Click here for Part 1 of “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in LCUSD.”
VI. Critical Race Theory, Anti-Racism and DEI
Any discussion of current and future plans for DEI at LCUSD must necessarily include discussion of the political ideology upon which most of the findings and recommendations by the DEI Special Consultant are based.
The ubiquitous use of critical race theory (CRT) terminology and theories in DEI efforts already implemented thus far is evidenced in the district's web page of DEI resources, as well as the LCHS student reporter’s account of a parent workshop she attended in January 2020:
“I attended the ‘Bringing Race, Diversity and Inclusivity Home’ workshop in January 2020, which was intended for parents and staff. During the workshop, Mrs. Hale-Elliott presented the social construct of race and important terms to be aware of like systemic racism, white privilege, internalized racism, microaggressions and the model minority myth.”1
Critical race theory has come to mean two slightly different concepts, one confined to legal theory while the second is a social philosophy more broadly applied to understanding racism across all of society. The Wikipedia definition of Critical Race Theory is as follows:
“Critical race theory (CRT) is an academic movement made up of civil-rights scholars and activists in the United States who seek to critically examine the law as it intersects with issues of race, and to challenge mainstream liberal approaches to racial justice. CRT examines social and cultural issues as they relate to race, law, and social and political power.
CRT originated in the mid-1970s in the writings of several American legal scholars including Derrick Bell, Alan Freeman, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Richard Delgado, Cheryl Harris, Charles R. Lawrence III, Mari Matsuda, and Patricia J. Williams. CRT emerged as a movement by the 1980s, reworking theories of critical legal studies (CLS) with more focus on race. As the word critical suggests, both theoretical frameworks are rooted in critical theory, a social philosophy which argues that social problems are influenced and created more by societal structures and cultural assumptions than by individual and psychological factors. CRT is loosely unified by two common themes:
• First, that white supremacy exists and maintains power through the law.
• Second, that transforming the relationship between law and racial power, as well as achieving racial emancipation and anti-subordination more broadly, are possible.”2
The second definition of CRT can be applied across more than just legal studies to all aspects of society. As defined in the Encyclopaedia of Diversity and Social Justice:
“Critical race theory (CRT) is a scholarly and political approach to examining race that leads to a consequential analysis and profound understanding of racism. It argues, as a starting point, that the axis of American social life is fundamentally constructed in race. As a result, the economic, political, and historical relationships and arrangements that social actors have to institutions and social processes are all race based. CRT also argues that, as a whole, this idea has been purposefully ignored, subdued, and marginalized in both the dominant and public discourse and that there are serious repercussions that arise from this structural blindness (Mills, 1997, p. 153)...One of the important tenets of CRT is the assertion that race is socially constructed, yet it denotes explicitly and implicitly how power is used and appropriated in society.”3
Some defenders of LCUSD’s DEI program deny that the current vision for DEI has any connections to CRT. This is a disingenuous assertion given how almost all of the resources linked on the district’s DEI Resources web page incorporate the CRT view of racism, and how the DEI Special Consultant’s myriad presentations and final Strengths and Needs Assessment report used CRT terminology, definitions, and assumptions.
Though the strength of the association between the district’s DEI program and CRT can be debated, the interconnection remains and needs to be examined. As it has come to be practiced, journalist Christopher Rufo has noted that, “critical race theory is the idea that the United States is a fundamentally racist country and that all of our institutions including the law, culture, business, the economy are all designed to maintain white supremacy. And the critical race theorists argue that all of these institutions are in a sense beyond reforming, they really need to be completely dismantled in order to liberate the oppressed people.”4
While this may seem an oversimplification or caricature of CRT, the characterization is used by proponents of CRT themselves. For example, Robin Diangelo, author of White Fragility writes:
“Racism is deeply embedded in the fabric of our society. it is not limited to a single act or person. Nor does it move back and forth, one day benefiting whites and another day (or even era) benefiting people of color. The direction of power between white people and people of color is historic, traditional, and normalized in ideology.
