On Facebook I come across a picture of the United States with Texas highlighted in red, along with Oklahoma, Tennessee, Idaho, and Iowa. “TEXAS PASSES CRITICAL RACE THEORY BILL,” is the headline that accompanies the article. One of the comments below the posting reads, “It’s about time.” Another declares, “Go, Texas!”
Race again. Hasn’t this issue been dominating our lives for long enough? While I believe that systemic racism should be taken seriously and that it has ruined lives, I also believe that minds have been opened and the majority is ready to move forward in making the changes that need to be made. Like many, I have a short attention span and I grow bored with discussing instead of doing. Though admittedly, I leave the doing to others.
But wait: I’m not actually sure what Critical Race Theory is. I look it up. According to Wikipedia, Critical Race Theory is “a theoretical framework or set of perspectives by which structural and institutional racism may be examined.”
That sounds worthwhile. Someone, not me, should definitely look into it.
However, knowing my fellow Texans, and knowing the person who shared the article, I doubt the implication of the heading, which is that Texas is on board with adopting a policy dedicated to examining the history and causes of systemic racism. This doesn’t sound like the Texas I know; so I look up the bill. Well, no. What’s really going on is that Texas has banned the teaching of Critical Race Theory in our schools.
But wait. I see that I’ve landed on an adversarial website that wants me to think that Texas is against teaching kids not to be racist. Looking into it further, I see that the law doesn’t ban Critical Race Theory: it bans schools from being required to teach Critical Race Theory. Does this mean that all those states that aren’t red have a law requiring their schools to teach Critical Race Theory? Does this also mean that, until this law was passed, Texas teachers were required to teach it? Because here is a law that implies exactly that; and this, I highly doubt. Although please, if you know of a school system in the state that, up to this point, has required the teaching of Critical Race Theory, let me know, because I sure haven’t been able to find one.
So. We have a state legislature legislating something that doesn’t need to be legislated. And politicians using the education system like a tool.
With federal, state, and local powers all weighing in, our education system is unwieldy enough without superfluous interference. As to Critical Race Theory, do teachers need a bill for them to know that their job is to teach children how to think, not what to think? And do they need a law to know that preaching against opinions that’re passed from parent to child over the dinner table is overstepping and futile? What teachers do know, without it being legislated, is that the best place to learn empathy concerning race is found in literature—A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest Gaines; The Color Purple by Alice Walker; and To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee—and so many more. Also, history is right there in the classroom, presenting facts to be discussed and interpreted, offering lessons about morality, greed, power-grabbing, land-grabbing, and political manipulation.
On the lighter side of the race issue—and believe me, if there’s a lighter side, I’ll find it—here’s a story of racial diversity in the workplace:
A friend of ours works in a business office in Dallas. Every couple of months a memo about diversity is circulated wherein personnel are encouraged to contemplate how the firm can obtain a more diverse standing. But realistically, workers are busy doing their jobs and there are no qualified brown people applying to the company, so what is the expectation here? People of color with higher degrees are rare and, in light of the country-wide drive toward the appearance of diversity, understandably sought-after. She told me that when Juneteenth was declared a national holiday, everyone was given the day off and instructed that they should use the time to reflect on diversity and racial relations, which I’m certain they all did. Also, it was suggested that the employees attend an online seminar concerning racial relations, which meant, for her, sitting in front of her computer, wearing a nice blouse, and listening to Latino lawyers share problems and suggestions concerning issues in the Latino community, while she ate fine cheese and sipped a robust Bordeaux.
I always enjoy a verbal ramble, but this post’s so scattered that I’m confused about what I wanted to say in the first place. Scanning back to see what the take-away is—if there is one—I find my three points. One: While teachers don’t need the government telling them how to teach kids to be human, they also don’t need legal protection from something that doesn’t exist. Two: Passing unnecessary laws just to look like you’re doing something is self-serving and stinks of duplicity. And three: There’s no such thing as one-sided diversity.
The hat is a rather weak symbol of Texas, but it’s all I had at hand.
An indication that construction’s fixing to start across the street. From this moment on, they have six months to get their house built. The guy moving in is Sgt. Sam, a conservative talk radio host in Austin. Predictably, he’s quite popular in this area.
These guys are heavy, made of ebony, and quite old. Considering the subject of the blog, I thought that they were quite delightfully inappropriate.
