Recent Election Proves Social Issues Are Not the Third Rail
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If we learned anything from the recent midterm elections—and we should have learned a lot—it should be that “social issues” are not the third rail of politics. The claim that they are the third rail is a manipulative lie told ad nauseum by RINOs who are so foolish they don’t understand that the social issues are essential for the health of any society.
From the midterm elections, conservatives should have learned that Republicans won elections from coast to coast in part because they have been “leaning in” to the “social issues” rather than fleeing from them. And we should have learned from the bellicose responses of Leftists that their only defenses are calling names and lying.
Republicans won in part because they justifiably worry about inflation and crime, both the results of doctrinaire leftist Big Government, pro-criminal, globalist policies. Republicans won also because they were disgusted with and animated by the usurpation of public education by leftist change-agents who use their jobs to promote their social, moral, and political ideologies on sexuality—including abortion—and race.
Taxpayers are fed up with obscene, profane, and age-inappropriate materials being presented to their children.
Taxpayers are fed up with divisive, exclusionary, racist, misogynistic, misandrist, misanthropic, anti- science beliefs that leftists identify as unifying, inclusive, anti-racist, philogynist, philandrist, humanitarian, and scientific.
Taxpayers are fed up with paying the salaries of leftwing propagandists who identify as “educators” and “experts” who believe they should have absolute autonomy over the curricula they teach to other people’s children.
Taxpayers are fed up with children being taught that whites are racist oppressors by virtue of their skin color, that masculinity is toxic, that homosexuality is ontologically and morally equivalent to heterosexuality, that all family structures are equivalent, or that boys can be girls–none of which are true.
Taxpayers are fed up with the sexual integration of private spaces and girls’ sports.
Taxpayers are fed up with the Orwellian de facto suppression of First Amendment speech protections as evidenced in speakers being canceled and jobs being lost.
They’re fed up with leftists screeching that conservatives are racist, homophobic, and transphobic when conservatives express their moral or political views with the clarity and confidence that leftists express their deluded, destructive views.
They’re fed up with the lie that conservative moral beliefs about homosexual acts, or same-sex “marriage,” or cross-dressing constitutes hatred of persons who identify as “gay” or “trans.”
I hope conservatives are learning that addressing the social issues is not only critical to winning elections but also that the “social issues” are critical to the health and future of any society. Dave Rubin,Guy Benson, and Tammy Bruce may be smart, articulate, and right on many issues, but embracing their views on homosexuality and marriage will be a political and humanitarian nightmare for the GOP and America.
It’s not just leftist ideas about sexuality that will destroy. Embracing ideas found in critical race theory (CRT) or allowing our children to be taught those ideas as inarguable truth out of fear of being called “racist” will be equally destructive.
Now that many more Republicans have raised their voices against the racist ideas embedded in CRT, leftists are screaming “racist” with increased volume. They feel the wind changing. Their con has been revealed. Their jig is almost up. Well, it will be if Republicans remain unified and fearless.
Not only are leftists shrieking “racist” louder, but they’re also making the disingenuous case that public schools “don’t teach critical race theory.” What they’re not saying is that the ideas promulgated in public schools on race, race relations, and American history are the same ideas on race, race relations, and American history promulgated by CRT and by both the ideologies that preceded CRT and the many money-making operations promoting CRT-derived ideas.
Leftist ideas about identity groups, “systemic bias,” and “systems of oppression” come from numerous ideological frameworks, including critical theory, critical pedagogy, and CRT. Thinkers associated with these theoretical frameworks include Paulo Freire, Herbert Marcuse, Peter McLaren, Henry Giroux, bell hooks, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Derrick Bell, Richard Delgado, and Peggy McIntosh.
Anyone who wonders whether schools teach CRT should spend some time reading what these ambitious scholars promote and then read the resources their local schools provide to students or teachers on institutional racism, intersectionality, oppression, education, diversity, equity, and inclusion.
All the indignant claims from school administrators that they don’t teach CRT are now stinking red herrings tossed out in a frantic attempt to distract opponents from all that inconvenient opposing.
Sure, schools and the organizations that profit from promoting “diversity, equity, and inclusion” in schools may not technically teach CRT and may not use the term CRT. Instead, they extract CRT’s assumptions and repackage them to make them seem less controversial, less scholarly, and more palatable to the gullible among us. For the outside organizations that profit from keeping racism alive, the goal is to make repackaged CRT more marketable to government schools.
From this election, conservatives should have learned that name-calling and lies rather than logic, reasons, and evidence are the chief weapons in the leftist arsenal. They should have learned that courage, boldness, unity, and perseverance in the service of truth are powerful. And they should have learned from the ideological corruption that is now systemic in schools that we must be committed to seeking and speaking truth in the public square even if they have to do it alone and even when doing so is costly.
The ideology of Black Lives Matter (BLM) and other “social justice” organizations teaches that all whites are racist oppressors, thereby justifying verbal attacks on people who are deemed inveterate racists and justifying riots to destroy everything that has emerged from an allegedly irremediable racist system. In promoting an explicitly racist ideology, BLM and other “social justice” organizations institutionalize racism, and we are suffering the fruits of that poisonous ideology.
In the hell-bent quest by America-hating revolutionaries to destroy America by destroying its institutions and history, 60 monuments have been removed, ordered removed, defaced, or torn down. In addition, according to Reinsurance News,
While no estimates of the costs of the damage is available yet, a look back at the costliest U.S. civil disorders shows that there’s potential for claims from the current riots, which are in multiple cities, to have easily run into the billions of dollars already.
Worse still, this BLM-led revolution has resulted in 25 deaths, hundreds of injuries—including injuries to 700 law enforcement officers—and the establishment of a rogue nation in the midst of downtown Seattle with the blessing of the incompetent mayor who called the squalid, uninhabitable, and dangerous encampment a free-love street festival.
