I just had an interesting experience that really took me off guard. I (literally) just got off a PTO Meeting Zoom call for my daughter's school. They are injecting antiracism and racial equity training into the school curriculum. And, even though I had to talk to my fiancé about making my opinion known on the call because we are scared of our daughter being ostracized for my opposing views, I had to speak up.

The call started out with the basic stuff (introductions, general PTO updates, etc.) but then the woke parents got to talk first. I don't want to reject their experiences or feelings (even though they probably aren't going to be reading this any time soon), but their stories were basically the same. They were mostly white parents with adopted or mixed-race children who were scared their kids would not fit in. To be clear, none of their kids actually experienced any racism (according to their stories), but they were scared they might. There was one Asian parent who was scared her Asian kids are going to be looked at differently. Her example was how her daughter was microaggressed against because a kid asked why her skin was darker than his. Her daughter, smartly, told the kid it was because she had a tan. You'd think this was just a slick comeback by the little girl, but her mom admitted she did have a tan from bathing in the sun recently, SO THIS WASN'T EVEN A COMMENT ABOUT HER NATURAL SKIN COLOR - just a kid, rightly, pointing out she has a tan. What I wanted to butt in and say is, "if you think that's discrimination, what until she applies for Harvard," but I decided to not make the remark for the sake of civil conversation. I know, missed opportunity.

After story time the big guns came in. I got a crash course in racial equity in schools, but I really didn't. They spoke only in what I call bumper stickers. Empty phrases, useless rhetoric, and unapplicable theories were all I heard. No substance needed, apparently. Then came questions time.

While everyone was reading the metaphorical bumper stickers on the Ford Pinto in front of them, I was going through the website of the presenting organization. I went right to their resources section and found a list of “Educational Resources” headlined by How To Be An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi. If any of you have been around the Engineering Politics Locals Community long enough, you know my special affinity for this book and its author. But I didn’t start my questioning there even thought I was the only person with my hand raised during question time. I started by asking a probing question (and I’ll paraphrase what I said because I was not able to record the session):

“Can you give an actual example of how antiracist courses work in the school curriculum? Is it a standalone class, set of courses, or is it added into the current courses being taught? (ex: taught during a regular history class)”

Their answer wasn’t unsurprising – they didn’t have one. It was like watching them play hot potato shifting the responsibility of answering my straightforward question from person to person until it was eventually forgotten. In their final attempt at even acknowledging my question, they had the principal bring up a different slideshow presentation giving a more “in-depth” explanation of what they were doing in the schools. I already knew the non-answer they were going to give, so I decided to ask a more direct question before listening to the next slate of nonsense.

“I hope you all don’t mind dissenting opinion because I’m going to give mine. I’ve read Ibram X. Kendi’s book How To Be An Antiracist and most of what is in that book shouldn’t be taught in academia, much less to our kids. He openly advocates for discrimination. He redefines racism in order to prove his narrative. I look at the email invite to this meeting and I see words like ‘antiracist’ and ‘racial equity’ which draw major red flags to me. I know there are different brands of antiracism and I’m interested to see where you land. Is what you teach in line with Kendi’s version of antiracism?”

What proceeded after my question was amazing to me – they sat there and clearly didn’t know how to answer. They’ve obviously never seen someone push back on their positions before. They took the dissenting opinion kindly, but you could tell, they’ve never heard an opposing view on this topic before tonight. After all that confusion, they decided to move on with the slideshow in the hopes it would answer something – or anything. It didn’t.

While the group was listening to 10 more minutes of bumper sticker slogans, the second amazing thing happened – I had several parents direct message me in the chat expressing how they felt the same way but didn’t know how to speak up. They expressed how they don’t want their children (some of them of color) learning this harmful material. They are like the growing majority in this country – they are stuck in a place where they know what is happening is wrong but don’t know how to or are too scared to push back. Reading these responses made me feel good for voicing my opinion, but also made me feel sick to my stomach knowing people everywhere don’t think they can push back because they believe they’re in a minority. [And to be clear for any dishonest people reading this, a “minority/majority” is NOT referring to race or some other postmodern dominance hierarchy in this context]

The final slideshow ended, and I did pick up on a few key points. For one, they want to teach kids at an earlier age to understand race. I actually don’t disagree with this notion. Kids will see race whether you talk about it or not, and it’s better for a parent to explain how people who look different but that doesn’t mean we should treat them differently. And for two, the principal praised the fact that students were making their own groups based on race (ex: black student coalition). This one rub me the wrong way, especially considering how it runs in direct contradiction to the first point. So, naturally, when they asked for follow up questions, I was the only one to raise my hand.

“This kind of answers some questions but I’ll have to talk to a teacher to find out how this operates in the classroom. But there is still some troubling stuff in here. Teaching kids about race is a helpful exercise, but creating groups based on race undoes all of that previous work. You can’t expect people to see and treat each other as different but equal AND advocate for groups based solely on race. You also talk about microaggressions as a way to prevent children from any sort of harm when we know this type of overprotection is extremely harmful for their development. A microaggression can’t be considered an aggression when there is no malicious intent behind it. Things like this is what we shouldn’t be teaching our children.”

My comment time was much more brief than I would of liked it to be, but the principal came in to refute the ‘microaggression claim’ by saying they do teach children how to deal with this type of small adversity. But, obviously, you can’t teach a kid how to deal with any type of adversity but defend against microaggressions at the same time. It doesn’t work that way. After this exchange I asked for the principal’s email for more follow up questions. The principal was perfectly delightful in his manner the whole time he was speaking and seemed open to criticism, so I’ll be testing that in emails directed at him in the very near future (possibly tonight).

I know this is not the “Ben Shapiro Destroys” moment that I would have liked it to be, and I really wish I had more time to discuss my concerns (and maybe quote a few awful lines from the books they claim to be “Educational Resources”), but I think I made some progress. I got a few email addresses from the people who did not speak up. I hope to start growing that email list of concerned parents so we can create a real check against what will most likely become out-of-control woke curriculum, and hopefully eliminate it from schools completely. Antiracism and Critical Race Theory in schools is just another form of child abuse, and if we care about our children, we will have to learn how to fight against it.

I want to give a special thanks to some people who motivated me to speak up. Even for me, someone who probably knows more about CRT and Antiracism than the people teaching it in that call, it can be very stressful when knowing anytime you speak up against the woke mob you run the risk of cancellation, social ostracization, and even physical retaliation. It helps when you have extra support and resources to know you’re not in the fight alone, much like the support I hope I gave to the people messaging me during the call. Know you are not alone. Know you are not in the minority. Know you can fight this. I want to thank @ReturnToReason, @karlyn, @ConceptualJames (and @NewDiscourses), @JamesDerian, and @debfillman for your support and knowledge.