The state of New Hampshire is trying to advance a bill in its state house of representatives (HB544) that mirrors the executive order President Trump issued “against Critical Race Theory,” which is to say against the divisive (and racist/neoracist) tenets at the heart of Critical Race Theory and so-called “diversity” training sessions based upon it. After testifying in support of the bill in a legislative committee meeting on February 18 (in which sitting state representative Kris Schultz slandered me), I have followed up with the legislative committee this week by sending the following letter urging positive endorsement and support for the bill as it hopefully makes its way to the New Hampshire House floor. Because I think it might be instructive for other people to see what I wrote, the letter I sent is reproduced below (correcting a typo or two from the original). I encourage other people to follow suit in their own states, urging similar legislation or executive action and then showing up to testify and sending letters of support and encouragement.
To whom it may concern,
I am writing as an expert and concerned American, though not a New Hampshire citizen, in unequivocal support of HB544 which bans the teaching of certain divisive tenets as though they are fact. I also testified in the committee hearing as an expert on Critical Race Theory, against which this bill is ultimately based, on February 18 of this year. Please give this important, necessary bill your full-throated endorsement and a positive recommendation.
I don’t know that this is the time for lengthy written testimony, so I’ll try to keep my remarks brief. The bill being proposed, it should immediately be noted, bans not only the divisive tenets that stem from the Critical Race Theory worldview and its related activism, which is very aggressive and very interested in achieving dominance in our schools, workplaces, and lives, but it also bans trainings and uncritical teaching of what would be the more commonly understood forms of unacceptable bias, behavior, and ideology, including both white supremacy and patriarchy. It prohibits recipients of state funding from the same things the Civil Rights Acts and the Fourteenth Amendment are already supposed to protect against, although these are failing. Namely, the bill would prohibit teaching as uncontested fact or mandating training in racial and sex stereotyping, scapegoating, and discrimination, as well as positioning the state, institutions, etc., as intrinsically racist in a “systemic” way, which has allowed them thus far to avoid being found in violation of either the Civil Rights Acts or Fourteenth Amendment despite openly and explicitly advocating, in the words of the theorist Ibram X. Kendi, “present discrimination,” which is billed as a necessary remedy to past discrimination. While someone might argue that this bill is unnecessary because of the Civil Rights Act, in practice this has not been borne out, making a bill like this more necessary than not. Every American, and every New Hampshire citizen, should not want discrimination, stereotyping, and scapegoating to be a part of their workplace training modules or children’s education. This bill helps support that fundamentally equal and fair treatment before the law, which is currently at risk.
It should also be noted that this bill has First Amendment relevance as well, and not in the way its opponents would explain. The essence of the First Amendment is that people have freedom of conscience, particularly with regard to matters of spiritual belief, and freedom of speech, such that the state can neither compel nor restrict speech. Opponents of this bill will say that the bill seeks to restrict speech, but this is not true. It explicitly leaves provision for workplace trainings and education that don’t teach these already-illegal tenets as uncontested fact. Moreover, the situation is quite the opposite to that portrayed by the opponents to the bill who oppose it on free-speech grounds. These workplace trainings and educational programs violate for very many people both freedom of conscience and freedom of speech. Their freedom of speech is violated by compelling them to admit to complicity in racism and sexism, among other social violations that are unlikely to be true. It also compels them to adopt a particular approach to anti-racism and anti-sexism that is very narrow and to speak on its behalf. This latter example, then, not only violates freedom of speech but also the freedom of conscience implied by both the free-exercise and establishment clauses of the First Amendment. It is not the state’s place to be dictating (or funding the dictators of) how one is to feel about the issue of racism and sexism. Citizens, the overwhelming majority of whom firmly reject racism and sexism, should be granted the freedom of conscience to oppose those on terms they find recognizable, which in a free, liberal country like the United States will mostly likely be rooted in equality, colorblindness, individualism, and universal humanity, which are solidly American values. They may also do so from Judeo-Christian principles, for example the famous injunction from Paul that in Christianity there is “neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free,” etc. They should not be compelled to do so in the terms most often employed by so-called “anti-racist,” “diversity,” “racial sensitivity,” and “culturally responsive” programs today, which are a specific ideology known as Critical Theory, which explicitly rejects virtually all of these values for others, sometimes termed “liberationist” and at other times rightly labeled “neo-Marxist,” including in the words of the activists pushings these programs themselves. While the law may not bear out today that these trainings and pedagogical pursuits violate the First and Fourteenth Amendments, as well as existing Civil Rights legislation, it is likely that they will eventually. It is therefore better to get on the right side of this issue now and take proactive steps to strengthen a legal architecture that is failing citizens in their most fundamental rights.
