UK academic sues university after losing role in critical race theory row

There are very real issues in schools and elsewhere about black hair, such as at Pimlico where there was an uprising against the new rules.
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Fact remains that in a market economy, a fractional minority is not going to get equal provision of specialist products compared to the eaiser to serve majority. Quite what manner of modified Marxism 'to each according to their needs' you have in mind to remedy this is anyone's guess.

When your list of oppression's manifestations in your case extends to a less extensive range of suitable hair-care products, the phrase 'First World Problem' comes to mind.

This is arguably an advantage, as research suggests that people are more likely to make a purchase with less choice!

https://medium.com/@FlorentGeerts/the-jam-experiment-how-choice-overloads-makes-consumers-buy-less-d610f8c37b9b

There are definitely issues around ethnicity and hair though, I was going to say particularly for women and girls, but boys have problems too in terms of length of cut.

I heard a good radio 4 programme a while back which said there was a battle between the "woke" left (cancel culture) and liberal left - of the 2 I favour the liberal left and am against censorship (even of people peddling lies within reason as I was that freedom for people to advocate for CRT and everything on left and right).

What happens to CRT when boredom sets in? Liberal democracy has been developing since the 18th century. The shifts have been gradual with the occasional bump to move things forward (women's suffrage). CRT appears to take a leap because it is trying to eliminate that curiosity which causes us to investigate and which has given us progress. CRT by arguing for the elimination of facts and science would mean, in a world where competition and dominance is the difference between your population succeeding or starving (this will be a much bigger argument with climate changes) could put the population at risk. It is the duty of governments to protect citizens, where does this lead? Does it mean the US steps back and becomes actively instrumental in its own demise and would its citizens accept that as a consequence. Is this an hypocrisy - doing battle with China for first among equals whilst at the same time destroying the very things that China and others value most and will take with open arms - science, fact.

On an aside - are our Academics looking for an easy way out of educating. Far better to story tell and ignore truth than to ask for research to back up assertions. The twilight zone is upon us TWAW

When your list of oppression's manifestations in your case extends to a less extensive range of suitable hair-care products, the phrase 'First World Problem' comes to mind.

And as a left-handed person in a right-handed world, I can only say, Tell me about it.

(Did you even know that scissors are right-handed? Dexterist!)

When it's presented in plain terms rather than impenetrable pseudo-academic speak that is supposed to encourage people to nod along while not understanding what they're agreeing to, CRT looks horrible. It looks backward-looking and, in a surprising number of ways, racist.

True and in fact even up by Hadrian's Wall in NE England where I am from (which is 98% white) there is some evidence in some people of the Africans who worked with the Romans on that wall.

I am still not sure I know what CRT is but I am just an occasional interloper in these discussions, not a serious student of this stuff.
Wiki says" Academic critics of CRT argue that it relies on social constructionism, elevates storytelling over evidence and reason, rejects the concepts of truth and merit, and opposes liberalism"

Okay this bit puts me off it on lots of levels:-

"Common themes that are characteristic of critical race theory, as documented by scholars such as Richard Delgado and Jean Stefancic, include:

