It’s not really a “theory” at all. It is a social movement, which exhibits characteristics akin to a religion.
The movement’s critics usually describe it as “woke” or “Cancel Culture,” although Pluckrose and Lindsay use the less judgmental term “Critical Theory.”
The movement itself rejects any name for itself. Generally speaking, you’re not supposed to acknowledge the movement’s existence; and if you do, you’re immediately marked as an opponent.
Because the movement rejects any name for itself, it is The Movement That Must Not Be Named.
And this movement is becoming a serious threat to our fundamental liberties.
A Word to My Friends
If you are among my friends and family members, then this post is going to be very difficult for you to read, because it contradicts your assumptions and all the propaganda you have been fed through social media for the past several years.
Yes, you have seen propaganda. We all have.
Those snarky political memes you “liked” on social media? Propaganda. The increasingly brazenly biased corporate news media? Propaganda. The list goes on.
As you read this post, your first reaction will not be to question your own assumptions, or all of the snarky self-righteous memes you’ve seen on Facebook. No. Why would you do that? No intelligent person would ever disagree with a Facebook meme, right?! (Ahem, sorry about that, I’m not supposed to be sarcastic.) The point is, instead of questioning your own assumptions, you’re far more likely to immediately make unkind assumptions about me, as a person. I understand. You have been indoctrinated and conditioned to react this way. We all have.
Yes, and the movement has even conveniently provided you with a laundry list of hateful labels which you know you’re supposed to apply to anyone who disagrees with the movement’s ideology.
“Never question this doctrine. Instead, criticize any people who question this doctrine! Any person who questions this doctrine is (a bad word)!”
Ask yourself: what do you actually know about this movement and the “theory” it wants so badly to teach in our public schools? You vaguely think the “theory” in question has something to do with what you call “real history,” but (beyond some frankly dubious allegations against your political opponents) you can’t really supply any details, at all. None. You don’t, in fact, know anything about the movement, other than, you think you have to support it if you want to be a decent human being.
I assure you: you are a decent human being. And you will continue to be a decent human being, even if you begin to question the philosophy and the motives of The Movement That Must Not Be Named.
A Word on My Sources
Before we go on, I would like to point out that the information I’m presenting here is based on personal experience as well as primary sources in the movement’s own words.
As a baseline, I have taken college-level coursework in Political Science as well as the Anthropology of Social Movements (wrote a great term paper about Jesus for that Social Movements course). That’s my starting point, although by now I’m, what, more than a quarter-century out of my undergraduate degree. (Incidentally, I also have an MBA in Marketing, although that doesn’t seem relevant to the subject under discussion.) Over the past decade I have developed a personal interest in history, and have read a number of original sources from classical antiquity, and a number of works by well-respected modern historians, as well as works from sources including Geronimo and W.E.B. DuBois, telling the story of American history in their own words.
And I have traveled fairly extensively overseas: including a year abroad in each of Scotland and Egypt when I was younger; as well as briefer sojourns to India, Nepal, Greece, Thailand, Switzerland, Ireland, France, and Amsterdam, most of this when I was in my twenties, young and single, sometimes living out of a backpack or even sleeping in a hammock. Through these adventures I have experienced a broad variety of the world’s cultures firsthand. I have spoken with people in all walks of life from all around the world: and from this experience I have drawn the conclusion that we’re all only human, all of us, we’re all basically the same, with beautiful unique differences, but still all basically the same, all around the world and throughout time: me, you, us, them, the so-called good guys, the so-called bad guys, we’re all basically the same. That’s my personal philosophy.
More directly relevant, my wife is an ardent supporter of the movement under consideration here: so we have several of the movement’s own books around the house, and I have taken the time to read enough of those primary sources to grasp their message. Reading those books has strongly influenced my positions on these issues, but not in the way their authors intended. I found that I disagree with some of the ideas expressed within those books; and I found it extremely disturbing that the authors expressly insisted on passing moral judgment against me should I choose to disagree with them about anything at all. Therefore, the text of those books is a key source for much of the discussion in this post.
Furthermore, I was my local district’s Democratic candidate for the Oregon State House of Representatives in 2022; and I ran for the local School Board in 2023: and in the course of those political campaigns, in Zoom calls and face-to-face encounters, in large groups and in personal conversation, I have listened to many Left-wing political activists enough to notice a recurring theme, as a number of them expressed some degree of support for disturbingly extremist ideas (that is, to say, these people voiced authoritarian, anti-democratic, and even pro-violence sentiments: if that was a “joke,” I am still not amused).
And on top of all that, I was active on Twitter from 2017 to 2020: and that particular cesspool of human society repeatedly exposed me to the worst of the worst ideas that are currently in circulation in our culture. And what I witnessed is, there are a lot of people who support disturbing ideas. My time on social media taught me that the radical Left is just as disturbing as the radical Right; possibly more so, because the Left is better organized and more deeply entrenched in key civic and economic institutions.
Disturbed by what I read in my wife’s books, and by what I heard from local political activists, and by what I saw from extremists on social media: I sought out alternative perspectives.
I found a number of books and articles that helped me understand the situation (I have provided links throughout this post). Contrary to what you are perhaps assuming, some of the books I’m recommending here were written by women who self-identify as liberal feminists; and several of the books and articles I’m recommending here were written by African-Americans.
Based on all of that, I believe I have a well-rounded basis for the following assertions.
What is a “Movement”?
I suppose it’s reasonable to begin by defining our terms. For simplicity, let’s go with this Random House dictionary definition: A movement is “a diffusely organized or heterogeneous group of people or organizations tending toward or favoring a generalized common goal.”
This movement, then, is larger than Black Lives Matter, or Antifa, or Anonymous, or the Democratic party, although some or all of the members of each of those groups may also be part of the larger movement.
What are this movement’s goals?
The question becomes: If that’s the definition, then what is the movement’s “generalized common goal”?
Very, very loosely defined, I think we can agree that everyone affiliated with the movement wants change of some kind. The movement wants to bring about social change. What kind of social change they want, and how they intend to bring it about, are not always so clear.
So, if the movement is this large and powerful, then it seems reasonable to ask: are there more specific goals that the movement’s members have clearly identified?
Well… no. The movement is not fond of details. Beyond vague and poorly considered slogans like “Defund the police” you’ll rarely hear them discussing specifics. Specific complaints, yes, an endless litany of complains; but almost never specific suggestions or policy proposals that would resolve those complaints. That’s not their style.
Consider:
- There was a wave of police reform laws passed across the nation in the wake of the murder of George Floyd; and the officer responsible was held accountable and sent to jail.
- We achieved marriage equality with the landmark 2015 Supreme Court decision in Obergefell v. Hodges.
- We made a crucial step towards equality of health care access with the 2010 Affordable Care Act.
That sounds like a long run of policy successes, doesn’t it? When we work towards these kinds of specific goals, we achieve them!
So why, then, does everyone still seem to be so angry? Why, in fact, do they seem to be angrier now than they were before we won? Why do they keep trying to convince us that we’re further than ever from our goals and we’ve got to fight, fight, fight just to stay in place? What, in fact, are the goals?