Racism differs from individual racial prejudice and racial discrimination in the historical accumulation and ongoing use of institutional power and authority to support the prejudice and to systematically enforce discriminatory behaviors with far-reaching effects. ...Whites hold the social and institutional positions in society to infuse their racial prejudice into the laws, policies, practices, and norms of society in a way that people of color do not.”5
The problems with CRT are manifold. First, it assumes that racism is ubiquitous in society. In other words, the core question, as framed by Diangelo, “is not ‘Did racism take place?’ but rather, ‘In which ways did racism manifest in this specific context?’”6 Second, CRT assumes one’s racial identity determines one’s beliefs and values. This is a racist ideology -- racial essentialism -- that has been discredited as a valid scientific theory.
Third, CRT posits that all social interactions must be viewed through the prism of systemic racism. Institutions are assumed to be systemically racist even though no individuals are committing individual acts of racism and no one or group intentionally designs the institution and its rules to be racist. In fact, this intentional position of assuming systemic racism is omnipresent and pervades all aspects of society is addressed in the theory of anti-racism by requiring that the efforts to dismantle systemic racism must be never-ending. Further, proponents of anti-racism assume a false dichotomy -- that people are either racist or anti-racist, and there is no in between. Ibram X. Kendi, the most prominent expositor of anti-racism elucidates this dichotomy and requirement for perpetual efforts to end it in his book How to Be An Antiracist (which is on the district’s DEI Resources page):
“The opposite of ‘racist’ isn’t ‘not racist.’ It is ‘anti-racist.’ What’s the difference? One endorses either the idea of a racial hierarchy as a racist, or racial equality as an antiracist. One either believes problems are rooted in groups of people, as a racist, or locates the roots of problems in power and policies, as an anti-racist. One either allows racial inequities to persevere, as a racist, or confronts racial inequities, as an antiracist. There is no in-between safe space of ‘not racist.’ The claim of ‘not racist’ neutrality is a mask for racism. This may seem harsh, but it’s important at the outset that we apply one of the core principles of antiracism, which is to return the word ‘racist’ itself back to its proper usage. ‘Racist’ is not—as Richard Spencer argues — a pejorative. It is not the worst word in the English language; it is not the equivalent of a slur. It is descriptive, and the only way to undo racism is to consistently identify and describe it — and then dismantle it.”7
The assumptions in CRT and anti-racism that systemic racism is always and everywhere and that systems can be racist without any individual acts of racism denies human agency. The theory condemns groups of people to a fate beyond their control and is used as an excuse for treating badly those groups posited to be in positions of power. Thus discrimination against “advantaged groups” is not only allowed in this worldview, it is encouraged in order to redress historical wrongs.
Lastly and most importantly, there is growing body of evidence that institutions that have implemented CRT-based prescriptions to address systemic racism have actually gotten worse with regard to race relations. For example, James Sidanius, professor of psychology and African-American Studies at Harvard has conducted several studies on diversity policies on American college campuses and how they affect student attitudes. While Sidanius and his research colleagues found that intergroup contact between students of different identities reduced ethnic tension and increased friendships across ethnic identities, they also found that:
“Ethnically oriented, student-based organizations such as the Afro-American Studies Association or the Latin American Student Association create more [racial] tension. Once students joined these organizations, it increased their own ethnic identification and gave students the feeling that they were being ethnically victimized by other student groups.”8
The increased polarization on college campuses where CRT is taught and CRT-based DEI policies are implemented is also well documented. For an illuminating example of what happens when CRT ideology spreads through an institution and becomes the basis for policy changes, look at the experience at Evergreen State College since 2017. Here are but a few links that describe the Evergreen story:
“How Activists Took Control of a University: The Case Study of Evergreen State,” by Uri Harris, Quillette, Dec. 28, 2017. https://quillette.com/2017/12/18/activists-took-control-university-case-study-evergreen-state/
Benjamin Boyce, “The Complete Evergreen Story,” a multi-part documentary examination of the Evergreen State College meltdown in 2017:
“A Lesson in Campus Consequences: Social-justice drama has students shunning Evergreen State,” Wall Street Journal, Jan. 15, 2020.