The culture-destroyers are not done yet. Well-known racist activist Shaun King, whose purported racial identity and numerous fundraising projects are questioned by even leftists, recently tweeted,
Yes, I think the statues of the white European they claim is Jesus should also come down. They are a form of white supremacy. Always have been.
and
All murals and stained glass windows of white Jesus, and his European mother, and their white friends should also come down. They are a gross form white supremacy. Created as tools of oppression. Racist propaganda. They should all come down.
BLM, with whom King was previously associated, is a destructive revolutionary group leading a Maoist-like cultural revolution, and many conservatives don’t seem to understand that. Those who support BLM and its skin-pigment-obsessed divisive, separatist, elitist ideology are de facto racists, no matter their skin color.
In National Review, Kyle Smith describes the white liberal BLM disciples as “the White-Guilt Cult”:
Amidst nationwide Black Lives Matter protests, a black man and woman are seated on a park bench while a white woman … takes to her megaphone. “We repent on behalf of, uh, Caucasian people,” she says. A small crowd of white people comes to kneel before the two seated black folks, who are co-pastors of a local church. Some of the kneelers wash the feet of the black people. … Several people start audibly weeping, or keening, as the speaker continues. Roughly a dozen people join in the gesture and kneel before the black couple. “We have put our necks, put our hands, our knees, upon the necks of our African-American brothers and sisters, people of color, indigenous people.” …
The original sin in the White Guilt Cult, the New Church of Anti-Racism, is to be, “uh, Caucasian people.” … If anything, the Great Awokening’s response to the George Floyd killing seems to be bolstering racial barriers rather than eradicating them. By making a religion of anti-racism, white people carry on with the longstanding project of “othering” black folks. … Take the principles of Woke in vain and you invite instantaneous ritual chastisement—the most thrilling, ecstatic element of the woke religion. The techno-narcissistic innovation of the Wokesters is that they have made themselves, as a collective, their own godhead, equipped with the authority to wield and unleash the thunderbolt of righteousness on blasphemers here and now, on their own authority. …
“White silence equals violence” is one new precept gaining currency. … How exciting it must be to upend the meanings of words in service of the greater cause of smiting one’s perceived enemies, or even whatever suspected counterrevolutionaries there may be among one’s sworn allies. No one dared to be the first to stop applauding a Stalin speech.
Even Chick-fil-A CEO Dan Cathy has joined the anti-biblical white-guilt Cult, last week calling for white people to pay penance for sinful acts of racism that they never committed by shining the shoes of black people.
The ideology of BLM grows out of Critical Race Theory (CRT), which is essentially repackaged socialism with its focus on economic redistribution. CRT like that espoused by BLM and scores of other organizations and ideologues emphasizes redistribution of wealth and values uniformity of economic and social position over liberty. Those whose worldview has been shaped by CRT–also known deceptively as “social justice warriors,” seek to use the force of government to establish economic uniformity.
CRT focuses on race, sex, class, “sexual orientation,” and “gender identity.” It encourages people to view the world through the divisive lens of identity politics, dividing groups into “oppressors” and “oppressed.” Those who are identified as “oppressors” need not have committed any acts of actual persecution or oppression, nor feel any sense of superiority toward or dislike of the supposed “oppressed” class. CRT promotes the idea that “institutional racism,” as opposed to actual acts of mistreatment of individuals by other individuals, is the cause of differing lots in life.
“Social justice” activists cultivate the racist, sexist, heterophobic belief that whites (especially males and heterosexuals) are oppressors—a belief that robs minorities of a sense of agency in and responsibility for their own lives, telling them that their lots in life cannot improve through their own efforts but only through endless confessions of guilt on the parts of the purported oppressors. CRT cultivates a sense of perpetual victimization and powerlessness on the parts of minorities and an irrational and illegitimate sense of guilt on the parts of whites (or men or heterosexuals).
Finally, social justice theory is distinctly anti-American and hyper-focuses on America’s mistakes and failings. CRT diminishes or ignores the remarkable success America has achieved in integrating virtually every ethnic and racial group in the world and in enabling people to improve their lots in life through economic opportunity and American principles of liberty and equality.
Racism peddlers—including colorless racism-peddlers and profiteers like Robin DiAngelo, author of White Fragility—disseminate their cancerous ideology everywhere. Many Americans view our colleges and universities as the primary indoctrination centers, but they should look at government middle and high schools, because indoctrinating the next generation begins long before college.
Through “professional development”—which are the teacher training workshops, seminars, and conferences that take place during summer breaks, institute days, and late-arrival days—teachers are being coached and pressured by administrators and colleagues to adopt the beliefs of “anti-racism” and diversity trainers whose hefty fees are paid for by the public.
Teachers are forced to attend these indoctrination workshops, which never include resources or experts that challenge the assumptions of “anti-racism” trainers. Teachers are then expected to incorporate these revolutionary, leftist, and dubious beliefs into their classroom instruction. Our taxes are being used in government schools to teach children to hate America.
The predatory “anti-racism” scammers profit from peddling guilt to whites, shaming them into falsely believing—or pretending to believe—they are racists. The snake-oil salesmen and women do that in two ways. First, they redefine racism. Racism no longer refers to the belief that people with brown or black skin are by nature inferior. Nor does it refer to individual acts of incivility, unkindness, oppression, or violence. It refers to being white in a culture whose power structures used to be controlled by whites. Whites are guilty of racism and oppression based on nothing more than the color of their skin. This repugnant redefinition is the antithesis of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream for America. It is also unbiblical.
The second way snake-oil salespersons peddle their ugly wares is equally sneaky. They recast all criticism of or opposition to their ideology as something negative, thereby making those who disagree reluctant to express their opposition. Robin DiAngelo insultingly describes the denials of white-skinned people that they are racists as “white fragility.” Those whites who aren’t racists don’t want to deny being racists because if they do, they’ll then be charged with non-existent white fragility on top of their non-existent racism.