It’s not about abortion. Yeah, sure, abortion is somewhere on the list of the movement’s policy priorities; but it only really made it to the top of the list for a few short months in the wake of the Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson. For the most part, other concerns predominate.
And it’s not about equality! The movement’s spokespeople have made that abundantly clear. I’ll be saying this repeatedly throughout this post: the movement’s own textbooks voice opposition to our founding principle of equal treatment under a Constitutional law. The movement describes the Constitution as a tool of structural oppression. Oh, yes, equality used to be the goal, when I was coming of age, way back in the 90s, and of course long before that, going back to the Civil Rights movement of the 50s and 60s. But not any more. All of that was decades before this present movement as we know it had coalesced. What we see now, this is not the Civil Rights movement any more. Now, the consensus among activists seems to be that equality isn’t good enough. Now, equality is described as just another form of oppression. Now, in their push for what they call “equity” instead, the movement’s activists are advocating the idea that different people should always be treated differently based on their identity: personal characteristics such as race, gender, and sexual orientation.
“What’s wrong with that?” you may ask. “After all, we support progressive taxation, which taxes different taxpayers at different levels based on their income bracket. Isn’t that treating different people differently?”
No, it’s not the same thing. There’s a key distinction here.
Let’s summarize it as a principle:
“The law should apply to what we do, not to what we are.”
-the SmithForOregon principle of law and equality
Consider the income tax example just mentioned. Earning income is an action. It doesn’t matter what kind of person earned that income. Math does not discriminate. All individuals who net the same amount of income will be taxed at the same rate, regardless of their gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, political affiliation, or whatever else. This law is only concerned with what you do: not what category of person you are.
By way of contrast, the DEI programs and CRT initiatives which have so rapidly sprung up in corporations and government institutions and public schools across America since 2018 are only concerned with what type of person you are. Income and other factors are largely irrelevant. Even performance measures are discounted! Your identity is the only thing that matters. These policies and programs are concerned with what you are, rather than what you do. Therefore, these policies and programs are unconstitutional. And we need more people to stand up and say so: because this is the path to a massive headaches for our homeland.
Should we try to help people who are struggling? Of course! But we should do so in a way that’s evidence-based, rather than emotionally driven. We should do so in a way that helps people find their own path to success, rather than training them to become dependent and entitled. We should do so in a way that balances the economic needs of the larger society with the economic needs of those who haven’t yet been able to figure out their own path to success within our society (always a delicate balance, I know, and one that constantly shifts one way or the other). And above all, we must do so in a way that values individuals for their basic humanity: not selectively, depending on their identity. If we’re making a point of helping some people, while leaving others out in the cold, based strictly on what kind of people they are: then we’re just as bad as our opponents… or possibly much, much worse.
But I’m well aware that all of this runs counter to what you’ve been hearing from the media (social, news, and entertainment) these past several years.
You Have Heard Propaganda
In all likelihood, most of what you think you know about The Movement That Must Not Be Named is propaganda: part of a campaign of subversive destabilization.
In their propaganda, the movement’s insiders systematically misrepresent the movement itself to outsiders. Many of the public statements made by insiders about the movement itself, its beliefs, and its activities, are misleading or deliberately false.
For example:
- The movement’s insiders deny that the movement exists (“There’s no such thing as Cancel Culture” – popularized by memes, this line has been spoken to me in conversation by people close to me)
- The movement’s insiders proclaim that “true history” can only be taught through the lens of the movement’s extremist ideology (I heard variants of this claim from several people during my recent run for School Board… update, and again from people close to me, a year later)
- The movement’s insiders claim that the movement’s ideology is not being taught in schools (among many, many others, United States Congressional candidate Jamie McLeod-Skinner parroted this specific line, “Nobody is teaching CRT in schools,” at a rally for supporters at Coolidge-McClaine Street Park here in Silverton in the summer of 2022. That’s a direct quote. Jamie was a good candidate, and my guess is that she was only repeating what she had been told to say by her political advisors. Nonetheless…)
All three of those claims are false statements. In fact:
- The movement most certainly exists, duh, and although it remains nominally leaderless for the time being, it is demonstrably the most powerful social movement in America today. This movement’s unethical behavior is a serious and growing problem for our society: not only because its anarchist intolerant vindictiveness is inconsistent and unpredictable, but also because nobody is holding the movement’s activist insiders accountable when they target innocent people and self-righteously harass them to death. (Those are links to news stories for example.)
- True history was taught in schools for decades before this movement ever emerged; whereas the movement’s ideology distorts history for political purposes – we’ll come back to this below.
- And while it’s not yet universal, the movement’s ideology is most certainly being taught in some classes in some public schools: not just in big city Orange County, California, but even right here in little old Silverton, Oregon. Oh, yes, and I have emails from local school officials who confirmed it in writing. On May 2, 2023, I received an email from Sione Thompson, the Principal of Silverton High School, who informed me that: “We are in the process of mapping out all our core course standards, including World History. We’ll be meeting to make adjustments as needed with an equity lens.” In other words, the public school course curricula for several subjects including History are all being revised in accordance with the principles of Critical Race Theory. CRT is being taught in schools: right here, right now.
The Movement That Must Not Be Named brings an all-or-nothing approach to social issues. According to the movement’s propaganda (and the activist thought police on social media) if you say you support our core values of tolerance and diversity, then you are required to support every single detail of the movement’s doctrine; and if you disagree with any particular detail of the movement’s ideology, then they accuse you of rejecting our core values of tolerance and diversity.
This all-or-nothing framing is mind-game propaganda, designed to force you to accept extremist ideology out of fear that you will be called names: names like “racist,” which is currently the worst word you can possibly be called in our society.
Nobody wants to be racist! So if Ibram X. Kendi says that you have to actively dismantle capitalism in order to be “anti-racist,” who are you to disagree?
If Ibram X. Kendi says that you have to actively dismantle capitalism in order to be “anti-racist,” who are you to disagree?
You’re a free human being and not subject to these sorts of malevolent manipulative mind games, that’s who you are. You don’t have to accept everything you’re told by extremist activists: even if you agree with some of the other things they say! Nuance is relevant. You can oppose racism and also oppose Marxism, despite what these extremists claim.
With its relentless rage over identity issues, The Movement That Must Not Be Named is actively creating a culture obsessively centered on racism, sexism, and intolerance. The movement wants you to think that it is the cure for these problems: but the opposite is true. The movement’s own self-righteous intolerance is making things much worse. Our society has made advances in the past few years despite the movement’s message of hatred, blame, and shame. Any improvements we have made are because most people generally want to make the world a better place. Meanwhile, the deepening divisions in our culture are a direct response to this movement’s extremist ideology.
When “anti-racism” is racist
We believe that all people should be equal under the law.
You and I believe this. What other people believe is beside the point. We believe that all people should be equal under the law. Right?
More than that:
We believe that it is evil to advocate for the dominance of any particular group based on skin color, or other identity characteristics, or anything other than the legitimate results of a free and fair election, really.
