Kerby Anderson

The latest battle in the culture wars has been the teaching of critical race theory. Concerned parents have been expressing their concern at school boards across the country. Defenders have responded in at least two ways: the critics don’t know what they are talking about, and schools are not teaching critical race theory. While it may be true that some critics don’t understand all the nuances of critical race theory, there have been numerous articles that can quickly educate you on the concerns of this teaching. We have a booklet at Point of View that can provide you with enough information to know why Christian parents and other parents should be concerned about this teaching. The second response, that critical race theory isn’t being taught, is even easier to dismiss. Critics have uncovered receipts for facilitators who come into the schools to train teachers in how to teach this theory. In a previous commentary, I mentioned that Christopher Rufo has put together a database of more than 1,000 stories about the teaching. But the biggest development in this culture war debate has been the list of more than 4,000 teachers who have pledged to inject critical race theory into their lesson plans. The pledge was created by the Zinn Education Project. The website offers free, downloadable lessons and articles that are linked to Howard Zinn’s book, A People’s History of the United States. The Zinn Project takes issue with state legislatures that are attempting to ban the teaching of critical race theory along with attempting to prevent the teaching of the 1619 Project and Black Lives Matter material. The current controversy over teaching critical race theory is merely one battle in the larger culture war over the teaching of contrary views on gender and sexuality, along with race and discrimination. [printfriendly]