When I worked at Deerfield High School, the district hired expensive racism huckster from California, Glenn Singleton, to teach District 113 employees about their racism. At his first lecture to the entire district, Singleton pre-classified his audience as falling into three categories according to their potential responses to his theories: The first group were those who would agree with him immediately. The second group were those who would be on the fence and need to be convinced. And the third group were those “who are gifted at subverting reform.” Singleton cunningly attempted to prevent criticism by pre-labeling pejoratively those who disagreed with him. This dishonest labeling tactic works because conservatives let it.
Organizations, resources, and profiteers that provide “anti-racism” propaganda to government schools are numerous, but here are some that taxpayers should watch out for:
The 1619 Project—a much criticized revision of American history by the New York Times and racism-peddler/activist Nikole Hannah-Jones
Teaching Tolerance, a project of the Southern Poverty Law Center
Deep Equity
White Privilege Conference
Pacific Education Group/Courageous Conversation About Race—founder Glenn Singleton
National SEED Project (Seeking Education Equity and Diversity)
“White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack”—essay written by Peggy McIntosh
The People’s History of the United States, a revisionist history written by Howard Zinn
It is not racist to criticize the loathsome and radical BLM that is explicitly committed to “disrupting ” the “Western-prescribed nuclear family structure led by a father and mother, and to normalizing homosexuality and “trans”-cultic beliefs and practices. Such justifiable criticism does not become racist just because leftists shriek over and over and over that it is. Their epithet-hurling is not a magical incantation that turns truth into ugliness. It is a means of intimidation that leftists use all the time because conservatives quake and crumble in its wake.
Snap out of it, conservatives or you feed and strengthen the belching behemoth.
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Drew Brees, the Mob, and the Poisonous Doctrine of Collective Guilt
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New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, a committed Christian, and, before last week, deeply admired and liked by people of all colors and no color, committed an almost unforgivable sin. He said this in response to a specific question about athletes kneeling during the national anthem:
I will never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag of the United States of America or our country. Let me just tell you what I see or what I feel when the national anthem is played, and when I look at the flag of the United States. I envision my two grandfathers, who fought for this country during World War II, one in the Army and one in the Marine Corp, both risking their lives to protect our country and to try to make our country and this world a better place. Every time I stand with my hand over my heart, looking at that flag, and singing the national anthem, that’s what I think about, and in many cases, it brings me to tears thinking about all that has been sacrificed, not just [by] those in the military, but … those throughout the civil rights movements of the ’60s, and everyone, and all that has been endured by so many people up until this point. And is everything right with our country right now? No, it’s not. We still have a long way to go, but I think what you do by standing there and showing respect to the flag with your hand over your heart, is it shows unity. It shows that we are all in this together, we can all do better and that we are all part of the solution.” (emphasis added)
“Progressives” became apoplectic and splenetic. Judging from their attacks, one would think Brees had publicly celebrated Derek Chauvin.
Under withering attacks, Brees offered two apologies because the mob hated his first one. Then his wife, Brittany Brees, issued an apology in which she said,
Somehow we as white America … can feel good about not being racist, feel good about loving one another as God loves us. We can feel good about educating our children about the horrors of slavery and history. We can read books to our children about Martin Luther King, Malcolm X., Hank Aaron, Barack Obama, Rosa Parks, Harriet Tubman.. and feel like we are doing our part to raise our children to love, be unbiased and with no prejudice. To teach them about all of the African Americans that have fought for and risked their lives against racial injustice. Somehow as white Americans we feel like that checks the box of doing the right thing. Not until this week did Drew and I realize THAT THIS IS THE PROBLEM. To say “I don’t agree with disrespecting the flag” .. I now understand was also saying I don’t understand what the problem really is, I don’t understand what you’re fighting for, and I’m not willing to hear you because of our preconceived notions of what that flag means to us. That’s the problem we are not listening, white America is not hearing. We’re not actively LOOKING for racial prejudice.
If saying “I don’t agree with disrespecting the flag” also says “I don’t understand what the problem really is,” then does kneeling during the national anthem mean both “America is systemically racist” and “I don’t understand why you value the flag and national anthem. I don’t understand what you see that’s good in America. I’m not willing to hear you because of our view of America as pervasively evil and whites as oppressors”?
Unlike Brittany Brees, I can’t speak for all of white America. I don’t know what all of white America feels. But I do know that for a lot of white Americans, teaching our children about the horrors of slavery and lynchings, about Jim Crow laws, and about Harriet Tubman, Rosa Parks, Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Hank Aaron, Jesse Owens, and the Tuskegee Airmen is not about “feeling good.” Raising our children to love others, to hate bigotry, and to stand up for mistreated friends is not about “feeling good” or “checking boxes.” It’s not about virtue-signaling or pride. It’s about serving Christ. It’s about loving our neighbors as ourselves. It’s about truth.
“Progressives” argue that people who explicitly condemn police brutality and all forms of bigotry and who have never said or done anything racist are the problem if they don’t endorse kneeling during the national anthem. Just curious, does that principle of collective guilt apply to all egregious sin? Are people who explicitly oppose the sexual exploitation of women and children in pornography, strip clubs, prostitution, and sex trafficking, and who have never viewed porn, visited a strip club, hired a prostitute, or trafficked women and children a problem? Should they kneel during the national anthem as a protest against the many Americans who watch porn, leer at women in strip clubs, hire prostitutes, and/or traffic in women and children? Are our flag and national anthem now symbols of the poisonous systemic abuse of women and children that colleges and universities promote through courses that celebrate porn? Are Americans who explicitly oppose the sexual exploitation of women and children, who are pro-actively teaching their children about its evil, and who have never been complicit in it via using porn, visiting strip clubs, hiring prostitutes, or sex-trafficking, the problem if they are not “actively” looking for the sexual exploitation of women and children?