However, in an article in The Atlantic dated October 6, 2017 titled The Language of White Supremacy, Vann R. Newkirk II (quoting Frances Lee Ansley) defines “white supremacy” (in part) as “a political, economic, and cultural system in which whites overwhelmingly control power and material resources.”
Okaaaaay… hold up. Let’s think about this. I understand it’s a delicate matter, but we’ve got to keep things in perspective.
First, with regards to economics: The fact is, regardless of the rights or wrongs of history, for the time being the majority of the human beings living in the United States are people of Caucasian descent. Newkirk’s assertion, boldly stated in that Atlantic article, is that we will continue to live in what he describes as a “white supremacist” society so long as the majority of our population controls the majority of our society’s property and other economic assets.
But Newkirk’s argument is hugely problematic. Here’s why:
How are you going to stop the majority of the population from owning the majority of the stuff?
There are only three ways to prevent the majority of the people from owning the majority of the stuff:
- You can outlaw private property entirely (Marxism/Communism);
- you can commit genocide and exterminate the members of the majority ethnicity (pure evil);
- or option number 3, you can create a system that disenfranchises the majority to the benefit of the minority (in this case through CRT).
Secondly, to consider Newkirk’s argument with regard to political power: We live in a democracy. In a democracy, the majority of the people have the majority of the power. In a Constitutional democracy, such as ours, the law guarantees the rights of minorities, in order to protect them from the oppression of the majority. (Yes, grave injustices have been committed! I will say it over and over. But past injustices do not justify present injustices.) And ever since the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, our “small-d” democratic leadership has been legitimately, sincerely trying to ensure that those Constitutional guarantees are enforced. On September 24, 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower – a Republican – sent 1,000 National Guard troops to Little Rock, Arkansas, to enforce the desegregation of the schools there. Are you, Mr. Newkirk, trying to tell me that the man who forced the end of segregation at gunpoint, was secretly a “white supremacist” because of his “whiteness”??? That’s utter nonsense, and you should be ashamed of yourself for spouting it.
But Vann R. Newkirk II, employing grand sweeping generalizations, rather carelessly discards all notions of “progress,” blithely characterizing them as “fiction.”
Instead, Newkirk argues (citing James Baldwin) that to be a person of Caucasian descent is to be a white supremacist.
After first describing “white supremacy” as “a collective effort,” Newkirk summarizes: “Baldwin ties the very concept of whiteness to white supremacy.”
That’s racist.
Newkirk’s argument (and Baldwin’s argument that he’s working from, and of course Robin DiAngelo’s nearly identical argument as well) is that if you are a person of Caucasian descent, then you are inherently evil.
That’s racist. To accuse someone of being fundamentally evil because of the color of their skin, is horrible racism. And it’s unacceptable. We in our society have been giving that type of racism a free pass for far too long.
Believing that you can judge another person’s character based on their skin color, is racism.
Racism is and has been a problem. “Turning the tables” and intentionally being racist against a different group of people, will not solve this problem: it will make the problem worse! You can’t fight racism with more racism. You can’t fight hate with more hate. You’re just making things worse.
But it’s rarely spelled out that clearly.
The Haze of Intentional Obscurity
Due to the fog of misrepresentation, as an outsider or even as a fringe member of The Movement That Must Not Be Named, it’s often difficult to grasp the core movement’s actual ideology.
Most of what you have heard about the movement was from social media; and most of the movement’s statements on social media are doublespeak posturing propaganda: a form of psychological warfare.
You can only begin to grasp the underlying meaning by reading primary sources – but even these tend to be heavy on the posturing and light on the underlying meaning. Thus, even if you have read primary sources, you would have had to read them very carefully to understand the real meaning behind the often impenetrable postmodernist prose, and all the fancy words that have been confusingly redefined to mean something other than what they appear to mean.
The only way to get past the haze of intentional obscurity is either to very “critically” read the works the movement’s insiders have written for other insiders; or else to read an analytical digest of those works: the most comprehensive and accessible of which so far is the one by Pluckrose and Lindsay. (I also recommend Professor McWhorter for a consideration of issues specific to race, and Dr. Soh for a consideration of issues specific to gender and sexuality.)
The First Rule of Fight Club
The movement’s insiders reject any name for their movement. Just as in Fight Club, the first rule is, you’re not supposed to talk about it: to the extent that you’re not supposed to even acknowledge the movement’s existence.
This imperative has repeatedly been made directly, explicitly clear to me. As I’ve mentioned in a previous post, I have repeatedly received email communications from a professional political advisor, specifically instructing me never to speak the movement’s name.
I repeat: they told me to never speak the words, “Cancel Culture.”
That’s some pretty serious mind games right there.
And that’s no accident. Like all subversives throughout history, the social movement in question relies heavily on deception, mind games, doublespeak, and disinformation.
That’s why some of this movement’s most well-known catchphrases are demonstrably false statements.
Denying its own existence
Probably the most famous of the movement’s lies is the one that goes: “There’s no such thing as Cancel Culture.” Yeah, right.
If you hear someone quote this line (or some variant of it) then you know you’re talking to one of the movement’s insiders or sympathizers. This line serves as a loyalty test.
Loyalty Test
In my analysis of extremist movements on both sides, I have reached the conclusion that a follower’s willingness to repeat obviously false statements (for example, “The Earth is flat” on the far Right, or “There’s no such thing as Cancel Culture” on the far Left) serves as a loyalty test.
If you question such obviously false statements, then insiders immediately know that you’re an outsider and should be treated as a potential enemy. If you’re willing to repeat whatever you’re told to repeat, even when you know perfectly well that it’s a false statement — and especially, if you’re willing to argue and argue and argue in defense of the false claim, and possibly even convince yourself that you really believe it — then you prove to other insiders that your commitment to the movement is greater than your commitment to the truth: and therefore the other insiders can rely upon your support in their crusade against their political enemies.
Inner Teachings for the Devoted Few
Obviously, most of the movement’s supporters do not think of it in the sorts of terms I’m using here.
Most of my friends and family support this movement. Like most of the movement’s supporters, they are “fringe members.”
Fringe members habitually click “like” on a few memes, and might even occasionally join in a mob shaming of some political enemy who has been framed as an evil wrongdoer (sometimes for cause, but often not). Fringe members are not privy to the inner teachings that are only available to the devoted circle of insiders. It’s not that the information is a secret; it’s just that it’s difficult to understand: so gaining that level of understanding requires a substantial commitment on the part of the devotee.
Just as in Scientology and the Latter Day Saints, the movement’s insiders are a much smaller core group of hardliners whose demonstrated devotion has granted them access to the movement’s true teachings: the deeper meaning of the movement’s ideology. These activist insiders steer the movement’s policy agenda. Insiders write the books, create most of the memes, teach the college-level classes on these subjects, and make most of the speeches; and insiders know damn well that the movement’s end goal is the violent downfall of America’s democracy: our democracy, an institution which these extremists describe as, “the structure of racist capitalist patriarchy.”
Speaking to my friends and loved ones now: You want to create a world in which all people are equal in dignity; a world where everyone has access to opportunity; a world where we all treat each other with tolerance and live in grace. But your deeply intolerant movement’s extremist ideology will never achieve that goal… because that’s not the movement’s goal.
