Since I’ve done several pieces on terms that get misused or should be avoided, I’d like to look at one of the most controversial of all: “Critical Race Theory” or CRT. Its meaning in political activism is different from what it means in academic circles, and I’m not convinced either one is very self-consistent. I did a Web search for a piece that discussed the theory without the popular controversies, but search engines don’t make them easy to find. Many of the articles I found didn’t look trustworthy. I wrote a whole post on an article that I didn’t find very satisfactory and scheduled it for posting; then I found an entry in dictionary.com which is far better. So I’m dumping most of what I wrote before and starting over.

The article notes: “Critical Race Theory is a complex body of thought that encompasses multiple disciplines, and its concepts and conclusions are interpreted in different ways. Even the words in its name are subject to debate as to what they mean or imply in the term itself or in general.” That says you won’t find one characterization everyone agrees on, even outside the fierce political controversies.

Three confusing words

Let’s start with the word “critical.” The article says, “The most general sense of the word critical means ‘containing careful or analytical evaluations,’ and, like in many other academic contexts, this is how the word is often intended in Critical Race Theory.” Any good academic theory should be critical in this sense, so it doesn’t tell us much.

However, the term is most often used by Marxists to analyze phenomena in terms of alleged social and class dynamics. Critical theories may blur the line between theory and activism. This sense is often present in CRT. It’s a reason that the response is often critical, in a different sense of the word. Marxism is largely about denying that individuals have agency and treating them as members of groups. This is also what racism does. Some forms of critical race theory look a lot like racism.

What about “race”? The article says that “those who apply Critical Race Theory largely view race as a socially constructed system of categorization that divides society and oppresses people of color.” They’re right on one important point; the division of humanity into races has no scientific basis. The idea that humans fall into biological subcategories or races was a product of the overenthusiastic interpretation of biological classification. This is the best point that CRT makes, though it’s not unique to the theory.

Then we come to the third word, “theory.” An academic theory, says the article, is “a systematically organized body of knowledge applicable in a relatively wide variety of circumstances, especially a system of assumptions, accepted principles, and rules of procedure devised to analyze, predict, or otherwise explain the nature or behavior of a specified set of phenomena.” A theory doesn’t mandate any actions, though it can provide support for or cast doubt on a policy or action. But Critical Race Theory isn’t always just theory. Once again, Marxist influence sometimes leads to blurring the line between analysis and activism.

What is “systemic racism”?

A central idea of CRT is that “systemic racism” has large and persistent effects. The term conveys an important truth but is confusing. Racism is an idea, and the term should refer to situations where people consciously or unconsciously hold unsound racial ideas, not to unintended consequences or the lingering effects of past policies. Don’t get me wrong; policies which inflict unjustly disproportionate harm on any group need to be fixed. But ideas exist in individual minds. The idea of “systemic racism” often carries the idea that ideas exist in hive minds and people are “racist” by the fact of their group membership. If this sounds a lot like attributing characteristics to people because of their skin color, it is.

In political arguments, CRT is often associated with claims that some racial groups bear racial guilt. It’s a vile notion that everyone should repudiate. We encounter it in the racist insult “whiteness.” Some legislation has attempted to ban the teaching of race shaming. It’s a laudable goal, but some of the laws have been badly written, preventing teachers from even discussing the claims. Teachers shouldn’t be allowed to say, “You’re a bad person because of your skin color,” but they should be able to say, “Some people claim that people of certain skin colors are bad.” You can’t fight bad ideas by prohibiting their discussion.

When talking about political issues, CRT tends to be a confusing or misleading term. Not all ideas grouped under CRT are Marxist, and the recognition that “race” is an unscientific notion is valuable. As I’ve said many times, it’s better to get specific. If you want to talk about race guilt, say “race guilt,” not “Critical Race Theory.” If you want to talk about the lasting racial effects of policies, “systemic racism” sounds like a sweeping accusation and may not be the clearest term.

Goodbye to my earlier version of the post. It was fun, but this one is better.