For the sake of brevity, I will not elaborate at length on the theory underlying the overwhelming bulk of these trainings and relevant school curricula, which is Critical Race Theory, the same (neo-Marxist) Critical Theory mentioned above specifically made to take race as a category of difference upon which Marxian conflict theory (oppressors versus oppressed) is to be applied. I will simply remind the committee that in addition to this theory being one among many approaches to the issue of race and racism, it is one that is rooted specifically in making precisely the same mistake that made racism the problem it has been throughout our history as a nation, which is specifically placing social significance into racial categories and considering that significance determinant and in some ways relevant to one’s social standing and access to power. This was a horrific thing to have done in the 16th century going forward, and it’s no better to do in the 21st century. It didn’t work out then, and it won’t work out now, unless one’s goal is to effect an American Cultural Revolution in mirror image to the one Mao perpetrated on China in the 1960s-1970s, which (as few people know) used many of the same arguments and ideas about race, applied to the Han Chinese race instead of “whiteness.”
Critical Race Theory begins from the assumption, in its own words, that racism is the normal state of affairs of society, changing the question from “did racism take place?” to “how did racism manifest in that situation?” (for racism is assumed to be relevant to every situation), and it calls into question “the very foundations of the liberal order, including equality theory, legal reasoning, Enlightenment rationalism, and the neutral principles of constitutional law.” That is, it is presumptive, divisive, and explicitly un-American, if not anti-American. Moreover, it is designed not to be able to be disagreed with, as all disagreement is framed as some variation of racial “fragility” or “privilege-preserving epistemic pushback,” which is to say a cynical drive to maintain one’s social dominance, not legitimate criticism of the genuinely bad arguments and cynical assumptions put forth by the theory itself. Because it cannot be disagreed with without accusations of bad intentions and motivations, it is divisive and very difficult to uproot once installed. Because it believes “there is no neutral” between “dominance” and “oppression” (Marxian conflict theory), it is again divisive and in fact polarizing. Because its issues are so sensitive and because it addresses them in such an accusatory way (everyone who doesn’t agree with it is racist and white supremacist), it diverts incredible volumes of resources to dividing and polarizing every environment it can gain a foothold in. HB544 exists to minimize that destructive influence and colossal waste of (taxpayer-funded) resources. Even worse, not only is there no evidence supporting the application of this theory, there is evidence against its claims that it can generate that which it claims to generate, so it tears apart organizations and poisons minds (including those of children) with its divisive tenets while profiting off a fraudulent enterprise that robs the taxpayers while destroying their communities.
On these grounds, and possibly hundreds of pages more that I could write if needed, I again urge you in the strongest possible way to support and recommend HB544 as a step in the right direction, away from these divisive teachings and in support of the fundamental inalienable rights this country has always recognized and strived to extend to all citizens, even the allegedly privileged ones. This bill is important for New Hampshire, and it sends a message to America, whose federal government has just unambiguously signaled it wants to take us in the opposite direction by rescinding a similar federal executive order. That opposite direction is back into racial and sex discrimination, stereotyping, and scapegoating, and its into things America has never been and has never been willing to become, namely whatever it is that Critical Theory (i.e., neo-Marxism) aims to make of it.
Thank you.
James Lindsay, Ph.D.
36 comments
I’m…disappointed by this. I was hoping for a concise indictment of CRT for the unaware layman. This…isn’t really that. It barely touches on what CRT actually is, and instead focuses largely on legalistic issues that don’t really make sense unless you already understand CRT. And the accusations it makes against CRT are mostly not clear and require a bunch of additional research to understand, let alone verify.
Those who see racism everywhere reminds me of the moral majority of the 1980s who saw sexual perversion everywhere. Thou prostitute too much. CRJ is not a teachable scientific or philosophical field of study for K12 students UNLESS it’s included as an elective, like French or Wood Shop.
“Opponents of this bill will say that the bill seeks to restrict speech, but this is not true.” After all this article is called “A Letter Supporting a Bill to Ban Critical Race Theory”
Where would someone get that idea that he was looking to ban something?
Banning the banishment of speech is not banning speech; it is the upholding of every America’s right and duty.
I’m astonished at your work in this area, JL and HP.
Passionate, forthright and relentless.
I feel in order to hit everyone with the weight it
deserves, that on occasion, more brevity, of the cogent kind,
is needed.
Thank you, for all you do.
The kind of liberalism that allows itself to be stomped on and beaten by authoritarians because “all ideas are equal” is the same kind of liberalism that failed in Germany in the 20s and 30s.
