[csusbpeace] Will Critical Race Theory Hysteria Influence Future of Affirmative Action?
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Will Critical Race Theory Hysteria Influence Future of Affirmative Action?
October 30, 2021
The end of abortion rights in the United States seems to be a foregone
conclusion. After rejecting
<https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2021-10-22/supreme-court-texas-abortion-law>
efforts to temporarily halt the Texas abortion law on two separate
occasions, the Supreme Court may validate
<https://www.texastribune.org/2021/10/22/texas-abortion-law-supreme-court/>
the law this term. Undermining Roe v. Wade, or overruling
<https://www.texastribune.org/2021/10/05/texas-mississippi-abortion-laws-supreme-court/>
it as the court’s decision on Mississippi’s 15-week abortion ban portends,
begs the question of what other precedents the Supreme Court will be willing
to weaken or abandon.
Affirmative action in higher education immediately comes to mind.
With the replacement
<https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/26/politics/supreme-court-conservative/index.html>
of Justice Anthony Kennedy—who famously helped reaffirm
<https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/27/anthony-kennedy-retirement-supreme-court-cases-680104>
the constitutionality of affirmative action in Fisher v. University of
Texas—upon his retirement with Justice Brett Kavanaugh, and the subsequent
filling of the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seat by Justice Amy Coney
Barrett, the days of affirmative action seem as numbered as those of
legalized abortions. Conservatives, skeptical
<https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/12/the-supreme-courts-conservatives-dig-in-against-affirmative-action/440988/>
of the justification for affirmative action, enjoy a majority
<https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/26/politics/supreme-court-conservative/index.html>
on the Supreme Court. A viable challenge to affirmative action that was only
recently shot down
<https://www.npr.org/2019/10/01/730386096/federal-judge-rules-in-favor-of-harvard-in-admissions-case>
in federal court may receive a more favorable ruling if it is heard by a
more sympathetic conservative Supreme Court.
As with abortion rights, it is possible for Congress to enact legislation
that protects affirmative action policies. However, the current national
conversation on critical race theory suggests that these efforts would face
an uphill battle.
The New Culture War
Conservative politicians, pundits, activists, and parents united during the
summer of 2021 to face a common enemy. No, that enemy was not the likely
candidate of the coronavirus pandemic, which so far has killed more than
700,000 Americans
<https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/01/us/us-covid-deaths-700k.html> and
counting. Nor was it the insurrectionists and anti-democracy extremists who
falsely claim
<https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jan/09/us-capitol-insurrection-white-supremacist-terror>
that the 2020 election was stolen from former President Donald Trump. No,
these allies banded together to engage in a meaningless culture war against
critical race theory.
Parents and conservative activists have accused schools of using critical
race theory to “indoctrinate” their children and spread “Marxism.”
The tragic murder of George Floyd in 2020 was a cultural inflection point
<https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/05/23/what-george-floyd-changed-490199>
that has inspired national introspection on the ways in which racism has
permeated every facet of American life. Everyday citizens have incorporated
<https://www.businessinsider.com/words-on-race-gender-and-diversity-you-should-know-2020-7>
terms like “white privilege,” “implicit bias,” and “microaggression” into
their vocabularies. Corporations
<https://www.cnn.com/2021/06/17/business/juneteenth-2021-company-celebrations/index.html>
are beginning to promote internal diversity and contribute to the economic
development of historically marginalized communities. Educational
institutions
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/10/09/california-ethnic-studies/>
at all levels are encouraging conversations and offering courses on
institutionalized racism, which is at the core of critical race theory. But
for every positive action, there is an equally opposite negative reaction.
Local school board meetings have become battlegrounds
<https://www.politico.com/news/2021/09/08/critical-race-theory-school-boards-510381>.
Parents and conservative activists have accused schools of using critical
race theory to “indoctrinate
<https://kansaspolicy.org/schools-should-educate-not-indoctrinate-with-critical-race-theory/>”
their children and spread “Marxism
<https://www.newsweek.com/critical-race-theory-repackaged-marxism-opinion-1599557>.”