Former NFL player Shannon Sharpe said this about Drew Brees’s response to an interviewer’s question about the knee-taking of athletes:
[Drew] issued an apology … but it’s meaningless because the guys know he spoke his heart the very first time around. I don’t know what Drew’s going to do, but he probably should just go ahead and retire now. He will never be the same. Take it from a guy that has been a leader in the locker room for a number of years. What he said, they will never look at him the same because he spoke his heart. It wasn’t what he said, it was how he said it. He was defiant. I will NEVER [yes, Sharpe shouted that defiantly] respect the man.
BTW, Brees did not speak defiantly as Sharpe falsely claimed—making Sharpe, therefore, a slanderer. Don’t believe me? Well, watch it yourself and see if you think Brees was “defiant”:
Sharpe expresses the “progressive” view of “tolerance,” and this is why “progressivism” will destroy both freedom and the country. Brees saying that he disagrees with knee-taking during the national anthem while at the same time saying the flag represents the sacrifices made during the Civil Rights era and acknowledging that right now we have a lot of work yet to do renders him—in Sharpe’s repugnant view—unsuitable for employment or respect.
Brees’s teammate Malcolm Jenkins castigated him too saying,
Drew Brees, if you don’t understand how hurtful, how insensitive your comments are, you are part of the problem. To think that because your grandfathers served in this country and you have a great respect for the flag that everybody else should have the same ideals and thoughts that you do is ridiculous. And it shows that you don’t know history. Because when our grandfathers fought for this country and served and they came back, they didn’t come back to a hero’s welcome. They came back and got attacked for wearing their uniforms. They came back to people, to racism, to complete violence.”
Brees never said anything like “everybody else should have the same ideals and thoughts” that he does. Moreover, Brees is justified in valuing the service of his grandfathers, and he is justified in his respect and love for America—the country to which emigrants the world over seek entry. He’s justified in loving America for her founding—though imperfectly realized—principles. He’s justified in celebrating the incredible integration of peoples of diverse races, ethnicities, and religions in America. He’s justified in appreciating how far we’ve come since slavery and Jim Crow laws.
It is possible for whites both to value the sacrifice and service of their fathers and grandfathers and to feel contempt for the injustice of black fathers and grandfathers being ill-treated following their service and sacrifice.
Vietnam war veterans—both black and white—were spit on by liberals when they returned home. Do we hold liberals who, not only didn’t engage in such behavior but also condemn it, accountable for that injustice? Do we blame such ugly behavior committed by some liberals fifty years ago on all of America? Does the American flag and national anthem symbolize their repugnant acts?
Jenkins continued,
And then here we are in 2020, with the whole country on fire, everybody witnessing a black man dying—being murdered—at the hands of the police, just in cold blood for everybody to see. The whole country’s on fire, and the first thing that you do is criticize one’s peaceful protest that was years ago when we were trying to signal a sign for help and signal for our allies and our white brothers and sisters, the people we consider to be friends, to get involved? It was ignored. And here we are now with the world on fire and you still continue to first criticize how we peacefully protest because it doesn’t fit in what you do and your beliefs without ever acknowledging that the fact that a man was murdered at the hands of police in front of us all and that it’s been continuing for centuries, that the same brothers that you break the huddle down with before every single game, the same guys that you bleed with and go into battle with every single day go home to communities that have been decimated.
Brees didn’t “continue to first criticize.” He has not been continually criticizing the kneeling protests. He didn’t initiate discussion of the topic. Brees was asked by an interviewer what he would do if teammates kneeled during the national anthem.
And while Brees didn’t mention George Floyd, he did acknowledge the suffering of the black community. To remind Jenkins, this is what Brees said:
[I]t brings me to tears, thinking about all that has been sacrificed, not just [by] those in the military, but … [by] those throughout the civil rights movements of the ’60s, and everyone, and all that has been endured by so many people up until this point. And is everything right with our country right now? No, it’s not. We still have a long way to go. … we can all do better and … we are all part of the solution.
What exactly did Jenkins mean when he said the kneeling protests were “ignored”? Likely he meant that there were many people who didn’t participate or support the protest. In other words, in Jenkins’ view, the only acceptable way to help decimated black communities is to protest the national anthem. But then isn’t Jenkins doing exactly what he accuses Brees of doing? Isn’t he demanding that everyone believe what he believes about the protests, the flag, and the national anthem?
Jenkins is ignoring that there are white people and black people trying to help decimated black communities. They’ve been trying for years, but they’re shouted down and called bigots for having different views than white and black liberals on how to solve the problems of racism and urban blight. Here are some of their ideas:
How should we address actual racism committed by racist individuals in police departments—most of which are controlled by liberals? Punish them and/or get rid of them. How do we do that? Revisit/reform “qualified immunity” and policies that conceal police misconduct and protect brutal cops.
How should we address crime in black communities? Work on transforming society by getting rid of no-fault divorce and using every resource available to promote true marriage and discourage out-of-wedlock pregnancies. Intact families with a mother and a father are the greatest protections against poverty and crime. And when crime is reduced in communities, businesses will move in.
How do we improve education? Offer impoverished families school choice and end teachers’ unions that promote destructive policies and protect lousy teachers. And stop teaching divisive and false ideas from organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center’s education arm Teaching Tolerance, or Howard Zinn’s People’s History of the United States, or The 1619 Project that present imbalanced views of American history and teach children of color that because of white oppression, they have no hope of moving up in the world.
How do we help blacks improve their financial position? Deregulate businesses and reduce taxes in order to grow the economy, thereby providing jobs.
How do we help eradicate bigotry, bitterness, and hatred? We preach the gospel—the whole gospel.