Don’t believe me? Try suggesting on social media that we should be more tolerant of dissent, and see what happens. Go ahead. Try it! I dare you. (Actually, if your account is small enough, you might get away with it. But if you’ve got 5k followers or more on any platform, then you already know exactly what I’m talking about.)
More to the point (since I was a candidate for School Board when I began writing this post), many of the people I’ve spoken to seem to believe that this movement’s ideology should be taught in our public schools. That is where we disagree most strongly: and I believe it’s because you have not fully considered the implications of the movement’s ideology.
Your motives are good. What you want, is for all children to learn our core value of tolerance; and you want to be sure our public schools are not “hiding” America’s history of slavery, as the conspiracy-flavored extremist propaganda memes have convinced you must be happening more or less everywhere: which is why we need the movement to rescue us, according to the movement.
But the movement’s ideology (specifically, Critical Race Theory or CRT) is not the appropriate solution for achieving these goals, for one overriding reason: The movement’s doctrine is irrevocably Marxist.
Again and again, the movement’s textbook doctrine calls for the violent overthrow of capitalism. (Kendi holds out the specific possibility. Delgado and Stefancic certainly imply it. Postmodernist Beaudrillard openly praises violence. And Newkirk’s article in The Atlantic, among others, seems to suggest that our society will be “white supremacist” as long as “white” people are allowed to own property.)
They put it in writing, folks. You can’t make this stuff up. They said it themselves (although usually – but not always – these writers employ coded language and obscure references to ensure that only the inner circle of devoted followers will grasp the full implications). The movement’s end goal is to achieve power by using subversive tactics to undermine our social, economic, and political systems until it has built sufficient public support to mount a violent revolution. That’s why this is a serious problem, and one that must be confronted.
That openly violent ideology absolutely does not belong in public schools.
Even if you happen to share that extremist ideology, it still doesn’t belong in public schools: because public schools should be ideologically neutral; they must not officially endorse partisan politics.
A Conflict of Values
The movement’s ideology promotes a Narrative about “structural oppression” which disregards economic factors in favor of identity markers.
Viewed through this lens, for example, a homeless man may be seen as “privileged” while a wealthy woman is “oppressed.” According to the movement, the male gender is higher up on the the intersectional pyramid of structural oppression, and therefore the homeless man personally benefits from the structural oppression of the wealthy woman. That’s just… backwards. It’s utterly ridiculous. Once you disregard economics in favor of identity, nothing you say makes the least bit of sense. Therefore, I reject the movement’s ideology.
I came of age in the 1990s. I was brought up to believe that we are all equal. (Not that we’re all the same! But that we are equal under the law.) I was brought up to believe that discrimination is bad. But The Movement That Must Not Be Named teaches that discrimination is good, depending on who you’re discriminating against. (Kendi states this repeatedly. This is his central thesis.) The movement teaches that equality under the law in a democracy is a form of “structural oppression.” The movement’s message is in direct conflict with my core values. Therefore, I reject the movement’s ideology.
The movement preaches that you are either privileged or oppressed based on your identity (race, gender, sexual orientation, and disability status). (Remember, according to the movement you can be terribly impoverished and still be “privileged”; and you can be very wealthy and still be “oppressed”: because this is primarily about identity, not economics.) It’s shameful to be privileged; therefore, your value as a human being is proportional to your identity as a victim. The movement teaches that everything about American society, economics, and government is part of a system of structural oppression, and no new laws, court rulings, or policy tweaks could ever possibly hope to compensate for that oppression, because democracy itself is part of the system of structural oppression; so “our” only hope is to complain about it constantly to spread this doctrine, and ostracize any heretics who reject this dogma, until “we” have built up sufficient public support to mount a neo-Marxist violent revolution and overthrow the system of patriarchal-race-capitalism. Personally, I think a revolution would be bad: mostly because killing people is bad; but also because in the past, Marxist revolutions have always made things worse for every country that has ever mounted one. Although exact figures are hard to come by, between the mass murder of political opponents under ruthless regimes such as Stalin (Great Purge), Mao (Cultural Revolution), and Pol Pot (Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge); not to mention mass starvation caused by disastrous communist so-called “reforms”; and the bloody deaths caused by a number of wars in various places around the world: the number of people killed by Marxism in the twentieth century is comparable to and perhaps greater than the number of people killed by Fascism. The evil of the one is comparable to the evil of the other. Are you still sure this is something you want to support? Not me! I reject the movement’s ideology.
The movement preaches that if your identity is classified as oppressed and marginalized, then there’s little hope of you ever succeeding in life, so you shouldn’t even try to succeed, and instead you should spend all your time and energy complaining I mean promoting the Narrative of structural oppression: making people with privileged identities feel ashamed of the way they were born so they will center you in their work and conversation; explaining to people with privileged identities why you should be allowed to discriminate against them based on their race, gender, and sexual orientation; and ostracizing any heretics who reject this dogma. And, since discriminating against people based on race, gender, and sexual orientation in the name of fighting “structural oppression” is deeply hypocritical and probably illegal, your one overriding responsibility is to repeat this message over and over and over until the movement has built up sufficient public support to mount a violent revolution and overthrow the Constitutional democratic system of patriarchal-race-capitalism. Therefore, I reject the movement’s ideology.
The movement preaches that if your identity is classified as privileged, then you don’t deserve any good things in life, and you should spend all your time engaged in self-flagellation, feeling bad about the plight of the oppressed and marginalized identities, because after all their situation is your fault because of your inherited guilt based on the way you were born, so you must center and elevate them in all your work and conversation and always put them first, and don’t aspire to do anything significant with your own life because if you did then you would be taking away opportunity from a marginalized person. Since no laws or policy tweaks will ever be sufficient to correct the problem of our inherently broken system, you must devote yourself to evangelizing this dogma, and converting all the other privileged people, and ostracizing any heretics who reject this doctrine, until The Movement That Must Not Be Named has built up sufficient public support to mount a violent revolution and overthrow the Constitutional democratic socioeconomic system of patriarchal-race-capitalism. Therefore, I reject the movement’s ideology.
And that’s not all.
It’s a Religion
This particular lens was proposed by Professor McWhorter, who was possibly the first person I ever heard discuss these issues in a way that seemed rational and reasonable. It resonated with me, and I find it’s an effective way of understanding how this social movement operates.
A proper “theory” can be discussed philosophically, and people on different sides of the issue can be civil and cordial with one another and go out for drinks afterwards. Not so with the “theory” we’re talking about here. Dissent is not tolerated. You must recite the canonical dogma, or else you will be shamed, harassed, and excommunicated for your heresy. That’s not a philosophy. That’s a religion.
The movement believes in inherited guilt. The movement practices ritual shaming. The movement has an apocalyptic “end times” mythology (the violent revolution which will overthrow the structure of patriarchal-race-capitalist-democracy, commonly abbreviated to “smash the patriarchy”). The movement has a belief in a future Utopia which will follow the revolutionary end times: a Utopia which can only be attained when everyone on Earth shares the movement’s faith. Therefore, the movement is, essentially, a religion: and we don’t teach religion in the public schools.
