Russ Douthat on Critical Race Theory

[Ken]

T1, I agree and I think SZD would agree with you as well. I think though I was wrong in my interpretation of her tweet; it seems she wasn't tacitly endorsing violence rather she was suggesting that both non-violence & violence protest are both futile in the struggle for black liberation. I disagree with her assessment but nevertheless must recognize that hers was not a call, even a subtle call, to violence.

I agree.

To me, the 1619 project tells a black-centric version of American history that is useful as a critique of what most of us learn in school, where black voices are essentially left out of most of history and our story is told from the perspective of elite white landowners, land speculators, and merchants - or from the perspective of wars without paying much attention to the consequences of these wars for ordinary human beings in their wake.

I'm interested in the same kind of synthesis that Douthat suggests.

Similarly, Benjamin Wallace-Wells of The New Yorker, reporting on the Texan battle over race and education, notes how quick the Republican spokesman in the legislative debates was to make concessions to the history of racism and discrimination, the failure of the ideals of 1776 to initially extend beyond “white property-owning males.”

This means that you could imagine, out of this controversy, potential forms of synthesis — in which the progressive desire for a deeper reckoning with slavery and segregation gets embedded in a basically patriotic narrative of what the founding established, what Lincoln achieved, what America meant to people of many races, even with our sins.

I actually think Jill LePore has done some useful work in that direction. Woody Holton and Ed Ayers are also voices I would want to include in that synthesis.

America needs a history that includes all Americans, telling the story from points of view that are well documented, but usually left out of the story we tell ourselves.

I think the larger problem is that while YOU and perhaps Douthat might be seeking some sort of intellectual synthesis that seeks to find the truth in our historical record. I don't believe that is what a majority of people engaging in this wider cultural debate are seeking. Quite the opposite. It is about waging a wider culture war and winning votes, viewers, and dollars, not truth seeking.

[Bootstrap]

That being said, her ambivalence about violence/non-violence notwithstanding; CRT is an extremely destructive force that gives cover for people to explore the use of violence as means to the revolutionary ends. That seems to be what Ms. Davis is suggesting in the first segment of the video that JBG posted but I will wait for his summation of her remarks.

CRT was created by people like Derrick Bell and Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw. I don't think they give cover to violence. They taught that "racism and disparate racial outcomes are the result of complex, changing, and often subtle social and institutional dynamics, rather than explicit and intentional prejudices of individuals" (stealing a quote from Wikipedia). Instead of calling people racists, they want to look at systems that work against black people and try to understand why, looking for ways to improve them. They don't want to overthrow the system, they want to understand the system and improve it.

I have seen a whole lot of violence in the name of democracy and freedom, God, and other things that I value. So yes, you can find people who espouse CRT and also give cover to violence. Violence is bad. Democracy and freedom are pretty good. God is amazingly great. CRT is a mixed bag, some of it quite good, some of it bad.

In right-wing media these days, CRT seems to be a very scary and extreme thing that calls all white people - or at least all conservatives - racists. I don't think that's true at all.

This New York Times article is helpful: Critical Race Theory: A Brief History

Some of those critics seem to cast racism as a personal characteristic first and foremost — a problem caused mainly by bigots who practice overt discrimination — and to frame discussions about racism as shaming, accusatory or divisive.

But critical race theorists say they are mainly concerned with institutions and systems.

“The problem is not bad people,” said Mari Matsuda, a law professor at the University of Hawaii who was an early developer of critical race theory. “The problem is a system that reproduces bad outcomes. It is both humane and inclusive to say, ‘We have done things that have hurt all of us, and we need to find a way out.’”

[HondurasKeiser]

I think the larger problem is that while YOU and perhaps Douthat might be seeking some sort of intellectual synthesis that seeks to find the truth in our historical record. I don't believe that is what a majority of people engaging in this wider cultural debate are seeking. Quite the opposite. It is about waging a wider culture war and winning votes, viewers, and dollars, not truth seeking.

