by Leah Flowers
15 September 2024
In Tracy Letts’s The Minutes, Mr. Carp discovers an egregious truth about the town of Big Cherry. He learns that the folktale about Sgt. Otto Pym rescuing a White child from kidnapping by the Native Americans of the time was a complete fabrication. That, in fact, the White men slaughtered 122 defenseless Native Americans, including women and children. Then, to add insult to injury, they named their town after a racial slur. Later, Mayor Superba introduces a resolution that will establish the lie about “Pym’s triumph over the Sioux” as the official town history and that their public schools are not allowed to teach any other version of history.
There is a dark turn in this otherwise comedic play that feels like suddenly being dropped into an episode of The Twilight Zone. Indeed, who would not be upset at the idea that their government wanted to perpetuate a lie and cover over the truth? Sadly, that is a question that the U.S. is currently grappling with. In the last few years, conversation among the general public about Critical Race Theory has been hotly debated.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has on his website the following take on Critical Race Theory: “In Florida, we are taking a stand against the state-sanctioned racism that is critical race theory. […] We won’t allow Florida tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country or to hate each other. We also have a responsibility to ensure that parents have the means to vindicate their rights when it comes to enforcing state standards. Finally, we must protect Florida workers against the hostile work environment that is created when large corporations force their employees to endure CRT-inspired ‘training’ and indoctrination.”
Someone in my family expressed their upset to me about CRT being taught in K-12 schools. When asked why that was a problem they said because it’s a college course and is therefore not appropriate for young children. When I asked what they believed CRT was specifically, they said, “Teaching little White kids to hate themselves.” I can see why they’d think that, given how the conservative media is portraying it. As the quote from Governor DeSantis says above, the conservative perspective in general is that CRT is itself a form of racism. He says that it teaches “kids to hate our country.” So let’s talk about those ideas – does it teach children to hate themselves and to hate their country? Is CRT something that should be taught?
First, let’s get a clear picture of what Critical Race Theory actually is. A lot of people in the U.S. were taught growing up that they should be “color blind.” The thing is, you don’t solve a problem by not acknowledging it, by not talking about it. All that does is keep people from the truth. White and White-passing people do not experience the various kinds of racism that people of color do. To a lot of White people, racism looks like burning down a synagogue, lynching someone, and screaming racial slurs at people. This is far from the whole picture, but one would never know that unless they learn about it somehow – either in school or by listening to those affected. The truth is there is racism built into the structures of U.S. society. As examples, let’s look at how it is present in just three areas: healthcare, schools, and housing opportunities.
According to the CDC, Black women were 2.6 times more likely than white women to die after giving birth (Hoyert). That’s the case because their pain and their dangerous physical symptoms are ignored, like in the case of Dr. Susan Moore, a Black physician, who was sent home with COVID-19 and died after the doctor treating her dismissed her shortness of breath (Andone). The physical symptoms of Colored People are ignored because of the false beliefs in biological differences such as pain perception (Hoffman et al.). In other words, when Black people say they are in pain, doctors do not believe them. And the dismissal of pain can lead to fatal outcomes.
According to the US Department of Education, Black children make up 18% of preschoolers and account for 48% of preschool suspensions (Baines Johnson). I want to highlight that they said, preschoolers. A real-world example of this is the 2020 incident where a 5-year-old Maryland boy was arrested and put in handcuffs because his teacher said he had a tantrum (Hellegren). Every encounter with extreme disciplinary action, especially for small offenses, leads to more and more discipline as the child comes to be thought of as a “problem.” This creates what is known as the “school-to-prison pipeline” (Sevon). Some people argue, ‘They must have done something to deserve it,’ but the truth is Colored People are more harshly policed than White people. It’s not that they did something to deserve it, it is literally the color of their skin.
Now, let’s look at housing. In 1944, after defeating the Axis Powers, WWII veterans were returning home to the promise of the G.I. Bill, which guaranteed free college and easy access to home loans as a “thank you” for serving their country (Lawrence). However, Black people were denied these benefits. As one WWII veteran’s widow said, “They didn’t actually say that they wouldn’t give me a loan, but they kept dragging it out. You know, there was always some excuse as to why it didn’t go through” (Lawrence). This is called redlining – denying access to services, like, say, credit for a mortgage, to people based on their race or ethnicity (Egede).
This is structural racism, and CRT is merely “an academic and legal framework that denotes that systemic racism is part of American society” (“Critical Race Theory”). That’s it. That is what Critical Race Theory education is trying to teach people. So it should be apparent now that in recent years, there have been government officials trying to distort what CRT actually is and, therefore, garner support for its eradication. Efforts are already underway to move away with CRT. In April 2023, The Conversation journal reported all but one state in the US saw efforts to ban CRT, and 30% of those were authorized to withhold funding for schools that did not comply (Adetunji). Not surprisingly, the ban is not just for children but for adults as well. In July 2023, Great Blue Hill reported: “40 bills have been introduced across the [U.S.] restricting colleges from having offices and staff devoted to diversity, equity, and inclusion. Of those, seven have become law in North Dakota, Tennessee, Florida, and Texas” (Sullivan).
Worse still, not only do certain government officials not want any education on structural racism, but they also want to introduce the idea that slavery wasn’t so bad. The Florida Department of Education released their Academic Standards, which, in one of the course descriptions, says, “Instruction includes how slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit” (“Florida’s State Academic”). They are asserting that slavery benefited enslaved people because it ‘taught them skills.’ This is the slow progression of rewriting history. There are government officials in the U.S. who are brick-by-brick building the idea that:
‘You don’t need to know what happened because it wasn’t even that bad. There are no people who are oppressed, and if someone is struggling to live, it’s because they deserve it. They just shouldn’t act out. Society has nothing to do with where they are.’