And yet, I received an email from the Principal of one of our local public schools, explaining to me that the movement’s “lens” is being “applied” to the curriculum of the entire History department. Structuring public school class curriculum around an extremist political ideology is called indoctrination. That’s what’s going on, right now, today.
And for the past five years, the official Education Caucus Platform of the Democratic Party of Oregon has formally, publicly called for the application of the movement’s ideology to public school education curricula.
Demonstrate fealty to the movement, or lose your job.
The movement’s power is fundamentally based on a threat.
The threat is this:
“Say what we tell you to say, in precisely the way that we tell you to say it; and be outspoken in your support of every single one of the various political policy positions we tell you to support, without exception: or else we’ll call you a (whatever horrible thing we’re calling our enemies today) and then you’ll lose all your friends, your social standing, and probably your job, too.”
This threat is often summarized by the popular slogan, “Silence is violence.” That’s exactly what that means. “If you don’t say what we want you to say, then you’re an enemy, and therefore we have an excuse to hurt you.”
We call it Cancel Culture, but maybe it should be called Blackmail Culture: because this is a form of coercion. There’s a specific demand, and there’s a clearly defined consequence (reputational harm) which the blackmailer will carry out if the demand is not met.
And we’ve certainly seen them follow through on that threat.
Repeatedly.
The problem is that it works. For the past several years (since 2018 or so), in universities, major corporations including the mainstream news and entertainment media, and even some government institutions, the movement has been systematically purging individuals who fail to vocally support the movement’s political agenda.
Political dissenters are being relentlessly culled from corporations, civil institutions, and media. And this pogrom is only accelerating.
This is our world today. And we stand idly by, believing we must accept it, and do as we are told… or else. And the worst of it is, most of my friends and family seem to believe that this is a good thing!
Instead of debating ideas, this culture of intolerance rejects individual people who are brave enough or creative enough to think outside the box.
The movement’s fanatically obsessive online thought-policing preferentially targets small-time moderates, most of whom you will never hear about: people who don’t make the news when they get canceled, because they’re not high-profile, but who are left embittered and polarized and deprived of employment opportunities after they find themselves targeted by extremist Left-wing trolls, usually over remarks that are not objectively offensive.
The movement’s angry intolerance actively pushes moderates towards extremist positions. In doing so, the movement’s intolerance has become the greatest driver of the divide in our society. It no longer matters if the movement was originally well-intentioned. It’s no longer even relevant if you think some of those people might have deserved to get canceled. Mob justice is injustice. We have laws for a reason. The movement itself has become a serious threat to our fundamental liberties: and the worst part of this problem, is that we’re all scared to death of even acknowledging that it has become a problem; because if we do, then the movement might come after us next.
And yet, most liberals, including most of my friends and family members, are active supporters of this movement and its “theory,” despite knowing little or nothing about the movement’s underlying ideology: because they have been told via social media that if you don’t support the movement, then you’re a “racist.” That allegation is propaganda, like the rest of the movement’s loud proclamations: and it is untrue.
The Big Secret
We have established that this movement: denies its own existence; behaves like a whackadoodle religious cult; and systematically purges non-members from important roles in government and industry.
But that’s not the big secret.
The big secret is the end game.
Are you ready for this?
Actually, I gave it away a few paragraphs ago.
Here’s what the memes don’t say. Here’s the real reason why conservatives are up in arms about the movement’s ideology being taught in public schools. (Although Florida’s DeSantis is not doing the movement’s other critics any favors by threatening teachers with arrest for simple possession of books that he disagrees with: that kind of authoritarian behavior only feeds the movement’s self-righteous victim mentality.) Here is why, after running for the Oregon State House of Representatives as a Democrat, I’m prepared to leave the Democratic Party over the party’s formal endorsement of the notion that the movement’s ideology should be incorporated into course curricula at public schools:
The movement utilizes indoctrination, disinformation, and propaganda for subversive purposes, to build public support for violent revolution and the overthrow of our democracy, with the end goal of creating a totalitarian state.
Violent revolution. That’s what Ibram X. Kendi is talking about when he endorses the “unnatural” end of capitalism. That’s what it means to “smash the patriarchy.” That’s why your friend’s T-shirt says “Rise Up.” These people invoke violent rhetoric to promote violent ideas.
It’s not about voting in better representatives, or asking people to be nicer to each other in the workplace, as you have incorrectly assumed.
The movement’s ideology is founded on the notion of using violence to replace “end stage capitalism” with neo-Marxist authoritarianism. It’s all right there in the literature. Sometimes (as with Kendi) the language of violence is cloaked in obscurely cryptic and coded terminology; and sometimes (as in postmodernist Beaudrillard, who praised terrorism) it is discussed quite bluntly and openly: but if you follow them closely, the threads always lead back to Marxism and violence.
And that’s not even the worst of it! The worst of it is, the movement’s own literature states clearly and repeatedly that the movement’s ideology rejects our core value of equality under the law (because in their view the legal framework of a Constitutional democracy is just part of the system of “structural oppression”). The most well-known example of this is a quote from the Introduction to Stefancic and Delgado’s founding textbook on Critical Race Theory; but additional examples abound.
The movement’s ideology is openly opposed to equality and Constitutional law. They said so themselves, in writing, in their own textbooks. Therefore, the movement’s ideology and goals are incompatible with life in a free and democratic society.
And that’s unacceptable. The movement has become the problem.
If You Can’t Prove Your Point… Squirrel!
So how do the movement’s proponents justify all this? There is no way to justify it: so they rely on misdirection instead. It’s the old “Don’t look at what I’m doing, look where I’m pointing” trick used by stage performers since time immemorial.
Misdirection #1: “Our Enemies”
The movement’s most popular argument is that you have to side with them, because the other side is so bad!
First of all, that’s a false dichotomy. There’s always a third option. (For example, in my case, I presently choose to flip the bird to both sides, because neither side possesses the integrity that would be required to earn my full support.)
Of course I have heard all of the rhetoric about the “other side.” In years past I have voiced some of it myself! But I’m telling you as a former candidate for State office, that I have officially lost faith in this argument.
Yes, we disagree about policy. Yes, some of that is important policy that directly affects people’s lives, and therefore we believe in that policy very, very strongly! But ultimately, it’s just policy.
When we talk about “enemies,” we’re not talking about policy. “Enemies” are the human beings who we have decided, for one reason or another, to hate.
We get so angry about our disagreements that we forget that our opponents are human beings, just like us.
The other side isn’t really that much worse than our own side. There are decent people, as well as nut jobs and corruption, on both sides.
Once while I was running for School Board, I wrote a Facebook post comparing two then-current political corruption scandals here in Oregon. One scandal involved a private fundraiser for Republican Sheriffs that made its money by auctioning off misappropriated (ie, stolen) goods that in reality still belonged to the State (funding police with stolen property? the irony is killing me). The other scandal involved the Democratic Secretary of State accepting tens of thousands of dollars from a business she was supposed to be regulating (she subsequently resigned her office in disgrace). My point was, neither “side” is better than the other. People on both sides sometimes do things they should not do; and it is up to us, as good stewards of a self-directed democratic society, to create and enforce a system of accountability that makes it hard to misbehave and makes it really easy to behave the way everyone should.