Critique of liberalism: Critical race theory scholars question foundational liberal concepts such as Enlightenment rationalism, legal equality, and Constitutional neutrality, and challenge the incrementalist approach of traditional civil-rights discourse.[25] They favor a race-conscious approach to social transformation, critiquing liberal ideas such as affirmative action, color blindness, role modeling, or the merit principle[41] with an approach that relies more on political organizing, in contrast to liberalism's reliance on rights-based remedies.
Storytelling, counter-storytelling, and "naming one's own reality": The use of narrative (storytelling) to illuminate and explore lived experiences of racial oppression.[42] Bryan Brayboy has emphasized the epistemic importance of storytelling in Indigenous-American communities as superseding that of theory, and has proposed a Tribal Critical Race Theory (TribCrit).[43]
Revisionist interpretations of American civil rights law and progress: Criticism of civil-rights scholarship and anti-discrimination law, such as Brown v. Board of Education. Derrick Bell, one of CRT's founders, argues that civil-rights advances for black people coincided with the self-interest of white elitists. Likewise, Mary L. Dudziak performed extensive archival research in the U.S. Department of State and Department of Justice and concluded that U.S. government support for civil-rights legislation "was motivated in part by the concern that racial discrimination harmed the United States' foreign relations".[44]
Intersectional theory: The examination of race, sex, class, national origin, and sexual orientation, and how their combination (i.e., their intersections) plays out in various settings, e.g., how the needs of a Latina female are different from those of a black male and whose needs are the ones promoted.[45]
Standpoint epistemology: The view that a member of a minority has an authority and ability to speak about racism that members of other racial groups do not have, and that this can expose the racial neutrality of law as false.[1]
Essentialism vs. anti-essentialism: Delgado and Stefancic write, "Scholars who write about these issues are concerned with the appropriate unit for analysis: Is the black community one, or many, communities? Do middle- and working-class African-Americans have different interests and needs? Do all oppressed peoples have something in common?" This is a look at the ways that oppressed groups may share in their oppression but also have different needs and values that need to be looked at differently. It is a question of how groups can be essentialized or are unable to be essentialized.[46]
Structural determinism: Exploration of how "the structure of legal thought or culture influences its content", whereby a particular mode of thought or widely shared practice determines significant social outcomes, usually occurring without conscious knowledge. As such, theorists posit that our system cannot redress certain kinds of wrongs.[47]
Empathetic fallacy: Believing that one can change a narrative by offering an alternative narrative in hopes that the listener's empathy will quickly and reliably take over. Empathy is not enough to change racism as most people are not exposed to many people different from themselves and people mostly seek out information about their own culture and group.[48]
Non-white cultural nationalism/separatism: The exploration of more radical views that argue for separation and reparations as a form of foreign aid (including black nationalism)"

If we are moving away from things like equal rights for all and facts and truth and equality then no way do I support CRT.

The Romans never left. Just the Roman Army. Those of us with ancestry in the Seven Saxon Kingdoms are all part Romano-British, and teh Romano bit could include Levantine, North African or still more exotic.

We also had roads and central heating imposed on us but, like the good celts and picts we were, we got rid of these cultural impositions when the Roman's left. Phew!

although of course that is a result of the Christianity imposed first on my own white ancestors probably to some extent against their will about 1500 years ago and then by white rulers in the Caribbean and Nigeria¡

Which in turn was imposed upon our white ancestors by people from the middle east - who at the same time went into africa, persia and india.

I think the question of inposing CRT on the UK or Europe can be overblown. It's true it makes even less sense. But it's not like it's being accepted across the board in the US either. And not across the board even by minorities. If you look at all these parents rebelling against school boards in the US they are not by any means all white, or even all middle class. It's very much a matter of university people trying to export this stuff an impose it on the population as a whole, and they've been somewhat successful with the middle class university educated cohort and businesses, but less so with others.

In a sense you could argue it is racist of the US to impose its cultural norm (black slavery and the results of that) on a very different country - UK.

However the more general issues of cultural relativism and whether some things are objectively always morally wrong even if they are fine in a different culture/country are broader than a specific US theory relating to race I suppose.

In the UK we often find black Christians from the Caribbean and Nigeria have a lot more in common with white Christians in the UK - more shared culture, than say Muslim and Hindu immigrants (although of course that is a result of the Christianity imposed first on my own white ancestors probably to some extent against their will about 1500 years ago and then by white rulers in the Caribbean and Nigeria.

Great thread - thanks to all of you.

