BY KEVIN MCGRUDER

In 2021, the movement against the purported teaching of Critical Race Theory in K-12 schools and public colleges dominated public discussions in many communities and has now resulted in legislation against the teaching of “divisive concepts” in many states. It is a matter of public record, as Jennifer Ruth noted here, that the controversy is a manufactured one, a masterful disinformation campaign to silence advocates of anti-racism. The campaign was conceived by conservative activist Christopher Rufo, and amplified by the American Legal Exchange Council (ALEC) through trainings, and then by the dissemination of sample legislation to state legislators. In Ohio, two pieces of legislation are in committee. House Bill 322 would amend sections of the Ohio Revised Code regarding the teaching of certain current events and certain concepts regarding race and sex in public schools. House Bill 327 would amend the Revised code to prohibit school districts, community schools, STEM schools, and state agencies from teaching, advocating, or promoting divisive concepts.

As educators, the divisive concepts controversy, while frustrating in its distortion of the facts, provides us with a teachable moment to share information, both with our students and with the larger community, that draws on our scholarship to answer the question, why is this happening now? My discipline of history provides clear answers. The disinformation campaign fueled by Christopher Rufo is part of a historical tradition in the United States of backlashes to steps toward achieving racial equity. As a nation, on paper we are a multi-racial democracy, but in practice we are a nation in which some White citizens expect to always have a dominant voice, and where the possibility of sharing power with citizens of color is seen as a threat to their power and privilege. A brief historical review:

• In the 1820s when most states rewrote their constitutions to eliminate property qualifications for voting, almost all white men gained the vote, but many of those same states introduced, for the first time, voting restrictions for Black men;
• In the 1870s, during the Reconstruction period that followed the Civil War, Black men gained the vote and the result was the election of two Black men to the U.S. Senate, sixteen to the House of Representatives, and hundreds to state and local offices. This fueled a backlash of racial violence that ended Black voting in the south and ushered in 80 years of racial segregation and violence;
• The Civil Rights victories of the 1950s and 1960s were followed by the migration of many White Southern Democrats to the Republican Party which was branded by Richard Nixon in his 1968 presidential campaign, as the party of “law and order,” implicitly charged with putting Black people in their place;
• Barack Obama’s 2008 election was followed by a rise in White Nationalism exemplified by the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville in which a White Nationalist killed counter protester Heather Heyer;
• The run-up to the 2020 Presidential election was accompanied by legislation that restricted the vote in several states with large Black populations. When get out the vote efforts resulted in record turnout and the election of Joseph Biden, viewed as an advocate for the issues relevant to people of color, opponents mounted challenges to the election results that precipitated the invasion of the Capitol on January 6^th, and “recounts” that continue to this day.

When we view the current debate over Critical Race Theory and “divisive concepts” in this context we can better understand that the debate isn’t about Critical Race Theory or divisive concepts, but instead about a much larger issue: an age-old fear of sharing power and privilege.

To understand why a forty-year old legal concept has suddenly been branded as the target of divisive concepts legislation nationwide we can look to the disciplines of communications and psychology. Christopher Rufo has skillfully used the “straw man” communications strategy to demonize Critical Race Theory. In that strategy one “misrepresents an opponent’s position in a way that imputes to it implausible commitments, and then refutes the misrepresentation instead of the opponent’s actual view.”  Rufo has claimed that Critical Race Theory promotes hatred of White people, shaming of White students, and a wide range of other actions not related to Critical Race Theory or to anti-racism. The divisive concept laws are broad brush attempts to refute this straw man by preventing such purported actions from taking place in the classroom, even though there is no evidence that this is happening in classrooms. The discipline of psychology helps us to also understand that confirmation bias, the tendency of people to favor information that confirms their existing beliefs, is fueling this disinformation campaign. The advocates of divisive concepts laws are aware that some White Americans want to believe that demands for racial equity are not inspired by efforts to achieve racial justice, but instead are efforts to shame White adults and their children, so legislation has been drafted outlawing a practice that rarely happens in K-12 or college classrooms.

White nationalist demonstrators clash with a counter demonstrator as he throws a newspaper box at the entrance to Lee Park in Charlottesville, Va., Saturday, Aug. 12, 2017. Gov. Terry McAuliffe declared a state of emergency and police dressed in riot gear ordered people to disperse after chaotic violent clashes between white nationalists and counter protestors. (AP Photo/Steve Helber) (AP Photo/Steve Helber)

Rufo’s disinformation efforts might have remained isolated, but they were amplified by a well-developed, conservative infrastructure that includes the Manhattan Institute, whose City Journal online magazine printed his articles about Critical Race Theory. More importantly the American Legal Exchange Council (ALEC), in collaboration with the Heritage Foundation organized a December 2020 online anti-Critical Race Theory training and then, as is their practice, disseminated sample divisive concept legislation to conservative state legislators across the country.

Using the knowledge of our disciplines to counter divisive concepts disinformation can provide analytical clarity to our current situation, but as a nation we need a progressive infrastructure to counter the conservative communication/legislative complex that regularly uses oppressive legislation to mobilize its base. I teach a class on the history of the ACLU which since the 1920s has used the law to protect freedom of speech. In the same way, since 1909, the NAACP has used the law to advance racial equity. Their actions could be described as defensive uses of the law. ALEC, by drafting legislation for state legislators is using the law in a pro-active manner. There is no progressive entity that I know of that is undertaking a similar strategy. Our nation needs one. In the same way that the Heritage Foundation has funded conservative causes, perhaps the Ford Foundation, which under the leadership of President Darren Walker has foregrounded support of social justice initiatives, could play a similar role for an organization crafting draft progressive legislation on various issues for state legislators to mobilize the progressive base.

In the 1970s and 1980s Critical Race theorists concluded that the Civil Rights victories of the 1960s had not resulted in the sweeping societal changes envisioned because many elements of the racial hierarchy that it sought to end were still embedded in the nation’s laws, and needed to be removed to achieve progress. Ironically the divisive concepts legislation already enacted in several states, and proposed in many others, affirms the veracity of Critical Race Theory in their use of the law to attempt to stall the momentum of efforts to achieve racial equity.

Kevin McGruder is Associate Professor of History at Antioch College. He is author of Race and Real Estate: Conflict and Cooperation in Harlem, 1890-1920 (Columbia University Press, 2015) and Philip Payton: The Father of Black Harlem (Columbia University Press, 2021).