As for the threat to our democracy that we’re going to hear so much about through the 2024 election: I saw the far-Right wingnuts do their best on January 6, 2021; and I saw the wingnuts fail; and I no longer consider them a serious threat. Dangerous, yes; but not a long-term threat to our democracy.
Now I see a much larger threat emerging from my own side, and I believe I would be failing to do my duty as a good citizen if I failed to raise this concern as loudly as I can.
Misdirection #2: What they call “History”
As I experienced during my recent School Board campaign, if you object to The Movement That Must Not Be Named, its followers hit you with the false argument, “Don’t you think we should teach history in schools?”
That question is an exercise in misdirection.
First of all, history, true history, including the uncomfortable truths about slavery and segregation: that history was taught in public schools for decades before this movement ever emerged. I learned about these subjects in school in the 1980s. Although it has earlier roots, the movement in its present form didn’t really begin to coalesce until the early 2010s. Therefore, you don’t need the movement’s ideology to teach history.
But this rhetorical accusation-in-question-form is not intended to be a reasonable argument. It is simply a manipulative misdirection.
Personally, I have never heard anyone say that we shouldn’t be teaching history. I have literally never once heard anyone say that. In fact, during my campaign for State House I even had a memorable conversation with a registered Republican who was very candid about America’s history of slavery and racism.
Like most people on both sides, I believe we should teach the complete truth about American history in our schools: including uncomfortable truths about slavery and the mistreatment of Native peoples; as well as the struggles of the women’s suffrage movements, the labor movement, and the Civil Rights movement. These are all a part of our past, and we should be candid.
I also believe we should celebrate our successes: including the end of slavery, the granting of women’s suffrage, the minimum wage and the 40-hour work week, and the end of segregation. You can’t possibly teach those successes without first acknowledging the problems: but the success is a crucial part of the story! Ignoring or denying those successes presents a false narrative.
The movement’s Narrative presents a twisted, distorted, biased, invented version of history. The best-known example of this is The 1619 Project, which has been repeatedly debunked. But chances are, you’ve never heard that it was debunked, until just now: because The 1619 Project’s conclusions suit the movement’s Narrative, and the historical reality does not.
The movement’s Narrative employs “history as a weapon,” as Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III described it in a January 2023 magazine article: a weapon that incites resentment, blame, and hatred. Weapons hurt people. Decent people do not use weapons on children. This ideology has no place in schools.
The movement does not want to teach true history. The movement wants to indoctrinate children with an ideology that distorts history for political purposes. That’s why this is a problem. That’s why this issue came up during my run for School Board. And that’s why this is worth fighting about.
Misdirection #3: Oh, those fancy words and their newfangled redefinitions
We are all equal. All human beings are alike; and every single human being is unique. Every one of us is at the center of our own universe of awareness. Our sensory perception revolves around our individual physical selves. Our thoughts and our memories all tend to be extremely self-focused. To you, you are the most important person in the Universe. And that’s okay, so long as you remember that everyone else feels exactly the same way.
So it is reasonable to want our business and governmental institutions to be as inclusive as possible.
If everyone has their own perspective and knowledge, then we should want to be sure to include as many of those perspectives as we can: including people from a broad variety of racial and ethnic backgrounds; a reasonable balance of both genders; and people of different sexual orientations, political orientations, religious orientations, tastes in music, and so on.
The best way to do this is to ensure that everyone has access to opportunity, so that every person can pursue the life path that seems most interesting and create a life doing work that is fulfilling, meaningful, and rewarding.
In a more fundamentally basic sense, as decent human beings, we should want everyone to feel welcome, regardless of their personal characteristics.
But that’s not what the movement means when they use their favorite words. The movement has hijacked these terms, and given them new definitions.
The new definitions often mean the opposite of what they appear to mean.
As tolerant, open-minded people, we should welcome a diverse society, right? We should want to include everyone, right, and make everyone feel as though they belong, as though they had an equity stake in our civilization, right? Of course!
But that’s no longer what this popular word means in its most common usage. (Witness its explicit portrayal in popular media, such as the conclusion of “The Pentaverate” on Netflix, for example.)
As newly redefined, policies described as “inclusivity” have the effect of quite intentionally excluding anyone who’s not on the list. You know who’s not on the list? Me. I’m not on the list because I’m male, Caucasian, and heterosexual.
Whatever I haven’t already attained in life, the movement is actively trying to prevent me (and people like me, such as my children) from attaining it, because of my identity. The movement is trying to prevent me and my children – and possibly you and your children – from advancing in this life because we are the “wrong” gender, ethnicity, and sexual orientation. Thus, the movement is doing exactly what they say their enemies are doing: with the key difference that the movement is doing it openly; they’re doing it on purpose; and people who really should know better are cheering them for it. And that is all wrong.
That’s an uncomfortable, unpopular thing to say, but it needs to be said, because as far as I can tell, every single defender of DEI programs eventually falls back on the argument you’ve heard so many times: something along the lines of, “There are too many white men in (name of industry).” The essential purpose of DEI programs is to exclude certain people based on gender and ethnicity. That’s deeply, horribly wrong, and we’re lying to ourselves as long as we permit this to continue.
But all of this remains obscure, in typical surface-level discussions, because these terms have been given newfangled redefinitions.
You know who redefines words? Cults.
Cults redefine words.
For an example of how all this plays out in the public sphere, I invite you to log in to your Twitter account (or whatever it’s called now) and do a quick search for “cis het white dudes” or similar terms.
If you take the trouble to do so, you will see for yourself that in our modern culture, one specific category of human being has become the frequent target of extremist, self-righteous, Left-wing hate speech.
The Movement That Must Not Be Named effectively functions as a hate group: and the specific target of the movement’s hatred, is people who look like me. The movement’s ideology openly advocates discrimination against one specific minority segment of the population based on such identity characteristics as race, gender, and sexual orientation.
If you believe in tolerance and equality, then this should bother you: because that’s not inclusive at all!
Left-wing hate speech is exclusionary: and that should be disturbing to anyone who values the notion of equality in a free and democratic society.
For another example, consider the political activist group “Run For Something” out of Portland. The homepage of their website candidly states that their mission is to promote candidates who are not, and I quote, “overly educated, straight cis-gender white men.” My MBA degree and I find that quite offensive. I believe the activists in question owe me an apology.
I am here, in the present! I cannot be held responsible for what someone else may or may not have done in the distant past. That’s completely unreasonable. (The notion that I should accept responsibility for what someone else did in the past, just because I happen to be the same race and/or gender as that other person, is called “inherited guilt,” and it is a religious doctrine: it is neither logical nor reasonable.)
I believe that I deserve equal access to opportunity in the present, just like you and everyone else; and, more importantly, I believe that my children deserve to have equal access to opportunity in the future!
