Critical Race Theory—Sowing Hate and Discontent for Profit
By Bob Beanblossom
11 May 2021
It seems to me that the Founding Fathers clearly stated their goal for the federal government in the Preamble to the Constitution when they stated that: “We the People of the United States,” would, through a carefully structured limited federal government, strive
1. “To form a more perfect Union,
2. Establish Justice,
3. Insure domestic Tranquility,
4. Provide for the common defense,
5. Promote the general Welfare, and
6. Secure the Blessings of Liberty…”
To do that, they invented a tricameral constitutional republic in which the power of the federal government was strictly limited by enumerated powers listed primarily in Article 1, Section 8, subject to the Bill of Rights. Each branch of government has specific responsibilities and limitations upon its own operation and its oversight of the other two branches. It was designed to be stable yet able to constantly adapt through orderly means to meet the changing needs of the People it served. The rule of law, the adherence to the Constitution, has allowed the United States to become and remain a bastion of freedom where opportunity is available to all, but success promised to none. Responsible behavior by all citizens is essential.
Despite the success of the American dream as the tenacity of constitutional law has been continually proven through changing times, the foundational precepts of America are currently being attacked as oppressive and onerous. The quest for a perfect Union through Constitutional means as directed by the majority of citizens is being cast aside in favor of a relativistic reactionary government serving the ever-changing demands of the few; Justice has left the courtroom as popular opinion and judicial initiative replace the rule of law; domestic tranquility has been replaced with intentional divisiveness for profit; the common defense of our borders is now an open door policy for any and all who would come here for any and all purposes; the general Welfare has become universal welfare as business and industry is no longer the source of wealth and income, but the oppressor to be conquered and eliminated; and the Blessings of Liberty belong to the vocal minority instead of We the People as a whole. Equality and the identity oppressed minorities and their oppressors are defined by a slanted media.
Two themes—perhaps operating modes is a better description—dominate American culture today that are anathema to the progress in eliminating racial inequalities that have been incrementally improved since the 1860s. The first is segregation. It is readily seen in the divisive invention of We-They groups striving for power and position in the pecking order of society. That this divisive behavior produces destructive behavior and destroys inclusiveness and equality points to the true motives of the proponents. Although couched in terms of inclusion and equality, they are attempts to gain unearned dominance by displacing other groups with their own. Markers include racial distinctions, sexual distinctions, geopolitical distinctions, and so on. The battle cries invariably include some form of “redistribution of wealth” in which producers are expected to support intentional non-producers. The second is self-proclaimed victimization. The underdog has always been the champion of Americans who root for the come-from-behind team to catch up and triumph. But this is different. It has become a tool for We-They groups to garner unearned exceptional privilege at the expense of earned positions of the majority. It is an Americanized expression of the heroic thief Robin Hood who took from the rich and gave to the poor. These operating modes are promoted and exploited by power mongers such as some politicians to develop and augment their own power bases. This is done by defining and coopting these artificial groups through promises of riches and power to come, achieved through highly developed marketing schemes that include media blitzes dominated by tales of victimization and oppression while ignoring any criminal wrongdoings of the group; and by lawmaking/rulemaking and distribution of funds that favors the currently elect and penalizes and shames all who oppose. This is done at any cost to the enumerated powers designed to prevent this overreach. One example is same-sex marriage. An honest review of the Constitution finds no enumerated power given to the federal government to regulate or define marriage. Another is attaching federal funding (domestic and foreign) to entities that approve abortion while withholding it from those who don’t. Again, one must be highly creative to find this enumerated power in the Constitution. Recent rulings show that many judges are highly creative.
Examples of this federal abuse seem endless. The use of Executive Orders to “create” law outside of Congress is obvious in the frenzy of COVID restrictions unequally applied to citizens and states alike; as is the reinterpretation of law by the judiciary as it finds new “rights” for citizens and non-citizens alike, such as effectively legalizing the illegal behavior of unauthorized immigrants. These successful tactics to control law-abiding citizens while giving free reign to non-citizens is mirrored in many states. Conservatives, often self-identified as Republicans, battle publicly to protect the Constitution and States Rights, while liberals, often self-identified as Democrats, fight valiantly for the rights of the poor and needy. When voting records are compared—with all the bills intended to obscure the real votes removed from the mix—there is precious little difference between these groups in any practical way.
