The California Teachers Association (CTA) has accepted its position on racial justice based on a guidebook provided by the National Education Association and one advocacy group finds its contents shocking.
“Public school teachers in California are almost universally represented by the CTA and any disputes about critical race theory (CRT) in California public schools that involve the CTA in any way can be connected to NEA’s position on racial justice as outlined in this guide,” said Maxford Nelsen who is the director of labor policy for the Freedom Foundation, a conservative think thank.
CTA links to the 80-page Racial Justice in Education PDF on its website and its target audience is teachers.
CRT educational proposals include teaching students that the history of America began with the enslavement of African Americans in 1619, not 1776.
“There's no publication date on the PDF that indicates when this was written or published but as somebody who follows the news day-to-day, I thought this could have been released yesterday,” Nelsen told the Southern California Record. “It seems very much in line with the discussions and debates about critical race theory that we've been having nationwide here for the last year and a half. So, this is either really prophetic, or the union is far more engaged in advocating for these far-left causes than it wants to admit.”
The ideology outlined in the guidebook that is concerning to the Freedom Foundation includes the following statements.
Structural racism is everywhere “What the NEA and the Left have done generally is redefine racism from individual prejudice to any outcome or any policy that they believe creates disparities among racial groups,” Nelsen said. “So, racism is no longer a problem with the human heart that relies on individual motivations. Now, racism could be any disparity of any kind between racial groups as evidence of structural systemic racism.”
Being colorblind is racist “Their goal is to reframe the issue away from individual prejudice to a systemic problem that requires a systemic solution, which just happens to look like old-school socialism at the end of the day,” Nelsen said. "Concepts of Western civilization are now being cast by many as faulty, racist, and necessarily a product of whiteness."
Whites are privileged because of their race “Under the Marxist framework, there has to be someone at the top that is oppressing the masses and the rebellion needs to take place against this enemy and so what the Left and the NEA has done is replace the bourgeoisie of classical Marxism with whiteness or whites generally,” Nelsen said. “So, white is the oppressor class now under this neo-Marxist framework.”
Failure to take antiracist actions is racist "One of the hallmarks of a truly free society is the ability to refrain from something," Nelsen said. "Yes, you should have the right to engage in action or advocacy if you want to but equally as important is the right to refrain from taking action you may disagree with, or may not have worked through and there's just no room for that."