Critical race theory

[Naskra]

Many people are paid to give instruction in CRT. Deconstructing that factoid will deepen your understanding.

 

[schlaufuchs]

You're still trying to compare real science to critical race theory?

You're gonna tell me mathematically how racist I am?

Give it a rest.

Nothing wrong w theories changing all the time if new evidence comes out. But this type of race theory stuff is not based on evidence. They try to dress it up as semi-scientific w these absurd fmri studies but to say flashing an image in a MRI machine in a lab gives any prarical insight into how human beings treat each in real life is idiotic (especially when as soon as there was any conscious awareness of the image the effect disappeared).

The more you argue the most embarrassing it is.

Come on dude, if you're going to object to critical race theory, actually advance some objections. Couching your critiques in vague gestures and directing attacks at things that don't actually have anything to do with critical race theory comes across like a Flat Earther yelling about absolute motions.

 

[eyrei]

I'm asking for a real source for a claim you made in this thread. If you can't be bothered to source your claims so that we can get a real idea of what we're talking about here, there is no discussion to have.

Also, the mark of good faith engagement would be willingness to read something. If you are actually interested in learning you should be grateful for someone doing the work of providing you with references so you don't have to find them yourself.



No, it isn't. The way to think of it is as what it is: a social construct.



This is deeply wrong. What we have learned about human genetics has basically nothing to do with race, despite decades of failed effort by racists to pretend otherwise.

https://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2017/science-genetics-reshaping-race-debate-21st-century/

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/genetics-history-race-neanderthal-rutherford



https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/race-is-real-but-its-not-genetic



Or if you want it maximally sophisticated:

https://www.nature.com/articles/ng1435




You're not ready to accept CRT because you ignorantly believe that race is biology. And such a belief actually puts you more in alignment with the GOP than with the Democrats despite your evident contempt for the GOP.

I read the entire wikipedia article twice, and have engaged in this discussion in order to develop an understanding of CRT. Most of the forum is actually being helpful and arguing with me. You just keep restating things you consider facts, but that I consider opinions. Its like talking to a GOPer...Trump supporter level too. You should be proud.

And if you think I got through college at a Quaker school without being exposed to all sorts of ideas like this, you are a fool. I've been thinking critically about race relations for decades...

Those articles about genetics don't contradict what I'm saying, and I've actually read articles like that before out of interest (you'd be surprised the breadth of my reading)...in fact, they kind of reinforce it. Those few physical characteristics which were considered 'racial' were used to create the social constructs you are trying to bludgeon people with. I'm not saying the ancient peoples who formed these constructs were correct...I think they were very, very wrong in many, many ways. That does not change the fact that the concept of race was developed using genetic characteristics...it was just a flawed conception. It kind of reminds me of CRT actually...broad judgements based on questionable analysis. I wonder if there is a pattern here about human bias...

There is no way you are going to completely separate biology from any discussion about race. I suggest you spend your energy on something more realistic...

 

[eyrei]

Many people are paid to give instruction in CRT. Deconstructing that factoid will deepen your understanding.

Sort of a conspiracy theory, but doesn't it bias their opinions a little that their livelihoods depend on this theory being mainstream?

 

[Senethro]

There is no way you are going to completely separate biology from any discussion about race. I suggest you spend your energy on something more realistic...

You must absolutely separate the concept of race in common usage from biology. The "group" of humans in Africa have the widest genetic diversity of the human race and yet people who think race is a reality insist they all share some kind of essence that indicates they are "black".

This is obviously pseudoscientific thinking. People who think race is biologically real can't define it, identify it, describe a couple of consistent examples or count how many there are.

 

[El_Machinae]

I would argue that race as a social construct was developed over time based on unscientific understandings of genetics, starting well before the word was even coined. That makes it a fundamentally biological concept. It certainly was abused by the power hungry, but that does not make it non-biological in origin.

Like, no one is denying that 'race' draws upon physical characteristics or that physical characteristics are determined by biology. But 'race' is also a social construct.