Right. I'm interested in this question I posed to SZD:

I don't agree with the sentiment here -- I think MLK's non-violent movement was extremely successful at bringing change, but it didn't solve everything and some of the inequities that are baked into the system continued.

I wonder though what you see as the extant baked-in inequities and what ought to be done about them specifically?

To get at the practical, real-world inequities seems to be a way to get past the intellectual impasse that arises not from a craven and cynical quest for electoral power on either side but rather a deeply held belief about the truth or falseness of Critical Race Theory. I find it a noxious, fantabulous assertion that has serious potential to end in violence and destruction. JBG and SZD feel I'm missing something and find it useful - none of us desire political power. All of us see real inequalities and lingering injustices in the black community. Perhaps getting at what they are exactly and what might be their root cause or what might be potential solutions would be a way to move beyond "CRT right or wrong, useful or dangerous?"

[Bootstrap]

I wonder though what you see as the extant baked-in inequities and what ought to be done about them specifically?

Let me start a new thread for that question. It pulls us in a very direction than what Russ Douthat wrote, which is mostly about how we understand and teach history.

Here's the new thread:

viewtopic.php?p=140270#p140270

[HondurasKeiser]

To be clear I reject violence a priori...but her point I think is worth hearing.

I'm not really sure to what end. She seems to be saying:

1. Abstract revolutionary principles are the only measure of the value of a revolution and far more important than the vehicle used to achieve those principles; which sounds an awful lot like that old pro-Stalinist maxim: “You can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs.”. Which is an elision of human atrocities on the grandest of scales. Is there anything decidedly Christian about such a sentiment?

2. She also seems to be saying that violence is, if not justified, is at the very least understandable after centuries of oppression and injustice. Taken by itself, it could be taken as a neutral statement of fact and I think it would be right. In light of her complicity in a murder, her apologias for brutal, murderous regimes and her endorsement of a psychotic suicide cult - it would appear that she's saying that violence is in fact justified at times and that maybe two wrongs really do make a right.


3. Finally she seems to saying that because I, or her interlocutor haven't lived her experience of violence, we have no right to question or "push back" against her potential use or endorsement of violence. That seems to me to imply that she believes there is nothing in our shared humanity to which we can acede and agree that violence is always wrong. That we may disagree on revolutionary principles but nevertheless agree that our common human dignity necessarily and always forecloses the use of violence to achieve our ends seems to escape her.

I'm not sure how this is helpful for we Christians.

Interestingly, Freddie deBoer, a man firmly to the left of probably everyone here writes this today about the use of violence or people on the left refusing to preclude the use of violence or even tacitly endorsing violence: (Click the link to follow his various links)

However, I do want to say this. At the time of the Kinosha riots, many many people along the left-of-center, including otherwise reformist liberals, endorsed riots to some degree or another. I know quite a few people who were willing to say that riots were just good on the merits, and there were also many saying in some terms or another that these particular riots could not be judged by progressive people due to what had inspired them. This sentiment stretches back a long way but has picked up steam in the last decade and the past year and a half particularly. Here’s a pro-riot piece and here’s a pro-riot piece and here’s a pro-riot piece and here’s a pro-rioting interview and here’s a pro-looting interview and here’s a riots-aren’t-necessarily-good-but-they-do-good-things piece and here’s a both-sidesy rioting piece and on and on. (And this is merely hilarious.) Pro-rioting sentiment is perfect for our edgelord media; it makes for good, click-farming headlines and engages in the kind of moral simplicity and righteous hectoring that defines our current culture.

Well, look: chaos is chaotic. Bad s--t happens when people riot. When you create environments where anything can happen… anything can happen. Some people are going to take advantage of that opportunity to do things that you don’t like. You can’t endorse spasms of directionless violence and then complain when some of it plays out in a way that you hadn’t intended. This seems totally obvious to me, and yet so many out there want to both condone riots and condemn their chaotic outcomes. It’s like putting on music and getting mad when people dance.

