in the realm of slavery, although clearly there are still some massive issues with the teaching of the post-slavery era - all the âslavery ended almost 200 years ago, get over it and pull yerselves up by the bootstrapsâ narratives clearly evidences issues there. As I recall from AP US history, it does a much better job of addressing the reconstruction era failures and continuing issues, but I donât recall much discussion of American presidential election historyâs most important loser, Goldwater, and the influence he had on the later Reagan era and just US politics in general. And while his intentions were admittedly pretty not evil - wildly interesting guy, even if misguided at times, and was definitely willing to say he got it wrong where he definitely did - his take on the bussing debate as, well, âwe canât force them to integrate!â and whatnot is just an unfortunate restatement of the same arguments that make the âthe confederacy was fighting for statesâ rightsâ narrative so appealing to a not insignificant group of people.
Japanese internment, as youâve said, somehow doesnât come up in some classes, and Iâve no idea how. More time should be spent on Chinese Exclusion too, while theyâre at it, as a look into local Californian politics of the time really would be beneficial to remind all students that itâs not, well, black and white. But also because it was unprecedented and accompanied a general nativist movement which continues to this day.
My main issue with all of this is that the republicans are so willing to criticize the left for teaching politicized history, when what we currently have 1) varies wildly by region and 2) generally doesnât do enough to address the many many ugly parts of our history while teaching mythologized narratives of events like the Mayflower and Thanksgiving and largely leaving out important information on the natives beyond where they decide to fight or the US decides they are to die. They totally disappear from the narrative at times. Before and during CRT era, there has been significant progress made in teaching about African Americans, but I still think thereâs some major issues in terms of not teaching redlining, gangs, etc. adequately - i.e. weâve gotten towards teaching the older parts better, but the more recent history is inadequate to explain the current day issues. Saying itâs just racism is a band-aid for covering up all the very intentional and very unpleasant ways in which black americans were closed out of opportunities, better living conditions, jobs, and education which are a huge factor in modern-day urban poverty plight. And the Republicans, with some well intentioned and some less well-intentioned criticisms of CRT, have little to offer in response because it is actually offensive to a significant portion of their voting base (read: boomers) as well as probably themselves to even think about talking more critically about American history. âWe already have to admonish ourselves about how we treated the blacks, this is getting ridiculous!â So the very unfortunate situation for the American left is to have an actual proposal, politicized as it is, on the board with some improvements in it but also some things that are questionable, but the Republicans seem to think that any concession is too much and some states are even backsliding on improvements in teaching certain issues (assuming such improvements actually took place beyond lip service). So itâs between stasis/backsliding and a overpoliticized way forward which has become more politicized by being politicized. Thatâs cumbersome. But the excessive amount of attention towards it from the start led to it becoming a boogeyman, and then maybe even it slowly morphing towards that boogeyman as it redefined and took on new members and whatnot. The problem is, I think that even any proposal to look more into the real history of the country would end up being treated as a leftist narrative to blah blah blah by the right in the country, and be shot down. They donât care about history, they care about patriotism, the blinder the better. The threadâs criticized CRT more than enough, so I wonât bother going into that.
Something as a concession: teach WAY MORE about unionization of Appalachian coal miners. Mostly white so there you go, balances out the color equation a bit for those who care about it. Not only because itâs greatly interesting, but also because itâs a microcosm for unionization in the gilded era, but because itâs a relevant issue as we see coal simultaneously remaining as a necessary resource, but a highly politicized one and itâs totally worth going into more detail about the awfully violent failures of unionization, the politicization thereof, and the role of the war effort in determining unionization as something âunamericanâ.
Obviously thereâs only so much time in the year. But god, we can do better. That time watching the awful but admittedly entertaining America: The Story of Us could be put to use much better in teaching actual history. I do want a more accurate and less politicized narrative; problematically, the narrative we currently have is politicized in various ways across the country, almost always in favor of the republicans preferred narrative. Just a question of to what degree. And its sad to see how history illiterate the average American is towards their own history, much less the rest of the world.
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I canât stand reading interviews like this. Anything in there that wr havenât already seen,
Itâs more of a debate. Itâs probably about exactly what you would expect from these two, maybe not worth it if youâre familiar with the arguments and donât want to read the back-and-forth. Rufo had an interesting rejoinder to the âchilling of teachersâ argument invoking negative historical statements in the other direction. I think the video is paylocked.