 

[AdamCrock]

Having not red anything (for purpose - after I post my opinion I will read Yours I promise - just a thing xD) I risk a following theory - In the end it does not matter !! Gender, role, money, sex, color - it does not matters completely ! What does matter however is how do You treat Your fellow sentient !!! :
How do you treat Your fellow sentient beings ? - IMHO - Dogs and Cats are Sentient, just like us. In essence if what God says is true If You committed a crime against them - my lowliest brothers - You have committed a crime against me ....

 

[Lexicus]

I read the entire wikipedia article twice, and have engaged in this discussion in order to develop an understanding of CRT. Most of the forum is actually being helpful and arguing with me. You just keep restating things you consider facts, but that I consider opinions. Its like talking to a GOPer...Trump supporter level too. You should be proud.

And if you think I got through college at a Quaker school without being exposed to all sorts of ideas like this, you are a fool. I've been thinking critically about race relations for decades...

If you still think race is biology this is hardly the recommendation you seem to think it is. Decades of critical thinking and you've arrived at the cutting edge of science circa 1925...

 

[Valka D'Ur]

One of the reasons those types of people have power is that we give them openings when we take things like CRT too seriously. Its basically a backlash against any perceived enemy of their chosen way of life, which in this case is science/dinosaurs, but in many other cases is people that don't look like them. If we are careful to mitigate our own overreach, we essentially take the wind out of their sails.

There's another problem with the curriculum I mentioned, and that's the material regarding indigenous history and culture. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission directed that this material be included in all school curricula from kindergarten through high school and that it be added to college/university courses (I assume where applicable, since 2+2=4 no matter which cultures are doing the counting).

There's so much controversy and disinformation about what's included, in which grades, how it's supposed to be presented, how non-indigenous teachers are supposed to do justice to it (I read and post regularly on the Minister of Education's FB page since she's my MLA as well as the cabinet minister for K-12 education) and there has been an overwhelming number of posts from teachers all over the province who are not confident that they can do a good job of teaching this material - because most of them are not indigenous, and lack the context to really get across to the students what happened in the residential schools, the Sixties Scoop, and many other injustices.

The indigenous elders who were asked for their views of the draft curriculum can't agree on whether they approve of it or not. I've seen statements on both sides. And it's frustratingly hard to figure out who is telling the truth... because there's a significant amount of this draft that's directly plagiarized from Wikipedia (not kidding; I've seen the screenshots proving this).

That's how it came across to me. Pretty obvious in fact.

Then we disagree, and isn't it wonderful that we can disagree and neither of us is wrong?

 

[AdamCrock]

Let's use a philosophical razor here : only the points You agree with are true, others are false ! Let's see ....

 

[Lexicus]

Like, no one is denying that 'race' draws upon physical characteristics or that physical characteristics are determined by biology. But 'race' is also a social consruct.

"Race" entirely refers to the social significance of those physical characteristics, is the thing. Like Senethro said, no one who thinks race is biology can even define it with any level of biological rigor, despite trying for over 100 years now.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Are we back to a need for definitions?

 

[El_Machinae]

"Race" entirely refers to the social significance of those physical characteristics, is the thing. Like Senethro said, no one who thinks race is biology can even define it with any level of biological rigor, despite trying for over 100 years now.

I think the actual problem is explaining what is meant by 'race is a construct'. Like, it's one brainfart away from being a Eureka!.

It's not a hard concept at all, it just requires a pivot in framing the paradigm that doesn't happen in real time.

 

[AdamCrock]

"Race" entirely refers to the social significance of those physical characteristics, is the thing. Like Senethro said, no one who thinks race is biology can even define it with any level of biological rigor, despite trying for over 100 years now.

Truth is so called "race" is entirely insignificant The only thing that matters is Your thoughts really ...

 

[Farm Boy]

I think the actual problem is explaining what is meant by 'race is a construct'. Like, it's one brainfart away from being a Eureka!.

It's not a hard concept at all, it just requires a pivot in framing the paradigm that doesn't happen in real time.

It's one brainfart away from a, "Duh. We were belaboring that at me?"

