So what is Critical Race Theory?

If it's being discussed in other threads, then feel free to split them out here. Everybody is screaming and yelling about it, but what the hell is it? Is it simply acknowledging that the US has systemic racism, and that white people living and breathing today benefit from it while people of color are negatively affected by it (which I am in total agreement), or is it something else? I've read a little bit about it, and it seems like it might be similar to neo Marxism...calling for sort of a revolution. Am I wrong about that?

As defined (edit: and AIUI, as taught in law school), it's a legal theory that says is that laws that are facially racially neutral can and do have racially disparate effects, and so proposed and existing laws should be viewed and reevaluated in that context.

It's got nothing to do with teaching history, nothing to do with systemic racism as a whole or individual bigotry. Assholes on the right are using it to whip dumb people up into a frenzy, idiots on the left are going along with that because some of them WOULD rather it did mean all that Marxist claptrap that the right says it does.

This is why calls to ban it in elementary schools, for instance, are so hilarious. It's not a thing that would be taught in elementary schools anyway*. Maybe in high school civics at the very earliest. Some *particularly* dumb Republican assholes think that it also means that the 1619 project and other curricula which focus more on the historical racism of the country would be banned, but it doesn't, at least not the straight up CRT bans. Some are slightly more intelligent and ban the 1619 Project by name.

* this is good fodder for whipping up the base on both sides, because neither has a clue what the hell they're talking about.

I haven't seen it call for overt revolution, but what I've read has a couple of parts:

One, race is an artificial construct
Two, racism is systemic in the majority of societies
Three, non-racial policies often have racist outcomes, whether intended or not. Such as redlining districts which were often based on unconscious racial decisions, preventing blacks from getting loans, or criminal laws that seem innocuous, such as making marijuana illegal, but that impacts one cohort more than the other.

All of these things are fairly apparent I think to most informed people at this time.

It goes a bit further though in many expressions, though (it's not uniform in all of its observances and guidelines, plenty of different takes within CRT).

For example, discrimination based on race should be allowed if it achieves anti-racial aims. Such as affirmative action or changing the criteria for higher education entrance based on race. That one of course is always going to be debated.

And some of its adherents believe that outcome is more important than opportunity. This is no doubt linked to its roots in Marxist thought, though critical theory which CRT derives from broke from Marxism on several points. Still, the concept that the outcome should be 'equitable', and therefore even, is what pisses off a lot of conservatives - at least, the few that know what it actually is, as opposed to all the lies that Faux News and company tell about it.

There also seems to be a generational divide. Gen Xers and older were taught equality. Younger people seem more focues on equity. The problem with that is who decides what is equitable - I can see a lot of healthy cynicism expressed on that score.

Idaho's Republican dominated legislature passed and the Republican Governor signed a bill banning the teaching of CRT in public schools.
ut critics of the bill, like Democratic Representative Steve Birch, say there's no widespread evidence these concepts are even being pushed by teachers.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

STEVE BERCH: What you have is an endless series of anecdotes, hearsay, conjecture, innuendo, emails, social media, robocalls, guilt-by-association arguments.

DAWSON: Even lawmakers who eventually voted for the bill, like Republican Representative Julie Yamamoto, a former superintendent herself, say it wasn't a problem. I guess you can never be too sure when it comes to communist plots.

Meanwhile, the (absolutely certifiable Lt. Governor) convened a task force designed to investigate whether public schools are indoctrinating students with CRT. Just one problem: no one could define what it is...
McGeachin appointed Pete Coulson to her task force after the ISBA president resigned from it after the group couldn't define critical race theory.

So basically they're openly teaching Marxism in schools and telling kids it's okay to be racist toward whites and you should have white guilt because the Founding Fathers were slave owner and that's somehow my fault.

Like has been said, a lot of CRT is looking at how a system that isn't explicitly designed to be racist, and indeed could be made by people who aren't racist, could still have racist outcomes.

The outrage against it is a massive own goal, because to be against it would seem to mean they think that racist outcomes are intentional, making themselves look worse.