If Jenkins is concerned about the decimation in his community, why attack Brees? Why not attack “progressives” who have run the cities in which those decimated communities subsist? Why not attack the racism profiteers like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson who make bank by fomenting racial division? Why not attack liberal leaders who deny school choice to poor black families? Why not attack teachers’ unions that protect lousy teachers in failing schools? Why not attack fatherlessness that results in criminality? Why not attack Black Lives Matter (BLM) that seeks to dismantle families, which are the single best hope for black children?
We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable.
We foster a queer‐affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking.
Note that mothers and parents are mentioned but not fathers.
Are those principles and goals helpful to black children? Are they unifying? Are they good?
Jenkins was not done with his accusatory screed:
Drew, unfortunately, you’re somebody who doesn’t understand their privilege. You don’t understand the potential that you have to actually be an advocate for the people that you call brothers.
Will Jenkins stand behind whites who advocate for school choice, true marriage, and the end of teachers’ unions? Will Jenkins cheer whites who advocate against premarital sex and out-of-wedlock births? Will Jenkins cheer whites who advocate for the end of divisive, destructive diversity training and The 1619 Project that teach lies and foster division? Will Jenkins cheer for whites who advocate the ideas of Candace Owens, Thomas Sowell, Ben Carson, Bob Woodson and “1776 Unites” project? Or are whites expected to advocate for only ideas and policies that Jenkins, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Nikole Hannah-Jones and her 1619 Project scam promulgate?
Liberals have had fifty years to solve the problems endemic to urban communities of color—including eight years with a black president whose presidency saw black unemployment and racial division surge. Is Jenkins willing to listen to the ideas of others on how to help, how to advocate, how to get involved? Is he willing to listen to diverse ideas on how to rebuild suffering communities? Or will he say to black conservatives what he said to Brees: “you should shut the f–k up.”
It’s ironic that progressives have controlled most major cities for decades and have been forcing Americans in government schools and the corporate world to endure years of “diversity training,” “sensitivity” sessions, and “social justice” indoctrination, and yet we just suffered through the worst race riots since 1968 when Boomers and their rotten ideas began corrupting academia.
Their rotten ideas have—as expected and predicted—produced rotten fruit that is poisoning the hearts and minds of Americans. Race relations had been improving slowly but surely until the Boomers’ ideas seeped from sullied towers in bastions of idiocy like Berkeley to countless colleges and universities and then into high schools. Peggy McIntosh, White Privilege Conferences, and Howard Zinn’s revisionist history of the United States turned young teens’ minds into burbling cauldrons of contempt for America and its founding principles—those very principles that had brought us so far from the days of slavery, Jim Crow laws, and red-lining. With an erroneous understanding of American history, young Americans falsely believe that America was and remains a wholly evil country that must be destroyed and rebuilt in the recriminatory image of “progressives.”
Former NFL coach and Christian Tony Dungy, who likes and respects Drew Brees, expressed disappointment with his initial comments. Dungy said that “we need unifying voices, not divisive voices.” Dungy’s comments were disappointing in that he didn’t address the divisiveness of Black Lives Matter, Antifa, The 1619 Project, Critical Race Theory, or people like Al Sharpton. He didn’t address the divisiveness of the attacks on Drew Brees for saying—when asked—that he doesn’t agree with kneeling during the national anthem. But you see, Dungy wasn’t asked about any of that, just like Brees was not asked specifically about George Floyd.
Two apologies from Drew Brees and one long one from Mrs. Brees, all of which suggest they have joined BLM. These apologies bring to mind Winston Smith at the end of 1984. Sadly, it doesn’t take torture to get grown men (and women) to capitulate to a destructive ideology. All it takes today is a barrage of insults.
Every day, we see across America signs of hope and progress. We see interracial couples, multi-racial churches, multi-racial groups of friends, and upwardly mobile black families. Is America perfect? Of course not. No society can ever be perfect because humans are fallen creatures. Fallen creatures hate. People of all colors hate. But our founding principles are good, and they are guiding us toward better.
Over a dozen years ago, while working at Deerfield High School in Deerfield, Illinois, I was helping a high school junior on her paper for American Studies (still co-taught by the same two teachers today). She cheerily told me that by the end of first semester in American Studies, she hated America and hated being an American. “Social justice” mission accomplished.
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Is White Privilege merely “Fake News?”
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Your college-bound son or daughter has a new obstacle to overcome in learning to be both an educated and wise young adult. Teaching White Privilege is now all the rage. Many universities have mandatoryclasses on it. Some even extend the indoctrination into the dormitories. Only youth with strong character will survive the experience without being warped.
Before exposing our youth to these arguments we are wise to scout ahead, to see what sort of trouble lies ahead. What is White Privilege, and what does it have to say about racism? Does God teach us anything about this? And what should our response be, both as Christians and as Americans?
Defining White Privilege
The concept of White Privilege can be traced to a couple of Marxist authors.
In 1935 Professor W.E.B. DuBois wrote the book Black Reconstruction in America. In it he used Marxist theory to explain some outcomes of the American Civil War.
Beginning in 1965 the labor activist Theodore William Allen sought ways to radicalize the American workforce. After studying the DuBois book he decided that American society had a built-in racial favoritism he called “white skin privilege.” He said that workers in America didn’t hear the Marxist call to action because of society’s built-in white supremacism. In one essay Allen claimed that:
“White Americans who want government of the people, by the people, must begin by first repudiating their white skin privileges and the white ‘gentleman’s agreement’ against the Negro.”
Allen’s ideas were expanded by academic researchers and social activists into “White Privilege,” an assertion that there are real but invisible advantages that only white people have. For example, Professor Peggy McIntosh supposedly carries an “invisible backpack” of advantages like these:
“I can turn on the television or open to the front page of the paper and see people of my race widely represented.”
“If a traffic cop pulls me over, or if the IRS audits my tax return, I can be sure I haven’t been singled out because of my race.”
