The Racialization of Just about Everything

For the moment, at least, it’s all about race. Thanks to the American intelligentsia, every question and every issue will be reduced to race. America is becoming completely racialized. And that means, David Marcus explains in The Federalist, that, in the name of anti-racism, America is becoming more and more racist. (via Maggie’s Farm.)

First, a word from Roger Kimball, from the Epoch Times-- paywalled. Kimball is writing about the Dalton School. You recall from two posts on this blog, that the Dalton faculty has proposed a series of reforms, designed to destroy the educational potential of its student body. The goal will be to indoctrinate these children in the basic tenets of critical race theory, to make them, if they are white, guilt ridden slugs-- ready for the Ivy League.

Kimball explains:

Consider, for example, its [Dalton’s] much ballyhooed “Commitment to Anti-Racism.” (Surgeon General’s Warning: have some Dramamine or an air-sickness bag handy.)

This desideratum is plastered all over Dalton’s web site.

But a closer look shows that it is really just code for the more insidious racism of the woke and malignant charlatans who view every aspect of life through the distorting prism of race.

They believe they declare their election by broadcasting their obsession with race.

One suspects that the goal is to elevate the performance of minority students by undermining the performance of white and Asian students. Rather than think that they were admitted to Dalton in order to fulfill a diversity quota, minority students will now become leaders in a moral crusade against racism.

It’s time for Dalton parents to withdraw their children from the indoctrination mill.

For his part, Marcus has pointed out other instances where anti-racist racism has prevailed. For instance, an ethics professor believes that the coronavirus vaccine should be given to minorities before it is given to the vulnerable elderly population.

He writes:

Dr. Harald Schmidt, a supposed expert on ethics and health policy at the University of Pennsylvania, told the New York Times that essential workers, not the elderly, should be the first to receive COVID-19 vaccines. 

His reason? “Older populations are whiter,” he told the publication. 

“Society is structured in a way that enables them to live longer. Instead of giving additional health benefits to those who already had more of them, we can start to level the playing field a bit.”

To be clear, the term “level the playing field” here means allowing people to die because of the color of their skin.

Discriminating against people on the grounds of race. Letting them die because of the color of their skin. Racism uber alles.

As it happens, Marcus astutely notes, the war against racism, led by the Black Lives Matter protesters, with an assist from Antifa, has disproportionately hurt minority businesses and minority neighborhoods.

Nothing, it seems, is more important than protecting the lives of the oldest among us, except for fighting racism. The great irony of course is that the lockdowns themselves have disproportionately destroyed minority-owned businesses. Yet, for the Marxists on the radical left, this doesn’t matter. They don’t fight racism by giving people tools to lift themselves up, they purport to do it by making people dependent on the state.

And then there is the effort, also reported here, to destroy the public education system in New York City. Top public schools, especially middle schools, will no longer accept children on the grounds of merit. It will allow race to factor into the equation, even to become a decisive factor. This will desegregate the schools, diminish academic performance and cause many families to leave the city.

Next, in outrageous racism infecting our educational system, this week, New York City mayor Bill de Blasio announced sweeping changes to the way in the city’s top public schools consider applicants in an attempt to diversify, or as some unhinged proponents of his plan put it, “desegregate” these schools. Essentially, admissions will focus less on grades and more on skin color.

The dirty little secret of his proposal is that it is Asian students, not white students, who dominate admissions to these schools and who will bear the brunt of de Blasio’s abject racism.

Of course, this is wrong. Marcus explains why:

It simply accepts that there is nothing we can do to help black and brown students achieve except put our thumb on the scale. De Blasio and his racist allies like School Chancellor Richard Carranza would argue that systems of white supremacy are responsible for the achievement gaps, but if so, how do they explain the success of Asian students, and why are they being punished?

As for the rising crime rate in America’s cities, caused in large part by the arrival of pro-crime prosecutors and pro-crime mayors. Again, who is getting hurt in this madness? Members of minority communities. How are we supposed to deal with the issue? Simply, by pretending that it is not happening. If we do not talk about it, it is not happening. Right?

What’s the real problem with crime? Is it that murders are skyrocketing across America, with the victims disproportionately black and brown? No, discussing that makes white progressives uncomfortable. Indeed, they would much rather indulge absurd fantasies about “defund the police” initiatives lowering crime than actually try to save lives in minority communities. And now, they don’t even think the media should report on those deaths.

It’s the new cultural agenda. We must see everything through the prism of race and we must pretend that achievement differentials do not exist.