Critical Race Theory Critiqued
“When people get used to preferential treatment, equal treatment seems like discrimination.” Thomas Sowell
Critical Theory is an umbrella term designating innumerable modes of revolutionary inquiry. The theories originated in the Frankfurt School and in Post-modernism. These may include critical race theory, critical psychiatry, critical literary theory, etc. The list proliferates. What they all have in common is the assumption that all theories or statements under a capitalist order need to be deconstructed. This, they argue, is because all such theories veil their true oppressive impact on the social order. Critical theory seeks to reveal the true consequences of theory when applied in real life.
For example, if you say “People should be judged by their character and not by the color of their skin,” you are expressing white supremacy ideology and white privilege. Why? Because such views make preferential hiring or entry into colleges appear discriminatory instead of understanding the handicaps for people of color generated by “systemic racism”. Privilege reversal is the only true way to level the playing field. “Hard work” and “Promptness” (that is, time itself) express whiteness which CRT inevitably expands beyond even skin color. So “whiteness” morphs into a set of qualities allegedly found among whites thus giving them more privilege and as such is to be condemned. Critical Language Theory assaults proper English as bolstering white privilege. I think you get it.
The theory is seductive because it purports to go beneath surface appearances and reveal the true expression of theory in life. The existence of inequalities is the data they use to fill their categories. Impressionable young intellectuals easily get high on a sense of having a superior and deeper understanding of the world. It provides them with a new vocabulary and a sense of moral virtue on the grounds they stand with the have-nots against the haves.
Critical Theory, besides other problems, fails on its own terms. It never analyzes the consequences of the application of itself as a practice when applied in society. In short, it masks its own meaning which is supposed to only be revealed in societal consequences. When we apply critical theory to itself, the “deeper truths” revealed are the revival of racism, the negation of individualism, the exacerbation of divisions, the introduction of cancel culture, the assault on the past, the invalidation of property, the intoxication with utopia and a host of other societal ills for which we now have plenty of data.
The following video does an excellent job of examining Trump’s recent cancellation of Critical Race Theory programs currently financed by your taxes through the Office of Management and Budget. Our President struck a great blow for liberty that will have huge implications for the training of those in the Administrative State. It is a long, past-due, swamp draining measure.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZJLdKbB-Rc&feature=youtu.be
Marvin A. Treiger, PhD was formerly the Youth Chairman of the Communist Party of Southern California, a member of the Maoist Revolutionary Union and Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) during the 1960s. He converted to conservatism and Americanism in the aftermath of 9/11 while in a solitary three-month retreat. He resumed activism when Barack Obama became the Presidential nominee in 2008. Dr. Treiger is a retired Psychotherapist.