I am interested in how CRT is highlighting a big cultural clash between the UK and the US. The US is expecting us to take CRT on board and many academics are doing just that, therefore when we don't, we are seen as bigots and racists. Our society has a great deal of variety and I'm sure statistically we have more of Asian heritage than African or afro/Caribbean. Asian ethnic groups made up the second largest percentage of the population (at 7.5%), followed by Black ethnic groups (at 3.3%), Mixed/Multiple ethnic groups (at 2.2%) and Other ethnic groups (at 1.0%) and yet the discussion is about the US because of slavery. The UK has had some slavery but our culture rests on serfdom which is different (slavery being ownership of the person) serfdom being tied to the land. These make for very different cultural norms.

I am surprised that we are importing a theory (academically) without question and what may start to solve an issue in the US (but I have doubts) is unlikely to solve an issue in the UK. I haven't seen anything yet, in CRT which can be wholly aligned with the UK.

I wonder if this is why there has been more awareness in the UK of the effects of e.g. TWAW because culturally, there isn't a good fit.

I think it will depend on the local convention. We have some local areas near me where people double park in the middle of the street and it is almost chaos and looks like I have seen in some countries abroad. Obviously I would rather that were not so but it is not a huge deal. Whereas my London borough has been awarded a special grant to help stop female genital mutilation (although I am not sure how much that is an issue here) so if that is happening here in my view that cultural norm is objectively wrong.

I have a personal beef against litter being dropped and have a bag in my car where I put it just on the few streets near me every day. I have not done a survey of which cultures drop more litter however. I also do not like noise at night but even that it is hard to be "fair" as older people around here are more likely to be white and young people of all cultures make more noise, although I do think we have some cultures around here where noise at night is more their norm. Even things like fireworks which in the UK used to be 5 November is now on many nights a year so I cannot get to sleep or I have to close my window and shove in sometimes painful ear plugs.

The issue for those of us who have not moved but the areas where we live have changed by those who moved here is we are not the other, different so our majority culture then has become the minority one and what effects that has. Obviously it does not bother me much or I would just do a "white flight" and move to somewhere which is not minority white etc. So I suppose given where I live the issues of how cultures live together in the UK peacefully (we all do by and large) is perhaps more of a day to day issue than for someone in rural Northumberland.

The issue of which cultural characteristics are objectively better or right is very interesting.

Reading with intrigue

I would say there are fairly straightforward, sensible, effective, and kind ways of deciding when and how to accommodate change or exceptions where indicated, such as when a person does not know the local convention (tell them) or is struggling to adapt (help them and be patient as much as you can.) But just deciding to change a whole nation's sense of something as intuitive as what counts as on time, or deciding that some students can pass courses without bothering to attend classes, is not sensible, effective, or even really kind. That's not saying that it's a better way to do things, it would be the same if the situation were reversed.

That's true - the "8 for 8.15" or "8 for 8.30" dinner invitation etc.

The interesting bit is to what extent we excuse people where our dominant culture eg in regards to work says one thing and theirs is different and when do we change the dominant culture and/or when should it make allowances for the non-dominant ones (eg the very old exception from motorcycle helmets for sikhs in the UK which seems to have worked out perfectly well and I can understand and other than perhaps meaning more work in A&E when they fall off the bikes does not really affect the dominant culture and makes a huge difference to the sikhs).

Whereas - even if your written English is awful and written English is a key part of the job we will change the application rules for you because of your culture and background - is that okay? Is it okay if that lower standard applies to everyone even white British who could not be bothered to learn spelling and grammar in school or had a very difficult home life?

Even all UK culture is not actually "on time means being there at the time I say". Yes, for work and classes, children's events, concerts usually.

But if you are invited to a party, when you really ought to arrive may very well be 10 minutes to half an hour or more later, and if you arrive on time you will be too early and some might think you are rude. And the rules on this can be very finely divided in terms of things like region or social class.

So there can be a need to accommodate in some way when you have people who are somehow displaced from their normal group.

What I think is interesting though is that there are always rules - it's not just about individuals doing what they want. The rule may say, come an hour later, or anytime within three days of the time appointed, but it isn't up to an individual to decide that.