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It got good towards the end and there was a bit of a coming together point about like, one author in very specific conditions. Whether this nice little arrangement would hold up if a state decided to prosecute a teacher for going against itâs state proscribed history narrative, who knows.
But the rest of it was, imo, Rufo pretending we canât judge these people by out values in their times, but it is worth noting that being critical towards slavery in the 1770s and onward wouldâve totally been not out of the norm especially in Europe, and these guys definitely followed thought out of there. Hence why there were attempts to limit slavery early on that ultimately failed. Hell, during his presidency Britain abolished it. And the US during his presidency and on Jeffyâs suggestion moved to ban the slave trade. Jefferson himself said the following on the matter:
I congratulate you, fellow-citizens, on the approach of the period at which you may interpose your authority constitutionally, to withdraw the citizens of the United States from all further participation in those violations of human rights which have been so long continued on the unoffending inhabitants of Africa, and which the morality, the reputation, and the best interests of our country, have long been eager to proscribe
A man talking about slavery â or at least the trade â as a âviolation of human rightsâ in the 1800s. Yeah⌠Canât judge them, different values.
So Iâm afraid I donât feel Rufo has the greatest actual grasp on history because there certainly were contemporaries who were more than willing to condemn slavery. Now this does not necessarily mean they werenât racist â plenty definitely wanted abolishment while also believing that Africans were mentally inferior and such. But I think the âwe canât judge them by our valuesâ is definitely an excuse in this case when he gets grilled about the definitely very much racist founding of the nation. Yes, only landed men above a certain age got to vote at first, but even poor men werenât slaves â although indentured servants they could be â and were at least guaranteed their freedom, although I donât think their pursuit of life and happiness was necessarily guaranteed.
The point being: maybe Jefferson wasnât exceptionally racist for his time, but he was racist, and him and many of the fatherâs did found a nation with a specific disregard to the rights of somewhat less than 25% of the population of the early Republic. He recognized it as an evil, but seemingly also recognized it as a necessary one for the nascent republicâs creation â on the eve of the civil war, Cotton was an export worth more than all the rest combined. So yeah, they decided to build racism into the state, Rufo! It was a realpolitik decision, helped by the existence of quite a lot of racist thought towards Africans, and in this way and going forward it was totally an integral part of the American state even if attempts were made to limit it.
Just frustrating to see him run circles around these points and the interviewer not bring this up. But as I said before, there was a worthwhile moment at the end where he seemingly was willing to allow one CRT text (well, texts, the stories of Derrick Bell which might ring a bell as kinda a big name in CRT history) to be addressed in classrooms in the states where enforcement is possible, given that itâs discussed in open forum basically. Which I think is great, as fiction has a wonderful way of engaging people and changing minds that a non fiction account might just be a bit too direct and unpleasant to realize canât do. Unfortunately, youâd also need to pair this with teaching actual hard truths, and I imagine teachers would be inviting a lot of negative attention if they had a story from like, the CRT guy, and then followed it next class session by directly addressing racism and all more. But itâs a nice step, regardless of how earnestly it was offered as a compromise. Thanks for the read, Tempo. I rather enjoyed that.
And this is all admittedly not going into his personals to address the ways he has said he is combatting CRT which arenât necessarily limited to CRT. I think proving him a bit of a fool can suffice for now 
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Yeah I thought Rufo was at his silliest here, Iâd just concede this obvious fact as he did with a number of others. Clearly he didnât want to go there. Overall I thought he did very well making his case though. Robinson made good points as well. Theyâre both very smart and have done their homework.
I donât think Rufo is shying away at all from teaching accurate history warts and all, nor is that part of the overall anti-CRT argument. Somewhat connected, did you see the Florida standards I posted the other day which have drawn so much negative attention?
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I havenât really looked into them totally yet. Could you direct me to the post in question just so I know what Iâm actually looking for
They posted this finally.
Ugh, 52 minutes. If anyone watches the whole thing pleade let me know which time stamps are worth skipping to!
Gets more interesting at about 23:00 with discussion of racism of US founding fathers, then current racism in US, then impact in schools of anti-CRT legislation to finish.
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Kinda tangential to CRT, but another example of progressive education policy that sounds nice in an academic paper while not being particularly useful in the real world
Good news for charter schools, I guess
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