CMV: Many "anti-CRT" parents are acting like the stupid people they accuse.

The title says it all. I have negative feelings about critical race theory (CRT). It has been used as a framework for divisive racial essentialsism, and to stifle dissenting voices. It's associated with ideas like intersectionality which have helped to further Balkanize the country. It's being used as a cynical framework to justify censorship and protect certain political dogmas from criticism. It's being taught uncritically to children. It's resulted in egregious racial bullying in schools and in corporate environments. <br><br>I feel reassured that parents are getting off the sidelines and demanding that schools be more transparent about the curriculum. I feel reassured that people are standing up to corporate HR departments that are subjecting employees to racial bullying. It's good to see that so many people are no longer content to just signal their support for the "right side," but are instead acting as if the future actually matters. <br><br>But there is a right way and a wrong way to do this. <br><br>Declaring that you will never vote Democrat again and engaging in a whole bunch of rah-rah partisanship puts me off. It makes you seem like a partisan bot. I'm not going to change my mind if your attack on liberal Democrats is followed by a huge list of Republican red meat issues. I'm not going to change my mind if you promise never to vote for a Democrat again. You just come off as your average partisan idiot. You don't come off as someone who is motivated by a desire to protect their children. <br><br>Furthermore, it seems like there is a huge amount of confusion about what CRT actually is. This is a complex and multifaceted topic. It actually takes familiarity with postmodernism and critical theory if you want to have a serious discussion about it. If you know nothing about Foucault or Derrida or Marcuse, or any of the other influential thinkers that have shaped the field, then I'm not going to take you seriously. I'm not going to take you seriously if you just repeat slogans or propaganda lines. I'm not going to take you seriously if you're a partisan idiot who has no curiosity about the world beyond your own little bubble. I'm not going to take you seriously if you let your Avalanche of Anger for LIBS overpower your capacity for reason or nuance. <br><br>People who are doing this are exactly the stupid people that they accuse their political opponents of being.<br><br>Edit: I just moved to Illinois. Recently I read that 6th grade students in Illinois public schools will be required to take a unit in Critical Ethnic Studies. I am the mother of a 6th grader. I should have a say in this, and I don't because I don't yet have local knowledge or time to be an effective advocate. I'm just trying to navigate this. I have no idea what they are teaching or how they are teaching it. <br><br>Why are the people in this discussion making assumptions about me? It's not accurate. It's certainly not helpful. <br><br>I'm a sincere person. I can't advocate effectively for my kid if I don't understand the curriculum. I'm trying to understand and advocate. My kid's education matters to me, and right now I feel helpless. I don't have time to research and be in control of everything my kid is learning. It doesn't seem right that I should have to. I should be able to trust schools. They shouldn't be trying to inculcate kids in a specific ideology. They shouldn't be teaching them that their lives are defined by racial identity. I want my kid to learn critical thinking, not critical race theory.<br><br>I'm sorry I hurt your feelings. If I was trying to hurt you, I failed. Then again, I wasn't trying to hurt you. I am trying to navigate a world that is not yet familiar to me, and I don't control schools or curricula. I'm not engaging in mob behavior. I'm engaging in a very niche conversation on a very small platform. I'm not trying to censor you, but I think you are trying to censor me. I'm not trying to impose my values on you, but you are trying to impose your values on me. You're just another person trying to impose your will on me. You're just like all the other people I have to deal with.<br><br>It's a strange thing that people who are all about the lived experience of intersectional identity and who are so woke that they can't even see the beam in their own eye as they point out the speck in mine have no concept of lived experience. They have no capacity for empathy. They have no idea what it is like to be someone else. They have no idea what it's like to live my life.<br><br>I don't want to discuss this anymore, and I'm not going to. I'm done.