These accusations may be the least of school districts’ concerns: School
board members have received
<https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/30/us/school-board-threats-violence/index.html>
threats to their safety, while many school boards have become engulfed
<https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/critical-race-theory-invades-school-boards-help-conservative-groups-n1270794>
in litigation, complaints, and record requests relating to critical race
theory. Conservatives at all levels have egged on these efforts from the Fox
News Network, which obsessed
<https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/fox-news-obsession-critical-race-theory-numbers>
over critical race theory to the tune of mentioning it 1,900 times in under
four months, to Trump acolyte and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who blasted
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/05/29/critical-race-theory-bans-schools/>
critical race theory as “[t]eaching kids to hate their country and to hate
each other.”
Harmful rhetoric is now giving way to tangible consequences. States like
South Carolina
<https://www.scstatehouse.gov/sess124_2021-2022/bills/4325.htm> and Idaho
<https://legislature.idaho.gov/wp-content/uploads/sessioninfo/2021/legislation/H0377.pdf>
have passed legislation to prevent schools from teaching the principles of
critical race theory. Oklahoma <https://bit.ly/3vS98LM> passed legislation
clearly intended to shape the contours of how discussions of race can occur
in the classroom. The debate over the place of the tenets of critical race
theory in the classroom threatens to tip the scales in the Virginia
governor’s race
<https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/critical-race-theory-virginia-governor-youngkin/2021/10/01/17ad45f0-1cc8-11ec-8380-5fbadbc43ef8_story.html>.
Federal conservative lawmakers have joined the chorus of criticisms,
including Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) and Representative Dan Bishop (R-NC),
both of whom introduced
<https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/stop-crt-bill-votes-in-congress-add-to-political-drama-over-critical-race-theory/2021/07>
the Stop CRT Act.
An Uncertain Future
The central irony of this nonsensical hysteria is that critical race theory
is a legal framework <https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-57908808>
taught in law and graduate schools, not primary and secondary schools.
Discussions of history, racism, and diversity are not synonymous with
critical race theory, so no children were ever in so-called danger of being
exposed to this pedagogy. But Republicans are well aware of the provocative
nature
<https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/article252807478.html>
of the term “critical race theory.” The potential to wield that term like a
battle-ax to frighten
<https://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/article252807478.html>
suburban white voters and ultimately frustrate progress on racial justice
issues was too tempting for conservatives to ignore. That this fearmongering
political strategy is working, based on the explosion of interest
<https://www.politico.com/news/2021/09/08/critical-race-theory-school-boards-510381>
in school board affairs, could be the death knell for affirmative action.
Before critical race theory, affirmative action was the buzzword deployed by
conservatives to stoke racial division
<https://www.politico.com/story/2018/10/14/asian-americans-affirmative-action-898521>.
Affirmative action has always been a controversial
<https://scholarlycommons.law.hofstra.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1020&context=hlelj>
policy. But if this level of panic is the reaction to the mere discussion of
racial inequality in schools, one can only imagine how apoplectic the
reaction will be to Congress seeking to preserve or even expand affirmative
action. One thing is for certain: Outrage at the presence of racial
discussions in the classrooms means that there is already a coalition of
opponents mobilized to challenge codifying affirmative action.