If the goal is overthrowing our current society then the White Privilege concept is very useful. You can accuse your opponents of having it and deny their objections because they are simply blind to the problem.
Racism and godly government
In a previous article I noted what God requires of a society and its government. In summary, its rulers must deter crime, provide even-handed justice, and defend the powerless. The people are to be honest, peaceable, living up to their promises, and caring for the poor and orphaned. Regarding issues of discrimination these instructions include:
Provide even-handed and truthful justice (Amos 5:12).
Give judgments that don’t favor either the rich or the poor (Leviticus 19:5).
Be even-handed in our treatment the aliens in our midst (Deuteronomy 10:17-19).
For Christians there is to be no favoritism of men or women, or of race, in Christ Jesus (Acts 10:34-36, Galatians 3:28, I Timothy 5:21, James 2:1). A Christian society is to be no respecter of persons or of race – a colorblind society.
Is America (still) racist?
The American experience hasn’t always been just regarding race. How about today?
Are our laws racist?
At times parts of America had laws where the intent was racial discrimination. Examples of these include racial segregation laws, voting poll taxes, and voting literacy tests. But after much time and effort, racial discrimination has been abolished from American laws. There are a great many watchers to ensure that the laws remain that way. Yet laws are not the society itself. They merely guide and regulate it.
Are there racist Americans?
You’re certain to find racist Americans because all people have sinned and fall short of God’s perfection (Romans 3:23). We should rather be gratified at how little racism there is. That is largely the result of more than a century of Christian preaching and public exhortations to not judge someone merely by the color of their skin.
Still, you don’t have to look hard to find overt racists:
These groups are racist because they don’t seek colorblind solutions. They pursue race-based policies and outcomes, for one race and against another. Curiously, each of these groups seek to reinstate some form of resegregation. The point of discussing racist organizations is that nobody is immune from becoming racist merely because of their own race. Racism can come from people of any race.
We know that there are some Americans who judge people according to their race, and that there are other Americans who judge people according to their character and acts. How do we decide if this combination results in a racist society?
Is American society racist?
American society encompasses the social interactions of its people, the good and the bad, the racist and the racially colorblind. Is the result a racist society? Reflecting on what the Bible says about racism (Galatians 3:28, et.al.) the answer must be NO.
First, actual racist activity isn’t that common. Not surveys or research studies, actual incidents of people being discriminated against. It’s surprising news when an incident occurs. News organizations love these reports. If there were a lot of them the newspapers and television shows would be continually reporting about the community’s racism, editorializing about what a shame it is. But you don’t see this wall-to-wall news coverage because the racist activity isn’t that prevalent.
Second, racist offenders are pressured to fix things. Their racist activities cease. A society that can fix its racial wrongs is healthy, not irredeemably racist. It has a conscience that causes social change. In a racist society nothing would change.
Third, a social interaction can be surprisingly complex. One person sees racism, while another recognizes a combination of normal social attributes. It can be difficult to determine if there are racist elements involved. Try these examples:
A girl avoids the coffee shop nearest work. Is it because she doesn’t like the race or religion of its workers? Or is it because she remembers an encounter with a certain rude barista?
A town with mostly white people is shunning a certain black family. Is it because of white racism? Or because that family’s children are “out of control?”
The local newspaper never shows pictures people of my race. Is it because of racist policies? Or because the people of your race are few and don’t get into newsworthy troubles?
A family has their apartment rental application rejected. Is that racial steering, with the remedy of the Fair Housing Act? Or was that family too poor to afford the rent?
A white scholar drives into a black neighborhood to meet someone. She is pulled over by police and questioned. Is her experience an example of “police routinely pull over cars in a black neighborhood?” Or is it, as the police said, that her driving pattern fits the profile of someone looking for a drug dealer?
When evaluating a social situation all of the details matter. But perhaps thorough research won’t generate the sensational headlines that were desired.
Is White Privilege “fake news?”
The White Privilege concept claims that white people have certain invisible advantages. These advantages might merely be the result of acquiring income, education, or a residence in “nice” neighborhood.
A Department of Education study states that “Black students are suspended and expelled at a rate three times greater than white students.” But was the study covering disparities in just one school? Or were some data gathered from schools in peaceful communities and other data from schools serving as substitute gang battlegrounds?
Again, all of the details matter.
An important part of the White Privilege concept is that you can’t lose it, avoid it, or fix it. You’re guilty of racism just by living. This is important for activists, for guilty people are easily manipulated, and you’ll keep doing whatever the accusers ask for.
Finally, the White Privilege concept creates its own definition of racism. The common definition of racism judges a person on their thoughts, words and deeds. The White Privilege version says that you’re guilty because the accuser doesn’t like how society is currently structured. These advocates are moving the goalposts to encourage a political and social reengineering of America.
So what do we know about White Privilege?
It was invented to push people into accepting a socialist or Marxist society.
You are accused of being racist, but not for anything you did.
There is no way for you to fix this so-called racism.
Your only hope is to join your accusers and reshape society to their plans.
That sounds like “fake news” to me. It is guilt inducing without cause. Throw it out.
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Responsi-D**n-Bility
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The young black man in the video below, Frederick Wilson II, expresses views that are arguably far wiser and more helpful in the debate over justice and racial reconciliation than anything Al Sharpton,Eric Holder, or Jesse Jackson has said in recent years.
And Wilson’s views are exponentially more helpful than these inflammatory words from Louis Farrakhan who spoke recently at Morgan State University:
The young are God’s children, and they’re not goin’ down peaceful. You may not want to fight, but you better get ready. Teach your baby how to throw the bottle [Molotov cocktail] if they can [he then imitates a child throwing, while the audience laughs and applauds].
We’re gonna die anyway. Let’s die for something. Elijah Muhammad said…near fifty years ago…there were 20,000,000 of us, he said “If 10,000,000 of us lost our lives, there would be 10,000,000 of us left to go free….”
