☆ Educ'l experts disagree about local high schools' diversity curriculum

Natalie Thoreson, M.Ed. (nonprofit rEVOLution, LLC's founder) regularly hosts DEI workshops for local adults who support youth, such as at Foothill High School with the SCC Dem Central Committee. Educational professionals Kevin McGary (Frederick Douglass Foundation of CA's president), Larry Sand (CA Teachers Empowerment Network's president), and Thoreson analyze oppression-based instruction from varied perspectives in this frothy, illuminating asynchronous discussion. An Opp Now exclusive.

On Oppression-Based Instruction:

Natalie Thoreson of the Oakland-based organization rEVOLution leads workshops that claim to work "toward liberation” by helping attendees dismantle evidence of oppression within themselves (as everyone has been socialized to participate in oppression as either the oppressor or oppressed, or, most often, both). Educational experts Kevin McGary, Larry Sand, and rEVOLution's own Natalie Thoreson address this controversial type of teaching below.

Kevin McGary: There are some people within poor communities of all ethnicities who submit to mindsets that negatively frame and limit their world. One such mindset is that they're oppressed, that societal/cultural plights limit their individual ability to excel. We should dismantle these old viewpoints about what's possible.

Naturally, it's reasonable to try to end personal oppressions people may be feeling at any moment in time. However, Natalie's phrasing here might also mean they bring the idea of racial oppression by a supposed class of oppressors into that conversation.

Larry Sand: I'll make this very clear: This is what's called cultural Marxism. These are radicals who aren't interested in traditional education but want to push their far-left political agenda. They're all about DEI and molding students to their own Woke standards. If they admitted that more forthrightly, it would be better.

Natalie Thoreson: Unpacking and dismantling oppression begins with folks knowing historical constructs (such as race), acknowledging how they've been socialized, and recognizing that they're good people.

To me and many others doing this work, everything is centered in a place of love (and for further reading, I recommend bell hooks' All About Love, which discusses how we've largely pushed love away but need it for social change movements). How can you love people you have disagreements with? Well, there's a higher likelihood that you have way more in common with them than you do differences.

M. Scott Peck defines love as “the desire for one's or another's spiritual and emotional growth.” When you frame love not in a capitalist or passionate way but “I want you and myself to develop into the best possible human,” it's easy to love the people around us. To have patience. To share our perspectives and listen to theirs. Otherwise, it's easy to shut people down, other them, dehumanize them. Being that my politics are progressive and radical leaning, I sometimes feel a block around love with folks whose politics don’t align with mine. But I still choose to love them.

On the Oppressor/Oppressed Binary:

KM: This oppressor/oppressed dichotomy is not a reasonable way to view society. Natalie of rEVOLution is pointing to the old Marxist playbook of proletariat and bourgeoisie: The bourgeoisie (victimizers) are the class that control mechanisms of power/wealth, and the proletariat (victims) are the worker class subject to the bourgeoisie. Wokeism has just changed the labels for today's nomenclature. (Something ironic here, if we're talking about anti-racism, is that Karl Marx was a historically documented racist and sexist. He hated Black people and was highly misogynist.)

People today who align with Marx's philosophies probably don't realize that they're unprincipled, that they ultimately lead to a communist/retribution mindset. Marx himself wasn't succeeding in business and life, so wanted to redistribute the community's wealth to benefit himself.

Truly, what's dangerous about feeding this oppressor/oppressed binary idea to the next generation is that it rejects meritocracy. It rejects the notion of personal responsibility: that you must motivate yourself and work hard to do things that encourage your success.

Instead, there's a sense of perpetual victimhood. No matter what you do, you're being victimized by the system, which is set up against you. There's no mechanisms for success besides demanding people be treated differently based on skin color (e.g., given the priority to speak, wealth via reparations).

LS: I don't know that I have words strong enough to describe how much I dislike Natalie's binary statement, which puts all workshop participants either in the "oppressor" or "oppressed" category. How dare this organization encourage educators to talk this way to children! Once again, this is agenda-driven. It's Marxist. People need to wake up to this pervasive ideology. Parents need to get into the classroom to stay informed and take action. It's the best way to effect change.

NT: I've done a lot of work with young folks, though I currently work almost exclusively with adults. In reality, in the work I do, it's not about a good/bad paradigm or binary. My work is really about us recognizing the structural inequality in our society, and how we can all be treated with more dignity and equality.

And this isn’t about “super radical” or “super conservative” folks taking over the larger sphere. If one group did, what would we do with the people who don’t agree with us? Do we imprison them or find some other way to destroy them?

We must find a space to connect across difference so we can move forward together as a society. Hating people who don’t agree with us isn't going to fix it. We can't keep pitting people against each other.

Here's an example. On the news the other day, I saw a clip of a conservative politician in Utah speaking about how transgender students are young people who are having a hard time, and just want safety and acceptance. First, I got to witness this person—whom I'd put in a box as completely opposite of me in so many ways—centering love and care for young folks in a way that politically might not completely align with his party. Second, I got to challenge some of my prejudices. We can't become perfect people, but we can grow together to help our next generation.

This article is part of an exclusive Opp Now series, in which three educational experts also analyze an anti-colonization curricular focus from varied perspectives

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Jax Oliver