Standing at the cusp of losing abortion rights has galvanized progressives,
but it is hard to envision affirmative action inspiring that same level of
activism, even among those who might be somewhat sympathetic. Indeed,
protests
<https://spectrumlocalnews.com/tx/south-texas-el-paso/news/2021/09/02/texans-protest-as-state-s-6-week-abortion-ban-goes-into-effect>
against the Texas abortion law began almost immediately after it went into
effect in September. Nationwide marches
<https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/women-s-march-hold-hundreds-rallies-nationwide-support-abortion-rights-n1280623>
hosted by the Women’s March to vocalize support for abortion rights totaled
at least 600. Whole Woman’s Health <https://www.wholewomanshealth.com/>,
which is part of a network of abortion clinics, sued
<https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/20pdf/21a24_8759.pdf> for an
injunction against the Texas abortion law. Spearheaded by women in Congress,
the Women’s Health Protection Act of 2021, which would maintain a woman’s
right to abort her pregnancy, passed
<https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/house-vote-abortion-rights-amid-challenges-roe-v-wade-n1280003>
in the House of Representatives.
Attaining higher education is still a relative privilege
<https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2020/educational-attainment.html>,
by contrast, so affirmative action is not as energizing a principle as
abortion rights—which directly impact half the population—theoretically are.
An argument, though one with which I disagree, could also be made that the
stakes of affirmative action are not as high as other racial justice issues,
including voting rights and police brutality. While legislation to address
these focuses stalls, progressives in Congress may be reluctant to add
protecting affirmative action to their list of priorities. As seen from the
example of some conservative lawmakers in Congress who have been vocal
leaders
<https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/stop-crt-bill-votes-in-congress-add-to-political-drama-over-critical-race-theory/2021/07>
in the fight to keep racial history out of the classroom, there is no
guarantee that legislation to preserve affirmative action policies would be
enacted even with the enthusiasm of congressional Democrats.
Furthermore, public opinion on affirmative action is tepid. Although Gallup
determined
<https://news.gallup.com/poll/352832/americans-confidence-racial-fairness-waning.aspx?utm_source=alert&utm_medium=email&utm_content=morelink&utm_campaign=syndication>
that 62 percent of Americans broadly endorse “affirmative action programs
for racial minorities,” there are indications that support narrows with
respect to affirmative action in the context of higher education
specifically. Shortly before the lawsuit
<https://www.npr.org/2019/10/01/730386096/federal-judge-rules-in-favor-of-harvard-in-admissions-case>
against Harvard’s affirmative action policy was set to be heard, WGBH News
conducted a poll in which 72 percent
<https://www.wgbh.org/news/education/2018/09/16/poll-72-percent-of-americans-oppose-considering-race-in-college-admissions-but-even-more-value-racial-diversity>
of respondents opposed the Supreme Court jurisprudence allowing a person’s
racial background to factor into admissions decisions. Perhaps most
tellingly, California voters opposed
<https://www.vox.com/2020/11/4/21537590/california-proposition-16-affirmative-action-results>
restoring the state’s capacity to consider race, along with other identity
elements, in admitting students to its public universities and hiring public
employees. An argument could be made that if affirmative action could not
survive in liberal California, what hope does it have of achieving national
protection?
The anger surrounding teaching children a more expansive (and truthful)
version of American history can largely be understood as a backlash to the
Black Lives Matter era, the victories of which have been largely symbolic
<https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/06/12/confederate-statues-flags-banned-black-lives-matter-movement-grows/5346701002/>
and localized
<https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/apr/25/justice-george-floyd-streets-courtroom-blm-protests>.
The legislative entrenchment of affirmative action will be spun by
conservatives as “reverse racism
<https://news.stanford.edu/news/2013/january/white-reverse-discrimination-012312.html>”
that hampers the educational advancement of white children. That argument
will hold traction among conservatives, moderates, and progressives. As we
prepare for the possibility of a post-Roe future, it might also be time to
anticipate a future in which affirmative action is unavailable as a means of
promoting diversity in and economic mobility through higher education.
Ebony Slaughter-Johnson
<https://www.laprogressive.com/author/ebony-slaughter-johnson/>Independent
Media Institute
This article was produced by Local Peace Economy
<https://independentmediainstitute.org/local-peace-economy/>, a project of
the Independent Media Institute.
DISCLAIMER: The opinions expressed here are those of the individual
contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the LA
Progressive, its publisher, editor or any of its other contributors.
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