In this book [Farakkhan holds up a book], there’s a law for retaliation: Like for like. The Bible says, an eye, a tooth, a life. As long as they kill us, and go to Wendy’s, and have a burger, and go to sleep, they’re gonna keep killing us. But when we die and they die [cheering and standing ovation], then soon, we’re gonna sit at a table and talk about it We want some of this earth, or we’ll tear this G##d#mned country apart! As-salaamu alaikum.”
Perhaps this kind of rhetoric contributed to some blacks believing that the way to end racial injustice in Ferguson, Missouri was to steal and destroy the property of fellow blacks.
I hope that those high school social studies teachers who currently use tax dollars to promote their Leftist social and political views about race would show the Wilson video to students to balance out the whole “institutional racism” theme.
A few years ago when I was helping a Deerfield High School (DHS) student with a paper for her American Studies class, she shared that by the end of her first semester in that class, she hated America and hated being white. Great job, teachers. I’m sure that’s just what American taxpayers want their hard-earned money to subsidize.
Political proselytizing in public schools continues unabated. DHS teachers Ken Kramer and Neil Rigler continue to teach American Studies, and this year’s curriculum includes an essay by Leftist homosexual playwright Tony Kushner and five essays (some of which come from controversial history book A People’s History of the United States) by Leftist American history revisionist Howard Zinn:
Other authors include Eric Foner, Barbara Kingsolver, Lorraine Ali, and Leon Litwack, all liberal.
“Progressives” will argue that these scholars are well-respected scholars and prize-winners, which is true but ignores the bias that shapes their work, determining which facts to include, which to omit, which to emphasize, and how to frame their analyses. It also ignores the academic mission of both Zinn and Foner to use their role as historians to advance their political agenda.
Let’s take a glimpse at the writers whom public school “agents of change” promote.
Former Leftist, now conservative writer David Horowitz writes this about Eric Foner:
In 2002, Columbia University hosted a conference of academic radicals called, “Taking Back The Academy: History of Activism, History As Activism.” The published text of the conference papers was provided with a Foreword by Professor Eric Foner, who is a past president of both the Organization of American Historians and the American Historical Association, and a leading academic figure. Far from sharing Professor [Stanley] Fish’s view that a sharp distinction should be drawn between political advocacy and the scholarly disciplines, Professor Foner embraced the proposition that political activism is essential to the academic mission: “The chapters in this excellent volume,” wrote Foner, “derive from a path-breaking conference held at Columbia University in 2002 to explore the links between historical scholarship and political activism….As the chapters that follow demonstrate, scholarship and activism are not mutually exclusive pursuits, but are, at their best, symbiotically related.”
Kramer and Rigler include in their coursepack the essay “And Our Flag Was Still There,” in which well-known author and liberal Barbara Kingsolver takes aim at patriotism:
Patriotism threatens free speech with death. It is infuriated by thoughtful hesitation, constructive criticism of our leaders and pleas for peace. It despises people of foreign birth who’ve spent years learning our culture and contributing their talents to our economy. It has specifically blamed homosexuals, feminists and the American Civil Liberties Union.
In other words, the American flag stands for intimidation, censorship, violence, bigotry, sexism, homophobia, and shoving the Constitution through a paper shredder? Who are we calling terrorists here? Outsiders can destroy airplanes and buildings, but it is only we, the people, who have the power to demolish our own ideals.
Thomas Sowell (who happens to be black), Senior Fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution ), has this to say about Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States of which Kramer and Rigler are so enamored:
It speaks volumes about our schools and colleges that far-left radical Howard Zinn’s pretentiously titled book, “A People’s History of the United States,” is widely used across the country. It is one indictment, complaint, and distortion after another.
Anyone who relies on this twisted version of American history would have no idea why millions of people from around the world are trying, sometimes desperately, to move to this country. The one virtue of Zinn’s book is that it helps you identify unmistakably which teachers are using their classrooms as propaganda centers.
One wonders if all the “progressive” public school “agents of change” around the country tell their students and their parents that Zinn is a controversial historian. One wonders if they require their students to read criticism of Zinn’s revisionist history and discuss Zinn’s open admission that he used his work to advance his Leftist political goals. One wonders if Leftist “educators” require students to spend equal time reading the work of Thomas Sowell, and Abigail and Stephan Thernstrom—you know, in the service of diversity, balance, and “critical thinking.”
It’s not just curricula that are infected with biased Leftist ideas that distort American history and foster division rather than unity among disparate groups. School administrations also promote Leftist assumptions through professional development conferences, workshops, and seminars that taxpayers subsidize. These include controversial racism-profiteer Glenn Singleton’sNational Summit for Courageous Conversations, Regional Summits for Courageous Conversations, and “Beyond Diversity” seminars, which suck money from Americans through their public schools.
For the uninitiated, liberal theories regarding oppression almost always address homosexuality. Here’s an excerpt from one of the sessions offered at last fall’s National Summit for Courageous Conversations in New Orleans:
Phase 2 seminar. Journey back to a time when homosexual men and women were exalted in their native cultures (”Two Spirits”), only to have it stripped away when Eurocentric ways took control.
And we can’t forget one of the most infamous wastes of taxpayer money: the annual White Privilege Conference that seeks to persuade whites that they are racist oppressors by virtue of nothing other than their skin color.
The curricular choices of liberal teachers present a lopsided picture of America that over-emphasizes America’s flaws and de-emphasizes those aspects of America that have made this the greatest nation in history. Biased Leftist resources transform education into indoctrination and exacerbate rather than mitigate racial hostility. The Leftist assumptions about race, oppression, and justice that emerge from the writings of Brazilian Marxist Paulo Freire, Peggy McIntosh’s invisible knapsack, the White Privilege Conference, and Glenn Singleton’s dizzying array of money-making seminars and summits are corrupting education and disuniting Americans.