I mean, can we just roughly approximate the percentage of genetic variation between humans and a dog, humans and a chimpanzee, and from one "unrelated enough not to usually inbreed over a singular occurrence" human to another(say normative 2nd cousins), and then quantify a rough share of that variation that corresponds to common racial social constructs? i.e. pigmentation/lip thickness/hair type/sickle cell/the whole stupid caboodle?

 

[Arwon]

Hey when did this place become Calipersfanatics

 

[Farm Boy]

I mean, it's vanishingly small, right? Is it orders of magnitude to write? Like humilate the genetics of race's tiny genetic p33n if there are numbers anywhere. I'm not a geneticist. But surely this is fairly basic and cited in well established academia. Gets it over with, no?

 

[Farm Boy]

Ah, I get it. The head measuring guy with the cranial capacities. Sure, what percentage of human genes, that seem to be unrelated to brain function, go into the trope of variable "racial" skull shapes? Then point out that skull shape isn't going to be a racially defining characteristic, once whole humans are present as examples, even if it's given its full moronic weight? What's the percentage of genes that typically vary between two siblings? How about one with FAS and one without? What's that impact on perceived skull shape? Perceived race? Hmm?

 

[amadeus]

I'm all in on phrenology. I like a good underdog story and I like measuring things, so really it fits like a glove.

 

[bernie14]

You know it only takes like 50 seconds to google the Encyclopedia Britannica definition of critical race theory and realize that this is a lie.
Here is the beginning of that definition:

Critical race theory (CRT), intellectual movement and loosely organized framework of legal analysis based on the premise that race is not a natural, biologically grounded feature of physically distinct subgroups of human beings but a socially constructed (culturally invented) category that is used to oppress and exploit people of colour. Critical race theorists hold that the law and legal institutions in the United States are inherently racist insofar as they function to create and maintain social, economic, and political inequalities between whites and nonwhites, especially African Americans.

So I am curious as to who in this thread disagrees with the premise that race is not a natural, biologically grounded feature of physically distinct subgroups of human beings.

Here is a further quote from the EB article:

In their work Critical Race Theory: An Introduction, first published in 2001, the legal scholars Richard Delgado (one of the founders of CRT) and Jean Stefancic discuss several general propositions that they claim would be accepted by many critical race theorists, despite the considerable variation of belief among members of the movement. These “basic tenets” of CRT, according to the authors, include the following claims:
(1) Race is socially constructed, not biologically natural.
(2) Racism in the United States is normal, not aberrational: it is the common, ordinary experience of most people of colour.
(3) Owing to what critical race theorists call “interest convergence” or “material determinism,” legal advances (or setbacks) for people of colour tend to serve the interests of dominant white groups. Thus, the racial hierarchy that characterizes American society may be unaffected or even reinforced by ostensible improvements in the legal status of oppressed or exploited people.
(4) Members of minority groups periodically undergo “differential racialization,” or the attribution to them of varying sets of negative stereotypes, again depending on the needs or interests of whites.
(5) According to the thesis of “intersectionality” or “antiessentialism,” no individual can be adequately identified by membership in a single group. An African American person, for example, may also identify as a woman, a lesbian, a feminist, a Christian, and so on.
Finally, (6) the “voice of colour” thesis holds that people of colour are uniquely qualified to speak on behalf of other members of their group (or groups) regarding the forms and effects of racism.

The only one of these points I would dispute is (6) and that only partially. I also might partially dispute (3) but to a lesser extent.

Yes, yes, anxiously awaiting the space traders

Like when you post something like this how do you not know its complete bullfeathers? This is such lazy crap. All of this discussion from the right wing PoV is such lazy crap. It seems to me to be nothing but hurt feelings and a complete unwillingness to confront one's own prejudices.

Lazy right wing POV....to lazy to check the source?

A few unadorned words in English are not always clear as to their intent or meaning. That is part of the richness of English as a language. Should I take your eight simple words as straight forward? Or is there something mocking in the thoughts behind them? Should you get the benefit of the doubt or should I assume you think you are clever or witty in how you can "Stick it to a boomer"? Your context is not my context and the link is merely the words we use. I, at least, am not above recognizing my errors, as seen in my edited post.

Don't feed it