By way of contrast, it sounds to me like the organizers of “Run For Something” (and the larger movement’s many minions on social media) are trying to make the argument that I shouldn’t seek political office, or attempt to do anything else of significance with my life, for the reason that someone else of my race and gender held political office or owned a business in the past. And that argument is simply offensive.
Please don’t get me wrong. (You are getting me wrong already. I understand: you have been conditioned to lump all arguments into either “with you” and “against you,” and since I’m not entirely “with you” then…)
Please don’t get me wrong. I deeply believe that Black lives matter. The disproportionate use of lethal force by police against any minority should sicken us all: and I am proud to live in an America where we can recognize this problem and begin to intentionally address it through legal reforms and through criminal justice that holds bad cops accountable. Let’s do more of that.
I also believe that every human being matters, equally and without exception. But in this day and age, you can get fired for saying “all lives matter.” (The Dean in question should have used the word “and” in place of the word “but” – although that likely wouldn’t have changed the outcome.) That’s counterproductive, folks. Firing people who say “all lives matter” will not bring us together as a society. If we want to create a truly inclusive society, then we have to promote the idea that all lives matter! We can’t go around firing anyone who says it out loud.
Black lives DO matter, and the police reform movements of these past few years have been very important: and we still have a ways to go.
Everyone’s life DOES matter, and canceling people who say so, will not create the equitable future of which we dream.
Let’s create opportunity. That’s the way forward. Let’s create a culture of tolerance. That’s the way forward.
But The Movement That Must Not Be Named is a culture of intolerance. The movement is a step backward. It is a step in the wrong direction. The movement is not the answer: it is just another problem.
Where I live, the most significant minority population is Hispanic. Like most other minority populations, the Hispanic people in the area where I live tend to work low-wage jobs, often performing grueling manual labor. Few of them attain college degrees. Very few of them own businesses. And almost none of them have positions in the local government.
Back in the day when I used to work manual labor, my Hispanic colleagues were some of the hardest-working people I have ever met. If they’re not financially secure, it’s because our society does not pay living wages to people who work in manual labor positions. And that’s more of an economic problem than it is a problem of ethnicity. I can state this with absolute confidence because, regardless of my own ethnicity and gender, I experienced the exact same problem, too, when I worked for those same kinds of wages: and the only reason I was able to escape that life, is because my wife and I both obtained university degrees.
And let’s face it: as far as “centering” is concerned, Hispanics are largely excluded by The Movement That Must Not Be Named. For the most part, the movement completely ignores them. Here’s an example that’s staring me in the face. My bank; my family’s favorite big-box retailer; and other large corporations I could name: have all been redecorating their public spaces with new movement-approved signage. The new signage systematically removes any imagery that might appear to portray men of Caucasian descent. And yet, of all the replacement faces these corporations so proudly display on their shiny new signs, almost none of them are Hispanic: even though people of Hispanic descent constitute a quarter or more of the local population in parts of this district, based on the demographic research I conducted for my State Rep contest. Once again, the movement’s agenda fails to align with reality.
But regardless of which professional models get their photos printed in supersize, the simple fact remains: Putting new signs in corporate lobbies is not going to improve the lives of the local Hispanic population.
Raising the damn minimum wage will make their lives better. Providing their children with encouragement and opportunity to get a college degree and/or start their own business, will make their lives better.
But that sort of practical “solutionism” is anathema to The Movement That Must Not Be Named: because if we were to actually succeed in making people’s lives better, then people would be content with the status quo, in which case we wouldn’t be building public support for a violent revolution. And that’s what this is really all about.
Misdirection #4: Statistics
Consider that everyone’s perspective is valid. You feel oppressed, and you’re certain it’s because of your identity, and you can offer some examples of the mistreatment you have suffered. I don’t deny your experiences. What I can say, is that pretty much everyone in the whole world has gone through some bad experiences at some point in their lives. That’s not to discount your experience: it’s to offer a broader perspective. If we’ve all been through some rough times, the question then becomes: Should we sit around dwelling on how bad life has been to us; complaining about our misfortunes; comparing our injuries and trying to prove that “my life has been worse than yours” (or vice-versa), and blaming our problems on the people (and the society) who have hurt us? Or are we going to take a meaningful step forward and try to make our own lives and the whole entire world better, starting now? It’s tempting to focus all our energy on blaming social structures; but it doesn’t get us anywhere. For a current personal example: My primary occupation presently involves housework and childcare; my business presently generates very little revenue; and my professionally successful spouse, who is a woman, is the primary income earner for our family. If I had a different identity, I would probably be blaming the system for my situation. And yet, as a heterosexual male of Caucasian descent, according to the movement’s doctrine I’m a member of the one and only category of human being who’s not allowed to blame “structural oppression” for any of my problems. Therefore, I must conclude that “structural oppression” is an inadequate explanation for the problems that people experience: and I further suggest that if you look at “structural oppression” closely enough, it begins to look a lot like a conspiracy theory.
You’re offended that I would describe “structural oppression” as a conspiracy theory. “What about Jim Crow laws?” you ask. “What about all these other things?” I recognize your point. Great wrongs have been committed in the past. However, we are not living in the 1950’s. The Jim Crow laws were repealed, overridden, and/or declared unconstitutional decades ago. Police reforms have been instituted in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. Discriminatory practices in banking, housing, and employment are generally illegal. No, the world is not perfect, and there is always room for improvement. But if the legal framework of discrimination has already been dismantled, then whatever discrimination remains is no longer “structural.” That’s the wrong word.
Yes, Republicans, especially in the Old South, are hard at work trying to restrict voting access in ways that disproportionately impact communities of color: and that is arguably a form of structural oppression in the present. But it’s not universally true, and it certainly fails to prove that our entire democracy is part of a system of structural oppression. Quite the contrary: if democracy is oppressive, then why would those Republicans try to restrict voting access? It’s precisely because democracy represents liberation! Claiming otherwise is, in fact, a conspiracy theory. The Narrative of “structural oppression” is a conspiracy theory.
You’re still offended that I would describe “structural oppression” as a conspiracy theory. “Why, just look at all these statistics!” you say.
Recall what Mark Twain famously said about statistics: “There are lies, damned lies, and statistics.”
I see a lot of statistics online, and about 95% of them are purely made up out of thin air. (For example, I just made up that statistic to demonstrate the point.)
Even when they’re accurate, statistics are often misleading, because they don’t tell the whole story. Statistics may be able to show a correlation, but they can never definitively prove causation.
Even when accurate, statistics are commonly twisted in service of a narrative. By emphasizing certain information and leaving other information out, such a narrative serves a definite political purpose, but the resulting narrative’s relationship to truthfulness becomes dubious at best.