Race ballyhooers who line their pockets from the sale of their snake oil that aggravates racial wounds thus ensuring the perpetuation of their schemes claim they seek courageous and honest conversations. They don’t. The only kind of “conversations” they want are ones that involve them pontificating and others sycophantically echoing.
It would behoove taxpayers to send an email to their local school administrators, asking if any district money has been or will be spent on any of these professional development conferences.
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Fatuous “White Privilege Conference” This Week
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Many Americans find President Obama’s obsession with income inequality troubling. Many think the goal of equality of outcome as opposed to equality of opportunity is misguided and harmful. Many are concerned with his hyper-focus on race, class, gender, and the dubious classification “sexual orientation.” Well, get used to it, folks, because the government is breeding a new generation of Obamas, chiefly through public education.
This indoctrination occurs in schools, colleges, and departments of education that train teachers and then through them, filters down into our high schools, middle schools, and elementary schools.
One of the scores of ways the Obama/Bill Ayers/Peggy McIntosh/Paulo Freire worldviews are promulgated is through the annual “White Privilege Conference” being held this March 26-29 in Madison, Wisconsin. And one sure sign that this conference is up to no good is that the morally impoverished Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) will be participating through its ironically named “educational” project: Teaching Tolerance. Yes, the Southern Poverty Law Center, which identifies the Family Research Council, American Family Association, Concerned Women for America, Liberty Counsel, and IFI as “hate groups” because of our orthodox Christian belief that homosexual acts are immoral thinks of itself as the teacher of tolerance.
The documents for this conference include a glossary of terms for the uninitiated in which the term “Christonormativity” is defined: “The system of oppression which assumes Christianity as the norm, favors Christians, and denigrates and stigmatizes anyone that is not Christian. Equates Americanness with Christianity.”
Oddly, I couldn’t find the term “Christophobia,” which is the system of oppression which assumes Christianity is the source of all evil and stigmatizes anyone who is an orthodox Christian.
To give you a clearer picture of the ideologies that infect public education, below is a sampling of bios and workshops from the White Privilege conference. (Remember as you read the following that when the terms “racism” and “bias” are used, they do not refer primarily to actual racism and bias, but rather to “institutional racism” and “bias” which are horses of an entirely different color—definitely not white. Just know that if you’re a white, male, heterosexual, orthodox Christian you’re automatically guilty of racism, patriarchy, heteronormativity, Christonormativity, and hegemonic practices):
Paul Kivel: “The Roots of Racism in Christian Hegemony: Decolonizing our Thinking, Behavior, and Public Policy”: Before Europeans understood themselves as white they thought of themselves as Christians participating in a cosmic battle between good and evil against all those labeled Other. Today, Christian hegemony punishes the poor, destroys the environment, and contributes to our seemingly endless “war on terror.” As our crises of financial meltdown, war, racism and environmental destruction intensify; it is imperative that we dig beneath the surface of Christianity’s benign reputation to examine how it undermines our interpersonal relationships, weakens our communities and promotes injustice. Join me in a discussion of the impact of dominant Christianity on our lives and on how Christians and those who are not Christian have resisted oppression and built communities of healing and justice.
Emily Chiariello: The Teaching Tolerance Anti-bias Framework, “Understanding Identity, Diversity, Justice and Action,” will orient participants with the first-ever road map for anti-bias education. Organized into four domains: Identity, Diversity, Justice and Action, the framework represents a continuum of engagement in anti-bias, multicultural and social justice education, moving anti-bias educators from prejudice reduction toward collective action….Participants will walk away with a copy of the complete framework and strategies for integrating the framework into classroom instruction.
Rosemary Colt and Diana Reeves: “Examining White Privilege and Building Foundations for Social Justice Thinking in the Elementary Classroom”: Learn how to design and implement curriculum around concepts of power, justice, relationship and community building. How does white privilege impact our society at a community level, a global level? …In this session, we will share curriculum that allows children to construct an understanding of how race and privilege have determined what our neighborhoods look like. Even young students can learn to understand and think critically about white privilege and power, as well as detect bias, assume perspectives different from their own, and take social action.
Christine Saxman: “Saxman is an English teacher [at Deerfield High School, Deerfield, Illiniois], Equity leader, Pacific Education Group Affiliate and “Seeking Educational Equity and Diversity” facilitator. She works for racial justice inside her classroom, school district and community….She will be co-facilitating “Interrupting White Privilege at WPC and Beyond: How Interruption Can Strengthen Relationships and Build CommunityRelationships and Build Community.” What do you do if you see white privilege asserting itself at WPC? What do you do when someone shares that you’ve been asserting privilege and you didn’t realize it? This workshop, facilitated by a Woman of Color and a White woman, will examine how to recognize privilege and how to interrupt it in the service of relationships, community, and justice.
Andrea Haynes Johnson: Johnson is a Black, female anti-racist leader and educator. Currently she serves as the Director of Diversity and Grants for [Deerfield and Highland Park High Schools], and she is an Affiliate with Pacific Educational Group. She will be the co-facilitator of “Moving K-12 Public Schoolsto Anti-Racist Action,” in whichParticipants will engage in a vibrant conversation about the paths and pitfalls to transforming Public Schools into spaces that interrupt White Privilege and promote anti-racist practices. Strategies for accountability, staff development and student engagement will be shared. The dialogue will empower participants to return to their home schools armed with language and concrete practices that can foster a more inclusive environment for all stakeholders.
White Privilege Conferences are attended by public school teachers who will take these controversial ideas about race, gender, class, “sexual orientation,” and bias into the classroom in subtle and not-so-subtle ways. There is no reason for teachers to attend this voluntary conference other than to bring the dubious ideas they ingest back to the classroom. And folks, we often pay for it.
Take ACTION: Contact your local high school and ask if any teachers are speaking at or attending this dubious conference, and if so, ask whether the school district is footing the bill.
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