This departure from the rule of law has been developing for many years, but Barak Obama stated the goal clearly and concisely, but was largely ignored: he said that his goal was to fundamentally change America. His goal was to displace the literal interpretation of the Constitution with a flexible, situational relativistic mode that allowed politicians to rule rather than serve. That continues to be the goal of the liberal left.
The door was opened for this drift from Constitutional law when the public school system cast aside the basics of reading, writing, arithmetic, and history as a foundation for graduates who were productive law-abiding citizens (behavior), and turned to a social agenda where job skills and critical thinking were replaced with indoctrination into proper and acceptable modes of thinking as defined by superior and knowing others. Freedom of speech has been replaced by freedom of hearing. Find that in your copy of the Constitution or any other document of our Founding Fathers.
Today, the new-old philosophy in this increasingly controlled environment is Critical Race Theory (CRT). The first tenant of Critical Race Theory is “to understand how a regime of white supremacy and its subordination of people of color have been created and maintained in America, and, in particular, to examine the relationship between that social structure and professed ideals such as ‘the rule of law’ and ‘equal protection.’” The second is “a desire not merely to understand the vexed bond between law and racial power but to change it.” (Crenshaw et al., 1995). CRT categorically holds that all “white” people are inherently supremacists who actively subordinate people of color. That this position is not supported by legitimate research is unimportant. To remind that all Whites are no more racists than are all Blacks, or all Hispanics is immaterial to those who seek the power of yet another divisive program. CRT is simply one more weapon in the arsenal of those who would divide and destroy for profit rather than unite and heal. Divisiveness breeds hate and discontent that undermines any holistic movement to continue the search for a “more perfect Union.” We will never have a perfect Union, but the movement towards that goal cannot produce unification in an atmosphere that breeds hate because of any skin color. The amount of melanin in one’s skin does not determine the love or hate in one’s heart.
Philosopher and theologian G. K. Chesterton suggested some time ago that “It is time we give up looking for questions and begin looking for answers” (G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy, 1908). His thesis is that divisiveness is no solution. “Where,” he asked, “are the builders and overcomers” who build consensus, overcome differences and hardships, and produce viable results for the whole of society. He would not approve of the current culture of victimization that seeks retribution as a measure of success. Examples abound. Harriet Tubman escaped the horrors of slavery herself and became a conduit for others to escape to freedom. George Washington Carver was a former slave who became an agricultural scientist and educator who developed crop rotation that helped restore the depleted cotton fields of the south and who also developed hundreds of products for the staple crops of peanuts, sweet potatoes, and soybeans. Martin Luther King, Jr., was a Baptist minister who helped bring improvements in civil rights behavior between 1955 and 1968, leading by personal example. Barak Hussein Obama rose to the Presidency of the United States, implementing many progressive innovations in American politics. The issue is not whether one agrees with these Americans or not, but that each (and many more), like their White, Hispanic, and Oriental counterparts, worked to overcome whatever challenges intervened to achieve their goals. This is the American way. Big business owners who prosper from their innovations and products are vilified today as many who have limited experience in the job place fail to understand that the wealth of America comes from the workers that they employee, whose tax dollars fund the programs that they demand. These, Black and White, Oriental and Hispanic, and many others would not be victims who blamed others for the challenges they faced, but are the victorious whose success has nothing with how much melanin their skin contains, but how much heart and determination they have to accomplish their dreams.
The socialist mentality today would regulate and tax these producers out of existence, not comprehending that government does not produce wealth, only deplete it, and that welfare may produce favorable votes, but only while the funds of the producers last. Those who want unlimited personal freedom and unearned benefits at the expense of those who produce do not be able to understand that their demands are intransitive—they have no object, no end, just open-ended demands that cannot be satisfied. Returning to the subject, Critical Race Theory seems determined to replace the perception of some Black citizens that they are slaves by somehow making White citizens the new slaves as punishment for the sins of people they never knew some 1500 years ago. The question begs, “Then what?”
America is an ongoing experiment. Even in its many imperfections (due the imperfections of each citizen), it has no peers in world governments. Those held up by socialists fail upon close examination when freedom and opportunity are the criteria. But American requires responsible behavior that is the result of a moral citizenry. Allowing those whom we elected to serve us to dominate us cannot be tolerated if we are free to intentionally and actively pursue lawful goals. The ballot box must be used to select those who would serve and eject those who would dominate. The sanctity of the voting process from beginning to end must be protected zealously. Any attempts to change the process should be met with two questions: (1) Why change; and, (2) Who benefits? I have no intention to change your political viewpoint, only to encourage you to responsible action in the operation of your government.