For example, a recent headline discussed the gender gap in the tech sector. Actually, the headline seemed positive, by proclaiming that the gender gap had narrowed. Even so, on social media the narrative surrounding this article focused pretty much exclusively on complaints that there are still fewer women in the tech sector than there are men. Fair enough, we believe the gender balance should be roughly equal across the professions, in an ideal world, right? But if you scroll down a bit in that Financial Times article, you may discover some details that were easy to miss on the first read: details like when the same article went on to briefly note that women presently represent 56% of the financial services profession… and, get this: women represent a whopping 66% of the legal profession. Did you catch that? There are presently more women than men in financial services; and there are a lot more women than men in the legal profession. So the headline probably should have read, “Holy sh*t, did you know that two out of three lawyers are women? Were you aware that women now strongly dominate one of the highest paying, highest profile professions in our society?” But one recurring theme you may eventually notice, if you watch these trends long enough, is that the movement never celebrates a success. To the movement’s supporters, there’s no such thing as a small victory: there’s only the next battle.
And as this example makes clear, parity is not the movement’s objective. If two-thirds isn’t good enough, then what would be considered adequate? The movement’s critics might be forgiven for wondering if the movement’s vision of “empowerment” possesses a disturbing resemblance to what’s usually called “supremacy.”
Here’s another example of that.
Where’s the Call for Equality in Homelessness?
Most homeless people are men.
Think about that.
If we are truly concerned with systematically enforcing “equality of outcome,” then theoretically we should want the bottom end of our socioeconomic spectrum to demonstrate the same identity characteristics as the broader population. And yet, no one is calling for more women to go homeless. That would be cruel. But if we don’t address this gross gender disparity, then it will continue to persist! And I certainly don’t hear the movement calling for social programs that would specifically lift more men out of poverty.
The movement is only concerned with perceived inequality at the very top. They’re not at all bothered by this gross disparity at the very bottom.
Well, I’ve never been at the very top; but I have been there at the bottom. I experienced a time in my life when I was unhoused and uncertain where I would be sleeping that night. I was fortunate to have a car, so I slept in my car, and I did not have to resort to sleeping on the street. Nonetheless, by definition, if you sleep in your car because you don’t have anywhere else to stay, then you’re homeless. I was effectively homeless for a brief time in my mid-twenties, shortly after I returned from overseas with a severe case of PTSD, as I’ll be discussing in an upcoming book.
So I’m very concerned with this gender disparity at the very bottom. This inequality of outcome has affected me, personally.
Physically Different Brains
Consider the possibility that both the disparity at the bottom, and the disparity at the top could be explained by biological differences between the physical brains of people of the two different genders.
(Yes, I said “two genders.” Gender is biological. There are only two genders: male, and female. “Fluid” is not a gender. “Bisexual” is a sexual orientation, not a gender. Stop conflating your sexual orientation with your gender, it’s not the same thing.)
Why are men often paid more than women? You insist that it’s because all the Human Resources departments are sexist. That was undoubtedly true, more than half a century ago; but today? It seems so unlikely as to be laughable. I suggest there may be multiple other factors at work: chief among them, the simple fact that there are biological differences between the physical brains of men and the physical brains of women: differences which cause men to be, on average, somewhat more assertive and more prone to risk-taking. Male assertiveness pays off in contract negotiation, and male risk-taking pays off in investments, sometimes, but a couple of big wins are enough to offset many small losses. Because they are more assertive and more prone to risk-taking, men are also more likely to try to attain a position that they’re not entirely qualified for (such as when I ran for the Oregon State House of Representatives, for example): not because society oppresses women, but rather because men’s brains are physically wired to disregard reasonable hesitations.
But on the other hand, men are also far more likely to experience homelessness, for the exact same reason!
When men take too many risks that don’t pay off, then they end up living on the street. Our homeless population skews vastly, overwhelmingly, disproportionately male, for this very reason. (That’s one statistic you’re unlikely to ever hear about from the movement!)
The solution to the problem of pay disparities, then, is not to cancel all men, or to promote Eugenics via human cloning to create a future with no men in it (thank you Jurassic World: Dominion), but simply to promote pay transparency.
I’m all in favor of pay transparency — and I’m in favor of an Equal Rights Amendment, too. There’s no need to call people names and go on a tirade filled with angry accusations and conspiracy theories about invisible structures of oppression, just to achieve these sorts of reasonable goals. Just ask for what you want! Be direct. You may be surprised how many people already agree with you.
A Post-Racial Society?
I was raised to believe in a race-neutral ideal, as preached by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
And I absorbed that message. I don’t particularly care what color your skin is. It’s not important to me.
I voted for Barack Obama, twice, because I liked his policies. I listen to Jimi Hendrix because I like his music. I watch Will Smith movies because I enjoy his acting. I connect with these great figures, and many others, on the basis of the quality of their work and their ideas: not based on superficial characteristics like skin color. And I believe that’s how we’re all supposed to relate to one another.
But my “race-neutral” world view is unacceptable to CRT activists. And that is precisely why CRT is a serious problem for the future of our society.
According to prominent CRT activists like Ibram X. Kendi, it’s racist to ignore race; and instead, we should focus on or “center” racial concerns in all of our conversations, considerations, and political policies, now and forevermore.
I came of age in the 1990s; and at that time, I learned that centering race before all other considerations is called “racism.”
Therefore, my core values are incompatible with the teachings of CRT. Forced to choose one or the other, I prefer my core values over the subversive demands and dictates of a dodgy social movement that doesn’t even want to tell me its own name.
In Conclusion
Can we agree to disagree? No, because the movement is intolerant of dissent. If you disagree with the movement’s ideas, they attack you personally: they call you names, they subject you to mob harassment, they do their level best to destroy your life and get you fired from your job. The movement does not permit disagreement. So, instead we’re going to fight.
The Movement That Must Not Be Named refuses to accept responsibility for the consequences of its own actions. It blames the far Right for all the divisions in our country: but the movement itself is the far Right’s primary motivator. The movement’s self-righteous intolerance; its obsession with dividing people into antagonistic subcategories; and its self-righteous enforcement of separations between those divisions (whence the term “cultural appropriation”): these behaviors are making things worse.
I was brought up on the ideal of the “great melting pot,” but that ideal is rejected by the movement’s dogma. The movement doesn’t want us all to join together in mutual acceptance: the movement wants vindictive revenge.
The movement’s propaganda is dishonest. The movement itself is anti-democratic. The movement is fundamentally opposed to our core value of equality. The movement’s extremist ideology absolutely does not belong in our public schools.
I will fight this movement as long as it continues to exert a stranglehold on the Democratic Party. Yes, a few bridges may catch fire in the process; but life goes on. I hope to build new bridges in their place: stronger bridges connecting me with people who share my concerns and my belief in our core values of freedom and equality.
Recommended Reading
Books
Cynical Theories by Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay
Woke Racism by Professor John McWhorter
The End of Gender by Dr. Debra Soh
Red, White, and Black: Rescuing American History from Revisionists and Race Hustlers, a compilation of thoughtful essays by leading modern thinkers, edited by Robert L. Woodson, Sr.
Articles
“I’m a teacher. Here’s how my school tried to indoctrinate children” by Kali Fontanilla on the Orange County Register-Guard. (paywalled)
“Critical Race Theory – The Marxist Trojan Horse” by Walter Myers III via The Discovery Institute.
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(Originally published May 22, 2023, this post was last updated March 8, 2024.)
Image credit: Towfiqu Barbhuiya via Unsplash.