When the authoritarian left or right act on their desire to dominate and remove all opposition, they are actively trying to destroy Liberal Democracy’s foundational principle: freedom of expression. Liberal Democracy has awarded rights and protection to its citizens – but those rights do not extend to the power to remove other people’s rights and protections. Such transgressions can only be met with brute force, not “more liberalism; be more tolerant”. Liberal Democracy can’t tolerate intolerance.
I have no patience for those who opt to “take the higher road” on this matter. There is no elevated morality in death.
Freedom of thought and freedom of expression apply to CRT as well as anything else.
The NH legislation seeks to prevent a course of instruction in public schools which is socially corrosive and fundamentally wrong and ill-intentioned.
Here’s an analogy: Many believe that God literally created the world in seven days and insist that this belief be “mentioned” in public school classrooms teaching biology, which necessarily assumes the provisional truth of natural selection, a concept seemingly at odds with this fundamentalist Christian worldview.
Mandating that public schools eliminate lessons on “creationism” does not violate anyone’s First Amendment rights.
Obviously, nobody is preventing the public discussion or the personal belief in these pernicious social theories. What we are preventing is the adoption of such nonsense in our publicly funded institutions.
So, would you be for supporting, “Flat Earth” ideology for students in public school?
I am currently working with my state Senator and Representative to write a bill for Missouri. This “theory” dies nothing but divide people, and silence any discussion which prevents the discovery of truth.
I am moving to MO soon. Please get that passed ASAP.
You sir, are a hypocrite’s hypocrite. Arguing to ban an academic theory that you accuse of…aggressive censorship and illiberal divisiveness.
The schools are forbidden from teaching creationism because it’s not science. Critical Race Theory (and all its variants) is exactly the same sort of fraud. Worse, its teaching forces students to believe what is effectively a faith (since it has no evidentiary basis), while specifically singling out particular groups for hate. Its teaching violates the First Amendment with respect to religion, and the 14th Amendment, for equal protection.
Critical Race Theory is indeed a monstrous and irrational ideology, but there are some forms of “creationism” that are scientific and/or logical in many respects, and they are not fraudulent. And, just like there are limits to what philosophy can claim, it is also the case that science has its own limitations in what it can claim. In terms of the universe, science cannot say anything about how it originally came about (can’t be measured or observed) or if there is a why behind it. In fact, when looking back into time, the closest we can get to what is actually the beginning of the development of galaxies (wrongly assumed by weak thinkers as the beginning of the Universe) via the Big Bang is some 380,000 years after the Big Bang. This limitation does not make the science of cosmology a fraudulent study, and the limitation of philosophy does not make it a fraud as you wrongly claim because some philosophies propose forms of creation with the most sophisticated form involving creatio ex nihilo because science cannot explain how or why the universe came about, and creatio ex nihilo provides a reasonable possibility for consideration.
The bottom line is as follows in terms of the creation of the universe. Either it created itself or has simply existed for all time (extremely problematic in light of the gravitational paradox and light paradox) or something accounts for it coming into existence. Neither position can be demonstrated to be true or false via science, and so a more philosophical approach is a legitimate player in this regard even though it also cannot prove that the universe was created or has existed forever. Still, the paradoxes mentioned above diminish the so-called scientific claim of an eternal universe, and thereby make the philosophical explanation stronger at this time.
Incorrect.
The paradoxes you invoke are only paradoxes within an inadequate working model.
Even if this were not the case, the presence of paradox strengthens or weakens either the scientific or philosophical cases – how?
Actually, my comment is correct, but your assertion of “are only paradoxes within an inadequate working model” is just that: a false declaration that is not based on facts. Kinda ironic and humorous in light of the manner in which Critical Theories merely declare things to be so and so without evidence. You have done the same thing by making a simplistic and false declaration to attempt to support a desired position.
The paradoxes pertain to the reality of the Entire Universe, and no less a physicist than Paul Davies has made references to them in some of his writings (see, for example, his “The Goldilocks Enigma” or if that is too much for you, then go with Gribbin’s “In Search of the Big Bang”) as reflecting a very serious problem with a so-called eternal universe. Only with a first moment of creation do the paradoxes get resolved, and Gribbin puts it this way regarding the light paradox: “If there was a definite moment of creation, and if it was recent enough, then there is no paradox. This is the whole crux of the matter.” (p. 113)
A first moment of creation should be clear enough for you to see why such provides strength for the philosophical case supporting creation ex nihilo while the paradoxes weaken the always existing universe case made by some scientists as a limited way to try to get away from anything that smacks of the universe being created. However, I only mentioned this material because of the false claim made by ADM64 (looks to be supported by you as well) regarding the notion of creationism being a fraud. I suggest that you research more of this on your own, and hopefully you will honestly come to grips with the paradoxes and what they demonstrate about the reality of the universe and why the claim of an eternal universe does not hold up to reality.