I mean, sure, the US could have developed a culture with African approaches to time perception. But they didn't. It's not a more or less moral approach, it's just the outcome of the historical process that actually occurred. Like a thousand other things in every place people live around the world.

And even in places like Africa of South America where there are real differences in custom, schoolchildren show up for class in the morning, and society in general operates within certain expectations for different kinds of activities. University lecturers do actual lecture, students need to be there to hear them, nurses show up for their shifts, etc.

The claims that there is some kind of unfairness in the US with regards to expectations for being on time always seems to be in terms of places like Evergreen College, where it's about allowing some people to avoid their work without taking a hit to their grades or wages.

Good points including on our example of being on time. My culture (and money or lack of money) depends on people being on time. If I were bored and trying to fill the day in and loving sitting around waiting for people to turn up whilst having a chat that would be fine but I am not. If people do not turn up for an interview or conference call or work thing then they will be cut dead in terms of my money and time and future business. I think it would be a bit unfair to accuse people of racism for that however and hopefully no one is doing so. If a client is prepared to pay me for every minute they are late for a call then I am happy to be paid whilst tapping the desk impatiently having planned my whole day around something happening at exactly that time. Swiss, Japanese, Germans, Britons and plenty of others do things on time. In fact in Lagos twice on business everything was on time. It was only in Iran that that was not so for me in my own limited personal experience.

In the UK I hope it is okay to say to work with me you must be on time, not 5 minutes late, not 10 minutes late but on time or a bit early. If not you are out on your ear. If it is your culture to be late then go and work for a business which is of that culture and does not mind people being late.

Now we have to live with people of all kinds of cultures in the UK and sometimes that causes a clash in all kinds of areas. Eg my own bug bear is noise at night In some Swiss apartment blocks you cannot even flush the loo after 10pm to be considerate to others and I like that.

NonnyMouse1337

Well said

[quote Jorriss]Good post Nonnymouse. Helen Pluckrose has also set up a discord group to help people push push back on this issue, amongst others, in the workplace.

counterweightsupport.com/[/quote]
Yes! Thanks Jorriss. The Counterweight group is especially useful because it provides pragmatic help and support in pushing back on CRT-based policies being implemented in the workplace etc.

Good post Nonnymouse. Helen Pluckrose has also set up a discord group to help people push push back on this issue, amongst others, in the workplace.

counterweightsupport.com/

Sorry I am extremely late to this thread. Been meaning to post but kept getting distracted with other topics.

It is shocking how some people think it is acceptable to use racial and derogatory slurs at those who do not agree with their ideological viewpoint. They are incapable of arguing their actual position, so resort to juvenile taunts and smears.
The notion that black people have no agency and they all think the same or agree with the same views is such a racist one. It's shameful that these kinds of attitudes are gaining in popularity among so called 'liberal' circles. Nothing good can come from it in the long-term.

Anyway, what reminded me to post on this thread was this fantastic essay / article that captures the difference between the traditional liberal worldview and the CRT worldview. I do think they are fundamentally incompatible and irreconcilable. Although I support people's right to believe in CRT and preach it, I don't think the ideology itself should be anywhere near the levers of power and law, even though that is its explicit aim. There are plenty of ideologies that are incompatible with modern, liberal Western democracies and I think CRT should be one of them.

But that's my personal view. This article is long but well worth the read though.

freeblackthought.substack.com/p/why-did-critical-race-theory-emerge

I haven't read the rest of this thread, but if anyone is interested in pushing back on the influence of CRT in the UK, there are some new organisations that are trying to do just that.

Don't Divide Us

The Equiano Project

I think it's important that more people from ethnic minority backgrounds speak up on these kinds of issues, as plurality of opinion is vital, especially if there are strong disagreements with ideological views and narratives. The impression that all 'people of colour' agree with the tenets and goals of CRT is a damaging one.