Nah, that's what you are being spoon fed by the right-wing lie chamber and gleefully guzzle down because it lets you hate someone you want to hate.

Absolutely not.

The implied premise that racially disparate outcomes MUST be evidence of racism-conscious or otherwise-does not follow.

Funny how often the ones who are most loudly opposed to "socialism" and "CRT" (not to mention Common Core) have a hard time coming up with a coherent definition of what they are. I guess they can be whatever they need to be at any given moment.

Teaching what something is, does not necessarily = an endorsement.

No.

Say, do you think this anti-white racism is some sort of...reverse racism?
Do you think it could lead to a genocide...a white genocide?
Do you think when the whites are genocided, they'll be replaced with browns in some sort of...oh, I dunno...great replacement?

Seriously though, Fox News has dropped the dog whistles, and flat out puts skinhead pamphlets into their teleprompter scripts.

And you can fuck off with that mind reading shit right now.

Weather you recognize CRT is a college level course taught to understand the reality the US has the effects of racism in their laws, or is you are afraid of high schools teaching the fact that the US began with racial slavery and then went on to segregation and racially motivated laws against immigrants and brown people, it is the truth. The fact the course was college level and not in high school is not an excuse to continually pretend the history and the government of the US was not woven with racism.

There was never a time in the history of the colonizers of the US that there was not racism. Just because the WASP majority of the US participated in it and thought black and brown people were a lower form of life, and WASps were god's actual gift to the world, does not mean racism didn't exist. It means racism was the law and considered good. It was everpresent and there was not some past of racial equality we can MAGA to.

Really, the whitewashing done by capitalist HS textbook sales from racist shitholes like texass should be eliminated. We should not be lying to kids in school pretending the US was ever good with being not WASPy because some people have the money to print propaganda and school boards eat it up because they are racist. We have a true history and it is full of proof. This idea that some idiot can make up a fairy tale that completely contradicts physical evidence and we have to include it in our academics as just as true as facts is ridiculous. Why don't we teach the MCU as facts because it is often more based on reality that the stuff in our history books?

This is one of the reasons why americans are so hopelessly stupid. We should be laughing ati the right just like we laugh at people who think they are jedis, furries, Harry potter wizards, or part of the matrix. Instead we hire these dolts and pretend they are educated professionals because they passed a history class that is full of complete fiction. Racist lies are worse than some of these fantasies. Some dude who thinks he is a jedi isn't going to hate their co-workers for being brown because they are a confederate loser. Fundamentally, the racist lies of the US education system work towards continuing the racist divide the US has always had.

If there are widescale different outcomes along racial lines there seem to be three main possibilities:

1. The system is designed to be racist.
2. The system isn't designed to be racist, but somehow still delivers different outcomes based on race.
3. The system is entirely non-racist, and the different outcomes are due to personal differences inherent to race.

What's the other option I'm missing?

The invisible hand of the Mighty Holy Mother Market walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, looks like a duck, but is a platypus because reasons and feelings.

So far we've only heard from lefties on what they think CRT is about. I wanna hear from someone on the right on what they've heard about it.

It is funny how @Obiwan-Can-Blow-Me continuously comes up with some tucker carlson level racist bullshit rather than being actual libertarian. Even if it was the case, why would a libertian be against allowing people to teach those things in school? Does he not understand what liberty and freedom is? Does he want fascist propaganda approved by the right to be the only thing allowed for kids to be taught in school?

When you keep chosing the path of racist white nationalist brain garbage, you probably think in racist white nationalist ways. If you think in those ways, how is it that you are not one of them when the definition is that you agree in the thought and ideas of racist white nationalists. Thinking like a racist white nationalist buffoon, and wanting their propaganda to be the only thing taught is the definition of being one. It is not like you do all of those things and are not one.