...what is the “robust anti-fascist action” that would actually lead to meaningful material change for the communities that rioters were ostensibly working for? You can punch a Nazi, if you can actually find one in the wild, but you can’t punch white supremacy, the gender wage gap, or the police state. You can burn down a Starbucks but not the Pentagon. Nor is it remotely clear that the army of graduate students and Instagrammers who make up today's antifa are likely to win many fights.

...Well, yes - sites of lawlessness and violence are good places to break the law and commit acts of violence. Perhaps the thing for thinking people to do, then, is not to pretend that such scenes are good for getting justice or anything else. Perhaps we should not give violent right-wing actors the cover of lawlessness and the excuse of mass violence, which they will inevitably use for their own ends.

[Bootstrap]

Perhaps getting at what they are exactly and what might be their root cause or what might be potential solutions would be a way to move beyond "CRT right or wrong, useful or dangerous?"

This thread is actually about how we teach history and some Russ Douthat articles and statements. Which is definitely NOT the same as "CRT right or wrong, useful or dangerous?" So discussing the topic of this thread here is one way to get beyond that, perhaps focusing on what aspects of history they get right and how that is a useful corrective to (1) what is usually taught in the schools, (2) what is being promoted in some right-wing extremist circles. This thread never was meant to discuss "CRT right or wrong" at all.

I started a thread for this other topic you want to discuss - could we please discuss it there?

viewtopic.php?f=24&t=4314

[joshuabgood]

She also seems to be saying that violence is, if not justified, is at the very least understandable after centuries of oppression and injustice. Taken by itself, it could be taken as a neutral statement of fact and I think it would be right.

Right. That is the part worth hearing. Violence was initiated and perpetrated on the black community for centuries by the white society. So then the audacity to morally object to violence when the black community is fighting for survival, against violence initiated and perpetrated and sanctioned by the state (Bull Connor) is really astounding.

It is probably another discussion but if one looks into the what happened at Soledad initially it is heart breaking. Violence begets violence. We shouldn't be surprised. Blowback is normal as Ron Paul explained with regard to 911.

[Falco Underhill]

Democrats are only pleading for compromise (a "synthesis") now because they got their hats handed to them in the last election. Even James Carville is warning that wokeness is causing Democrats to lose power -- and since losing power is the only language progressives understand, they're ready to negotiate terms of surrender.

(James Carville was very funny by the way, saying "Some of these people need to go to Woke-Detox! Taking Lincoln's name off of school buildings and setting up 'autonomous zones!' What's wrong with these people?")



Ross Douthat has been conceding some points to the CRT notion of systemic racism from the beginning so he can plead for negotiating terms of surrender all he wants but he doesn’t speak for me. My recommendation is to oppose them at every turn (legally) so that whatever gains they make at least it will not be with our consent or complicity.

The relevant Biblical principle here as I see it is to make no covenants with unbelievers because it will only become a snare to you later.

[Josh]

She also seems to be saying that violence is, if not justified, is at the very least understandable after centuries of oppression and injustice. Taken by itself, it could be taken as a neutral statement of fact and I think it would be right.

Right. That is the part worth hearing. Violence was initiated and perpetrated on the black community for centuries by the white society. So then the audacity to morally object to violence when the black community is fighting for survival, against violence initiated and perpetrated and sanctioned by the state (Bull Connor) is really astounding.

It is probably another discussion but if one looks into the what happened at Soledad initially it is heart breaking. Violence begets violence. We shouldn't be surprised. Blowback is normal as Ron Paul explained with regard to 911.

Josh,

Do you feel violence is sometimes morally justified?

[Falco Underhill]

Exodus 34:12 -- Be careful not to make a treaty with the inhabitants of the land you are entering, lest they become a snare in your midst.