Critical Race Theory

[Spongebob]

Are you a parent?  I'm curious what experience you bring to the topic.

I have three grown kids.  I never censored their reading and didn't take too kindly to anyone who tried to.  From my set of classics that I had as a child, I read the un-PC versions of books to my kids though explained why some words weren't acceptable any more.

I had one teacher tell me that my son was one of the few kids in her second grade class who knew the difference between fantasy and reality.  The worst was to teach kids is to hide things from them...teach them the good, the bad, and the ugly and explain is each is so.

If you have trouble getting kids to read, maybe it's because you should have been reading to them from birth on.

Yes, I have two grown girls in their twenties.

We also never censored anything and even encouraged them to read controversial material.  We had no trouble getting our girls to read, both were/are advanced readers.  Maybe because we read to them from a very young age, maybe not.  My wife is a teacher and sees many children who aren't interested in reading.  The school library tries an array of different things to encourage reading, but some kids just aren't interested.  There are some who are voracious readers and can't get enough.

One thing my wife and I both notice is how much more "involved" parents are today than when we were in school.  And I don't mean involved in a good way, either.  I mean, lots and lots of parents are absolute monsters, know-it-alls, nit-picky people who's children are all "special".  The parents are way more of a problem than their children.  One couple sent an email to the school superintendent telling him that his kids were not going to get vaccinated or wear a mask and there was nothing they could do about it.  (Turns out that wasn't true)  Many parents have crowded the city council meetings to complain about school mask mandates.  Most of these parents are of my own generation; the generation of heli-parents.  Something bad happened when we were young that convinced a lot of people that they had to hover over their children 24 hours a day to protect them from all of the horrible things that teachers, coaches, fellow students, friends, neighbors and the entire world was going to do to them.  My parents are scratching their head.  I left for school a 6 AM on the bus and didn't see them again until 6 PM when supper was served.  On Saturday I ran out of the house and didn't see them all day.  Somebody put some bad chemicals in the water, I think and ruined my generation.

Sorry I'm so bitter.  BTW, I think you did it right, so kudos!

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Something worth pointing out: In reality, CRT is something taught at college level. Undergrad level minimum, although it's probably more likely to be found at grad school level. Critical Theory is a complicated subject (and one that can get pretty batshit) and will almost certainly go over the heads of grade schoolers.

When people on the right talk about CRT, they're not talking about any actual critical theory; it's basically a label for anything that threatens to put a dent in their fragile white self-images, up to and including teaching that America gave black people a raw deal in the days when we enslaved them, let alone now.

Yes, you are right to point all of this out.  This has been discussed a lot on many platforms so I wasn't sure if it was common knowledge here.  There are no school systems teaching CRT, but because of the Ridiculous Right Media, all of the Republican voters now believe the opposite.  The governor of our state has publicly stated that our state does not teach CRT.  This wasn't to ease concerns, it was to brag that we aren't one of those nutjob Leftist Commie sanctuaries.  

So, to point out something else that might be obvious.  The RR is fearful that materials such as this book will cause harm to white children by making them feel bad about being white.  They feel that the intention is to teach white children that they are inherently bad, that all white people are racists and that they should voluntarily give up their white privilege so that people of other colors may prosper.  Or something equally ridiculous.  I've now read several articles and listened to actual parents discuss this on interviews.  I've yet to have a conversation with a live human who believes these things but I'm interested to see how that will go.