Are you waiting for @Uncle Albert to give his definition? Because he isn't going to. When you define it you allow for your claim to be debunked. When CRT is defined as it was being a college level course it was debunked that high schools were ever teaching it. This is why the right plays their little game of move the goal posts and pretend they have a different definition. This is why they do not like specifics and actual truth. Because when we nail you down to your definition we can beat you over the head with your ignorance. When you play stupid games you get to believe you won while the rest of us laugh at you for losing.

Now, don't you have some loserpalooza tickets you should be worrying about? We know you didn't vote for trump, but somehow his shit keeps on coming out your mouth. I would get that checked if I were you.

Why wouldn't you rather find some impartial facts about what CRT is? Two seconds on Google will find you archived CRT class syllabuses from previous years, and pre-2020 definitions of CRT from before righties started trying to politicize it.

In other words, you want to hear your own assumptions parroted back at you.

Like 14thDoctor said the material is all out there, go have a look at it yourself like many of us did and let us know your opinions based on first hand research.

Cuz anything not-right is commie lies!

So what about the Civil Rights Act? According to CRT, is that a good thing or a bad thing? Was about protecting the rights of minorities, or was it a cynical ploy to get third world countries on board with us during the Cold War?

Oh I'm all about school choice and homeschooling. That would solve the problem right there, but liberals don't like school choice.

this is the thing.
The technical and correct definition of CRT is manifestly NOT objectionable and not what's really at issue since the whole thesis is that a given individual need not have any racist intent or even awareness for them to be operating in a system tainted by racism.

There are adjacent implications of the same sort of thinking - when Pete Buttigieg said there was racism built into our highways the right mocked, but historian Kevin Kruse literally wrote an entire book (and he's not the only one) that centered on how the interstate highway system was used to divide major cities (he used Atlanta as the example) and built on land taken from poor black neighborhoods. Doesn't mean every one who drives on them is racist, but it means that their literal physical existence furthers disparate racial outcomes.

This sort of thing does and should come up in education, things like redlining, or ostensibly race-neutral Jim Crow voting laws are a necessary topic if you're teaching history correctly, but they aren't CRT except insofar as they make a similar observation about societal structures that WERE created with racist intent and many of which have never been cleansed of that.

But it's crystal clear - as if evidence were really needed - that the right wing is propagandizing in bad faith because they tell their marks that CRT is the exact opposite of what it literally is - that it claims that if you are white that you, individually and personally, MUST be a racist.

But that is just how you mobilize the gullible base - they know full well what they are doing: trying to pre-emptively blunt any worldview that might weaken the foundations of white supremacy.

it has been ever thus. Screaming "socialism!" goes back literally to Reconstruction. There's always a scary threat that only our right wing saviors can beat back on our behalf (nevermind what specifically it is, just know that it's bad and we're here to save you from it)

and each and every time it's either a term with no meaning they can accurately describe that serves as a catchall for whatever the liberals are doing, or it's a pablum term like "politically correct" or "cancel culture" (often co-opted from the very people they oppose) which only applies when they other side does it but is a good and righteous act when we do it.

That is actually a lie created by the right. Liberals are fine with whatever school you go to. Having regulations and certifications that confirm you have learned the facts you need to participate in a industry is not about choice. It is about a standard of education. To be a cosmotologist I need to know what chemicals do to the skin and hair so I dfo not burn someone, or spread infection. These are facts I need to learn. These should not be a choice because you can hgurt someone or the community through misuse of chemicals andf disposal of dangerous items. The same sort of thing goes for a mixology degree to be a bartender. Don't mix dairy and acidic liquids because they don't. What does it mean a glass is clean so you do not pass on bacteria.

liberals want regulations regarding the truth. Even down to teaching histoyr, it is just not anywhere near the truth that racism is not the US standard through history, or that racism is not a huge part of where we are today. denying that is a lie, and as a standard you should be able to repeat that. If you have to do any work based on that reality then you need it as part of the standard of the truth.

What the fuck are you lying about that for? This is where you get lumped in with the trumpanzees and qtards on the right. You have to spread the same lies they do, but then you want to say you have different ideas? You are spreading the same shit that goes under that label.