Good luck.
Some forms of Creationism do a fancy job of using the language of science to superficially appear scientific to the naive, but they are not scientific or logical. They are as fraudulent and silly as CRT.
You cannot argue with an entity like Chui. Your arguments are met by enigmatic, undeveloped reactions.
Requiring evidence is one of systemic racism’s tools of oppression. The US Constitution and its amendments were written by white racists to institutionalize systemic racism. Criticism of efforts to combat system racism is evidence of systemic racism.
See how it works? There is no point in arguing with people who consider reason an oppressive tool.
Why do you imagine there is no point to it?
Has arguing or trying to reason with the regime in power and their lackeys actually helped you or your fellow citizens? It doesn’t look like things are getting any better.
I don’t really think these bureaucrats and their zealots care about what other Americans think or have to say. Whenever I read some crazy news or hear some nonsense policy being passed, I try to pinpoint the exact reason as to why they are intentionally derailing the country. Since Obama’s second term, the one hypothesis that has remained the most plausible is one of the worst scenarios. That is, our wealthiest individuals (maybe not all of them?), politicians, and institutions have sold the country to China and are now doing China’s bidding. As James pointed out, a lot of the lefts tactics are akin or identical to the Maoist takeover in China. I don’t think that’s a coincidence.
Of course, it’s just a hypothesis, but until the real reason of why the left is doing what they are doing is revealed, we won’t know precisely what’s coming, how to prepare for it, or how to fight back, if the latter is even possible at all at this point.
I have no idea how to prove this hypothesis to be correct other than by researching further on the history of the Mao Revolution and how it parallels to whatever this is.
While I vigorously disagree with Critical Race Theory and similar nonsense, I also disagree with the claims made by ADM64 regarding creation and the stereotype of creationism. I posted a previous comment with some illustrations to demonstrate the use of reason in many aspects of favoring creation, but, alas, it appears that the free exchange of ideas, if such ideas challenge the false claims of scientism, will not be allowed to appear on this site. Very disappointing, but such is part of the liberal mindset touted as being open to free exchange by Lindsay and Pluckrose. Will this comment also be deleted?
I am pleased to now see that my original comment has been “restored,” so I happily withdraw my dig at JL and HP et al.
Many Thanks!
DV
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“science”
Creationism, UFOs, Bigfoot, and the Bermuda Triangle all have advocates who are clever at presenting their nonsense in scientific terms, with plenty of “evidence”. They are all equally specious, but I support your freedom to discuss them any place you want to.
They aren’t, They may well not teach Creationism as science on those grounds, though some schools notably do, but what restrictions are in place are placed there due to the religious ideology, not to due to the scientific merit.
This academic ‘theory’ is being actively taught and applied throughout education, industry, and administration. He is not opining for the banning of CRT and CSJJ, merely its imposition on society. It has no more scientific validity than flat earth theory or transubstantiation. Would you have either of those taught to students and workers? Especially when paid for by your money?
It ought not to be banned. It deserves to be ridiculed into obscurity to join phrenology, the theory of humors, and other failed and bogus theories about the nature of men and mankind.
It isn’t being taught as science. Apples to oranges.
If the academic theory in question (Critical Theory, to remove any ambiguity) explicitly closes out any alternate avenue of inquiry and explanation, then removing public funding seems appropriate.
Critical Theory attempts to use the tools of liberal democracy, specifically its willingness to accept criticism and its openess to discuss any idea, to destroy liberal democracy. Adolf Hitler, Chairman Mao, Pol Pot, and countless other tyrants would hearily approve.
Agree. Where it enforces illiberality, it needs to be constrained. In theory, it ought to be so-constrained already. No new laws required. Just enforcement.
Read it. NO WHERE does Lindsay support a ban. This is called NEW DISCOURSES. This means discussion. Critical thought. It requires the ability to read, consider and exchange ideas. It is the tool of Marxism and all authoritarian structures to “ban” thought and reasoned debate. Forcing individuals to listen to ideas and philosophies that intentionally target their beliefs and intellectual freedoms at the expense of their own tax dollars, furthers the very sort of oppression Critical Theory claims to fight against. In effect, creating hypocrites of its own acolytxs.
Where does the force come into it again?
Bingo.
Tolerate everything but coercive/violent intolerance.
Critical/Conflict theory is built on intolerance.
National Socialism was an academic theory in its day. Are you saying that it is ‘hypocritical,’ ‘illiberal’ and ‘divisive’ to wish to ban that particular academic theory?
Arguably, Critical Race Theory is National Socialism revived and lightly disguised with a sprinkling of leftist pixie dust.