Understanding the Deeper Methodologies Driving White Privilege Education.

I started writing because of my experience in social work education. During the first semester, my professor flat out stated I was not fit for the profession because I opposed concepts like social justice and white privilege. They taught us America was a nation of systemic racism where white people have privileges that minorities do not have. Therefore, white people benefit from a system of oppression and, failing to question it means we are racist. This is the textbook definition of white privilege and it based on something called critical race theory.

This was alarming to me because I realized they were stoking the flames of discontent and if not stopped, hatred and anger towards white people would only grow. How could it not? Students were being trained to believe that white people had the privilege of living in a society that was designed only for them. A decade later, white privilege education has grown into an uncontrollable monster. People driven by the need to find racism behind every corner are overwhelming our education system.

For instance, in New York City, an elementary school principal has encouraged parents to evaluate the eight identities of whiteness which range from being a full-blown white supremacist on one end to an all-out white abolitionist on the other. The term white abolitionist means denying whiteness altogether to dismantle systematic power and privilege. The eight identities of whiteness allow white people to identify their own racism and where they are in their attempts to eliminate it. Only by working to completely dismantle white hegemony can one expect to overcome their own bigotry.

This is like the Helms racial identity model found in an article entitled Owning Whiteness: The Reinvention of Self and Practice (Blitz, 2008) in the Journal of Emotional Abuse. Under this model, whiteness is broken down into six categories. Contact, disintegration, reintegration, pseudo-independence, immersion/emergence, and autonomy. These phases start with a white person being aware of racial differences but being satisfied with the status quo. The next phase realizes that there are social implications to whiteness that cause feelings of guilt. Reintegration involves adopting the attitude that whites have it better than people of color and, denying any responsibility for their own racism. Next, there are the recovery phases, which include white people becoming dependent on persons of color to help them define their racial identity. White people who recover from whiteness (if you will) emerge with new ideas on morality, and how to approach discussions about how other white people deal with their own racism (Blitz, 2008).

Unfortunately, many Americans remain blissfully unaware of how entrenched concepts like Critical Race Theory are in our education system. Having a degree in social work I have the added benefit of knowing where to find the latest news on white privilege education.

For example, the journal Understanding and Dismantling Privilege published an article entitled Considerations for Using Critical Theory and Critical Context Analysis: A Research Note. (Perez Huber, Gonzalez & Solorzano, 2018) The purpose of the article is to examine the best methods of determining whether there is racial bias in children’s books and the theoretical framework in which they should identify this bias. As a student at Liberty University, I took a class where we interpreted various stories through the lens of critical theory. This would entail any perspective that challenges what the left refers to as, the normative power structures. When examining children’s books for racial bias through a theoretical perspective like CRT, they are looking for anything that can fit that framework, even if the author did not intend it.

Along with CRT, the journal article above discusses two other theoretical perspectives from which they examine power and privilege. Critical multicultural analysis and critical context analysis. The first examines power relationships, looking for hidden ways in which dominant cultural ideologies are oppressing minorities. For example, if immigrants in a children’s book were portrayed as Mexican, Perez Huber, et al (2018), would claim the book is suggesting all Mexicans are immigrants. This is not true, of course, but for examining so-called hidden biases and implementing change, this would be the claim. Critical context analysis focuses on examining sociocultural elements of a story that may identify which characters may or may not have power and whose perspective the story is being told from (Perez Huber et al 2018).

The larger point of Perez Huber et al’s article is the merging of these three theories to frame a theoretical approach to implementing CRT in all aspects of education. Critical context and multicultural analysis’ are the research methodologies being used to question children’s literature and, identify what the left would view as racist or biased. CRT is a way of interpreting it. Because critical race theory is just a theory, there is no truth in any of it. Much of this is based purely on the pre-existing biases of those conducting the studies. They are looking for racism because they are critical race theory scholars who, in the absence of race theories, would have nothing better to do than twiddle their thumbs.

It is one thing to understand that they are teaching our children they are racists for being white. Taking the time to understand the perspectives and methodologies they operate from, to teach such things, is what we need if we are going to do something about it. They use theories like white privilege and critical race theory, along with words like systematic oppression to silence opposition and keep people afraid of speaking up.

The justifications used to prove this racism are laughable and only justified through the left’s ridiculous definitions of racism. For example, in the University of Oklahoma’s Master of Social Work Program I attended in 2013, we had a textbook that suggested a black woman was depressed because she sold herself out to the white man’s economic system and lost touch with her historic roots of oppression. As ridiculous as that sounds, the same concept is highlighted in the journal article I discussed. A critical analysis of the short story The Circuit, which is primarily about the triumphs of an immigrant and his journey to America, still highlights a system of white hegemony because the main character is pursuing the American dream (Perez Huber et al 2018). The implication being that the American culture is superior. According to Perez Huber et al (2018), the story pushes a racist narrative by focusing on the American dream and not the journey of the immigrant and, the struggles he endured as an immigrant.

It is hoped that by writing articles like this I am making readers aware of the deeper methodologies the left is using to push their theories. At the end of chapter one of the book, The Naked Communist, Cleon Skousen said if we could just study and come to understand the problem of Marxism, we may be able to save humanity. Unfortunately, he said this nearly seventy years ago and since that time, the left’s agenda has advanced almost unnoticed in terms of how deeply they have infiltrated our educational institutions. We must understand what it is they are doing if we stand any chance of defeating it on an ideological level. My intent is to give readers the opportunity to review these sources for themselves.

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