Criticizing Critical Thinking

 CRITICAL RACE THEORY, which isn't "theory", but historical fact, or the search for it, has been with us for more than four decades, but has never taken hold in American public education, largely due to strenuous objections to it by, as you might have guessed, conservatives. Critical race studies are nothing other than an attempt to describe and understand the history of racism, and the nature of current racism in America, factually, without "white washing" of the sort ideology or patriotism can bring to any area of study. conservatives, known for their ostentatious patriotism, prefer hagiography, which is the presentation of one's nation's history from a patriotic, dishonestly favorable point of view. As Goethe said: "patriotism corrupts history". Several states, governed as you might have guessed governed by republican legislatures, have already banned critical, honesty based education about american racism in their public schools, preferring the whitewashing of hagiography. Other states may be expected to follow, the ones which are doing similarly harmful things like limiting the rights of transgenders, limiting opportunities to vote, gerrymandering congressional districts to favor republican candidates, and so forth. The simple, undeniable truth is that the United States of America was founded on racism, as well as genocide, and that racism remains very much with us today, not only as the attitude of choice among many on the far right (racism is a traditional, conservative phenomenon, not a progressive one), but also deeply embedded within American institutions such as law enforcement, criminal justice, housing, access to voting, and education. Proving this is easy; one need only consult the arrest and criminal and sentencing records of thousands of American citizens, and  correlate these results with the race of the criminals. Another way is to check the history of government "red lining", and to compare property values of properties owned by European-Americans to those owned by African-Americans. The facts are irrefutable. Being African American, native-american,  Asian-American, or a minority of any sort, especially gay and transgender, is, in the United States, a distinct disadvantage in terms of income, wealth, social status, and chances of advancement in any of these area. this, despite attempts to band aid the phenomenon, bands aids such as affirmative action, color blindness, among others. Critical race theory is the process by which american racism, past and present, is understood critically, historically, scientifically, and factually, rather than ideologically. Predictably, studying the phenomenon of racism with intellectual integrity yields the same result as studying the Christian religion with objective, historical, factual analysis; the wrath and opposition of America's conservative community.