In this essay I’m trying to show how everyday politics, education, and media: both liberal and conservative, will not allow for a discussion of alternative realities to capitalism. I want to show that Critical Race Theory (CRT) can be a unifying critique of how capitalism misconstrues reality. Through the constructs of CRT we can see that, instead of competition, empathy should be our path to a more democratic and peaceful world.
According to liberal capitalists, which are all of the mainstream media, our politics and even our education system, the only legitimate economics is capitalism. We have to figure out our problems inside that particular reality of capitalism. But that’s the problem: Human beings created capitalism; they can create a better system in its place. Many of us think capitalism is the problem. There are millions of us who believe that a worker-driven economy will be better able to solve the crises that affect us today. We can obviously do better than the present reality that says a small group of capitalists knows best. The discussion of socialism, as an alternative reality to capitalism, isn’t even on the table. This leads Americans to a shallow and easily manipulated state of being. And this leads to the idea that love and empathy are childish when applied to creating a better society.
I have to admit to being a white guy who benefited by my ancestors doing genocide on the original people simply because we needed more opportunities to build riches. As a cis gendered white man (he, him) I am not ashamed or guilty. I just have to admit that I have benefitted from my forebears barbarity. While my personal ancestors probably didn’t own slaves, I am a beneficiary of white supremacist ideology. I am not guilty. I am not the culprit. But I am the beneficiary of white male supremacist ideology. I am the beneficiary of 400 years of capitalist acquisition and chauvinism. I am the beneficiary of the genocide perpetrated on the native people in the name of greed and power that is capitalism. I am the beneficiary of the capitalist racism perpetrated on the African people who built this nation. But I am not guilty. I am not the culprit. And this is the reason we need to teach CRT based history in our high schools.
CRT teaches us that individuals are not the problem. It’s the systems that were put in place to make sure that white Christian men could advance at the detriment of black and brown people. CRT is necessary to bring us together as a nation and a world. Racism, militarism, and capitalism need to be examined critically to understand the nature of our radicalized, racist world. CRT is about empathy: empathy for those who have had to endure, rather than thrive because of systems that were put in place by our forbears to stifle the equality of conditions necessary for growth. These systems of racism, militarism, and capitalism have dulled our natural human impulse for empathy and have instilled defensiveness and hostility in its place.
As a very recent example of systematic military racism, Kelly Cobiella, NBC news correspondent, said about Ukrainians fleeing from the Russian invasion, “To put it bluntly, these are not refugees from Syria these are refugees from Ukraine … They’re Christians, they’re white … they have cars. They’re just like us …” But, in this particular instance, it’s not about Kelly Cobiella’s racism; it’s about the editors who let this pass. The system just told us that “we” are not black or brown: “we” are not Jews, Muslims, or atheists: “we” are white Christians. This is the system that’s in place. I would bet that Kelly Cobiella works with black and brown and non-Christian people a lot, but in a moment of subconscious revelation, her chauvinism slipped out.
But the point is that we need a real history of the United States. That has to include the colonialist racism of our foreign policy. It started in 1619 and continues to this day. It’s part of the broad spectrum of racist interventions especially in the affairs of our neighbors to the south. As an example, our “liberal” legislatures and president decided that Venezuela picked the wrong president and so is trying its darndest to invent a new one. We, the white U.S., have done this all across the Latin south for our entire history as a country. It’s systemic. A history guided by CRT can dispose of the idea of this or that individual being a hero or villain. Instead, we can see the progression toward or away from real democracy and empathy.
CRT and its pedagogy of teaching history without the narrowing of vision to heroic men and events, allows us a fuller appreciation of the progress we’ve made (or haven’t made) toward a better world. The problem is that our leaders, the capitalists in charge of our country, don’t want a full discussion of our history. If we, the workers, realize that it is our forbears, the unionists, the socialists and communists, the migrant workers, the black farmers’ groups, the upstart women, and all the other agitators, we would still be a slave-owning quasi-fascist country. Schools need to teach that unions brought us the five-day, 40-hour work week. The ruling capitalists worked and continue to work hard to undermine all labor gains that we’ve made. CRT-related history allows us to see that the gains we’ve made with respect to racism, sexism, and gender freedom have come in spite of, not because of, our rulers, the capitalists.
Robin Lehman
Warren
