The battle against critical race theory and the Left’s attempts to force it upon young, impressionable children in the public school system is one that conservatives can win. The Left knows this, which is why it is spreading outright falsehoods about the legislation several Republican states have passed to ban this toxic, divisive, racist ideology from their public school systems.
One of the more popular lies about these bans on critical race theory is that they prohibit public schools from talking about slavery, racism, and white supremacy. Here’s the New York Times’s Astead Wesley falsely claiming that Florida’s CRT ban would prohibit teachers from talking about Juneteenth, a holiday celebrating the emancipation of slaves.
its kinda amazing: juneteenth is gonna be a federal holiday for reasons teachers won’t be allowed to explain to their students out of fear critical race theory backlash
— Astead (@AsteadWesley) June 16, 2021
The bill does nothing of the sort. In fact, it upholds Florida’s preexisting curriculum, which explicitly requires public schools to teach about “the history of African Americans, including the history of African peoples before the political conflicts that led to the development of slavery, the passage to America, the enslavement experience, abolition, and the contributions of African Americans to American society.”
Florida’s new amendment does ban “material from the 1619 Project” and any other material that defines “American history as something other than the creation of a new nation based largely on universal principles stated in the Declaration of Independence.” In no way does that make Juneteenth an off-limits subject or suggest that the history of slavery and racism will not be taught.
Either Wesley hasn’t bothered to read the amendment and doesn’t know what it says, or he is deliberately lying about it. Given the full-blown misinformation campaign being waged by the media against these bills, I’m inclined to believe the latter.
Here are a few more examples: Nikole Hannah-Jones, author of the New York Times’s historically erroneous 1619 Project, claimed that Texas’s bill banning the teaching of critical race theory is “part of a legacy of the government banning the discussion of slavery.” The Huffington Post’s Jennifer Bendery made a similar false claim:
Morning! ☕️
In the dead of night, the Texas Senate passed a bill that will effectively ban public school teachers from talking about racism, white supremacy or current events.
It already passed the House. On its way to be signed into law now. https://t.co/fUFNeHVQP0
— Jennifer Bendery (@jbendery) May 22, 2021
Again, it appears neither Hannah-Jones nor Bendery bothered to read the Texas bill in question. Because if they had, they would have known that not only does this legislation not ban the teaching of slavery or the history of white supremacy, but it actually lists these topics as “essential history” that must be included in every school’s history curriculum.
What the Texas bill does is ban the core elements of critical race theory, including the idea that “an individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, is inherently racist, sexist, or oppressive, whether consciously or unconsciously” and that “an individual, by virtue of his or her race or sex, bears responsibility for actions committed in the past by other members of the same race or sex.”
And yes, these noxious and divisive tenets of critical race theory are, in fact, being taught in public schools across the country. A few examples: In Seattle, white teachers were told they were guilty of “spirit murdering” black children and that they must “bankrupt their privilege in acknowledgment of their thieved inheritance.” In Cupertino, California, third-graders were instructed to list their racial identities and rank themselves according to “power and privilege.” And in Buffalo, New York, students were taught that “all white people” perpetuate systemic racism.
This is what critical race theory is about.
There’s a reason a majority of the country opposes critical race theory. It is a racialist and racist ideology that insists race is determinative of character and that every structure and system upon which America was built is oppressive and must be destroyed. Many, many parents don’t want this ideology anywhere near their children. Republican states are helping them fight back against it. Clearly, their efforts are working because the Left has fallen into its favorite defensive posture: blatant dishonesty.