This is an outright lie. DeSantis and his ilk want everyone to think that learning about racism is the true cause of division and that anything that makes White people aware of their privilege is oppression. However, as author Reggie Jackson says, “Truth-telling is not the cause of the divisions in the country. A refusal to accept the truth is the cause.”
In the end, if learning these ugly truths about your country makes you hate your country, perhaps it is warranted. If learning the truth about how Colored people and minorities are treated makes you feel uncomfortable, maybe you should feel uncomfortable. Being uncomfortable is a good thing when you see someone being harmed. It means you have goodness in you that you don’t want to see another harmed.
The Minutes ends with Peel returning to the city council members. They hand him the bowl of blood, and there is a pause before he touches it. The moment stretches out while he weighs his choice – is he willing to knock the bowl away and stand up for Makawee and all the people who were brutalized and continue to be stepped on for White comfort, or will he close his eyes and submerge his hands? Letts invites us all to stand at the precipice and think about whether or not we are willing to open our eyes and be uncomfortable. Peel needs to decide what kind of town he wants to live in, and in a democracy, it is each and every person’s job to ask themselves that. So will you choose to feel the discomfort and let it guide you to making a better country than the one you don’t like looking at? What will you do?
Sources:
Adetunji, Jo. “Efforts to ban critical race theory have been put forth in all but one state – and many threaten schools with a loss of funds.” The Conversation, The Conversation Trust (UK) Ltd, 7 April 2023, https://theconversation.com/efforts-to-ban-critical-race-theory-have-been-put-forth-in-all-but-one-state-and-many-threaten-schools-with-a-loss-of-funds-200816.
Andone, Dakin. “A Black doctor died of Covid-19 weeks after accusing hospital staff of racist treatment.” CNN US, A Warner Bros. Discovery Company, 25 December 2020, https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/24/us/black-doctor-susan-moore-covid-19/index.html.
Baines Johnson, Lyndon. “Civil Rights Data Collection. Data Snapshot: School Discipline.” Office of Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Education, the Government of the United States of America, March 2014, https://civilrightsdata.ed.gov/assets/downloads/2011-12_CRDC-School-Discipline-Snapshot.pdf.
“Critical Race Theory.” Legal Defense Fun, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., https://www.naacpldf.org/critical-race-theory-faq/. -p[0;’=]
DeSantis, Ron. “Governor DeSantis Announces Legislative Proposal to Stop W.O.K.E. Activism and Critical Race Theory in Schools and Corporations.” Executive Office of Governor, the Government of the State of Florida, 15 December 2021, https://www.flgov.com/2021/12/15/governor-desantis-announces-legislative-proposal-to-stop-w-o-k-e-activism-and-critical-race-theory-in-schools-and-corporations/.
Egede, Leonard E. et al. “Modern Day Consequences of Historic Redlining: Finding a Path Forward.” Journal of General Internal Medicine, vol. 38 no. 6, 6 February 2023, National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology Information, the Government of the United States of America, doi: 10.1007/s11606-023-08051-4, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9901820/.
“Florida’s State Academic Standards – Social Studies, 2023.” Florida Department of Education, 2023, https://www.fldoe.org/core/fileparse.php/20653/urlt/6-4.pdf.
Hellegren, Mike. “Handcuffs in Hallways: Mother of handcuffed 5-year-old speaks as WJZ looks at child arrests in Maryland schools. CBS News, CBS Broadcasting Inc., 16 November 2022, https://www.cbsnews.com/baltimore/news/handcuffs-in-hallways-mother-of-handcuffed-5-year-old-speaks-as-wjz-looks-at-child-arrests-in-maryland-schools-elementary-schools/.
Hoffman, Kelly M. et al. “Racial bias in pain assessment and treatment recommendations, and false beliefs about biological differences between blacks and whites.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, vol. 113 no.16, 4 April 2016, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1516047113.
Hoyert, Donna L. “Maternal Mortality Rates in the United States, 2021.” National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control, US Department of Health & Human Services, The Government of the United States of America, 2023, https://dx.doi.org/10.15620/cdc:124678.
Lawrence, Quil. “Black vets were excluded from GI bill benefits – a bill in congress aims to fix that.” NPR, 18 October 2022, https://www.npr.org/2022/10/18/1129735948/black-vets-were-excluded-from-gi-bill-benefits-a-bill-in-congress-aims-to-fix-th.
Letts, Tracy. (2023). The Minutes. Acting Edition. Samuel French.
Sevon, Mawule A. “Schooling While Black: Analyzing the Racial School Discipline Crisis for Behavior Analyst.” Behavior Analysis in Practice, vol. 15, 11 April 2022, National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology Information, the Government of the United States of America, doi: 10.1007/s40617-022-00695-8, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9744995/.
Sullivan, Shealgh. “ Laws banning ‘critical race theory’ in schools will persist. One of its originators says it’s time to address the deeper issue.” WGBH, Great Blue Hill Educational Foundation, 31 July 2023, https://www.wgbh.org/news/local/2023-07-31/laws-banning-critical-race-theory-in-schools-will-persist-one-of-its-originators-says-its-time-to-address-the-deeper-issue.