Michigan taxpayers footed the $20,000 bill for a one-hour guest lecture on Critical Race Theory (CRT) via Zoom, The Federalist reports.
Beverly Daniel Tatum headlined the University of Michigan’s (UM) annual “Nancy Cantor Lecture on Intellectual Diversity.”
She describes herself a “noted expert on the psychology of racism,” who “brings unique insights and strategies in both her writing and public speaking to those eager to jump-start the kind of productive conversations that can lead to effective action for social change.”
She is also a bestselling author, who in the same vein as known race-hustler and last year’s UM “anti-racism” speaker Ibram X. Kendi, rakes in the big bucks to divide Americans on the basis of skin color.
In her speech, Tatum did not apologize or make excuses for teaching CRT. In fact, she embraced it, unlike some of her more moderate counterparts on the political left who have denied CRT’s existence completely, or otherwise dismissed it as a right-wing “conspiracy theory.”
“When we even think about the pushback against CRT, it’s really a social ‘shh, don’t talk about it.’ Right? That there is [sic] so many cues in the environment to teach us at an early age [that] this is a toxic subject,” Tatum said. “People don’t want to hear about it.”
“Many people think of racism as individual acts of meanness,” she continued. “We know as social scientists, that racism is more than just individual attitudes or behaviors. It is, in fact, a whole system of policies and practices that reinforce a system of advantage based on racial categories.”
The political left continues to struggle in its own definition of CRT, and to what extent it is being taught in schools.
When not denying its existence, or sometimes while denying its existence, some say CRT practitioners are simply teaching American history.
For example, Michigan’s State Superintendent Dr. Michael Rice recently denied that CRT is part of the official curricula in the state’s public schools, but also that it is taught as a sort of backdrop of America’s history.
“It is an academic lens or set of lenses developed primarily by those in higher education to consider the elements and impacts of racism and particularly institutional racism on our country and citizenry,” he said.
CNN benignly describes the practice as “education programs” that “address systemic racism in the US and the country’s legacy of slavery.”
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Pete D’Abrosca is a contributor at The Michigan Star and The Star News Network. Follow Pete on Twitter. Email tips to [email protected].
Photo “Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum” by Beverly Daniel Tatum. Background Photo “University of Michigan” by Jha4ceb.