VII. Definitions of Diversity and Inclusion
During the DEI Special Consultant’s year examining the state of DEI at LCUSD, numerous past incidents of discrimination were alleged by students, former students, and parents. During the same period, all stakeholder groups in La Canada expressed a commitment to the goal of ending racism, sexism and the other forms of discrimination in the district. While agreeing on the end goals, room remains on how best to achieve those goals.
There has been little to no objection to the district’s Commitment Statement on DEI:
However, the definitions the district and Special Committee on DEI have agreed upon for diversity, equity and inclusion are another matter. The current definition of diversity as approved by the Special Committee on DEI is:
“LCUSD defines diversity as the array of differences which exist between people, on a personal as well as an organizational level. Those differences include, but are not limited to race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, socio-economic class, ability, religion, family structure, age, and core values.”9
It should be noted that earlier versions of this definition included “political belief” instead of “core values,” but “political belief” was removed during committee meetings because some members thought political belief was incongruent with the other identities and characteristics listed. The concern with the substitution of “core values” for “political belief” is that there is no acknowledgement or adequate protection of the array of viewpoints other than religion. Core values is considered too ambiguous a substitute as core values can be community established and there is insufficient protection of individual beliefs.
Viewpoint diversity is considered essential to any definition of diversity, yet the current definition does not address it. This omission is intentional in the theory of Critical Social Justice as pointed out in the New Discourses’ Social Justice Encyclopedia:
“Diversity in the Critical Social Justice usage, while occasionally claiming to be tolerant of differences of ideas and political viewpoints and nodding toward ‘philosophical differences,’ focuses, in reality, almost entirely on physical and cultural differences, which it evaluates according to the Critical Social Justice conceptions of privilege and marginalization. It therefore aims to privilege the marginalized and marginalize the privileged in order to redress the imbalances it sees in society. This is made more obvious by observing that in this usage, diversity is described as a ‘set of conscious practices.’ That is, not only is diversity something that one is expected to do under a rubric of Critical Social Justice, it is a set of practices that require conscious awareness.
...
Diversity in the Critical Social Justice usage therefore tends to mean uniformity of viewpoint about ideological matters. All diversity of viewpoint, from the perspective of Critical Social Justice’s meaning of the term, arises by providing different cultural knowledge(s), which are only considered authentic if they corroborate the relationship of the identity group in question to systemic power as described by Theory.”10
In a similar manner, the LCUSD Special Committee on DEI has also agreed to a definition of inclusion that differs from the commonly understood definition. The current definition of inclusion as presented by the Superintendent’s Special Committee on DEI is:
“Inclusion within LCUSD is the daily and intentional nurturing and maintenance of a welcoming climate of care, which fosters a sense of belonging and empathy for all. An inclusive environment is one in which every member of the community is supported in order to feel valued and respected, has equitable access and opportunities, and is invited to meaningfully contribute to and help define the culture of the LCUSD community.”
The plain meaning of inclusion is “the action or state of including or of being included within a group or structure.”11 The common definition is stretched in the Critical Social Justice (CSJ) view to be a process. CSJ defines inclusion to create a welcoming environment. This subtle shift in definition has had profound consequences in institutions using the CSJ definition, such as college campuses across the United States. The change of inclusion to define a process of creating a welcoming environment allows the Orwellian interpretation that exclusion of anything that could feel unwelcoming to marginalized groups is allowable. Thus, college administrators have created speech codes, safe spaces, segregated dining spaces and dormitories, and allowed censorship of views that are interpreted as unsafe to individuals in marginalized groups. In the name of safety, creating a welcoming environment, and preventing emotional “violence” or “trauma” to students in historically marginalized groups, professors have been fired, students expelled, and speakers canceled for espousing views that “harm” other students’ feelings. Even worse, to be inclusive of marginalized groups, the CSJ definition of inclusion has been used to justify excluding and discriminating against people considered privileged like whites, Asians, males, and heterosexuals. The explicit allowance of discrimination against privileged groups runs afoul of anti-discrimination district policies and state and federal laws.
Due to the large gap in definitions of diversity and inclusion between their common usage and how Critical Social Justice understands it, clarification is required in order for the community to mutually agree on a way forward. Hence, consideration should be given to a view of diversity and inclusion that does not contravene anti-discrimination policies and laws, that does not assume everyone of a defined category thinks only one way, and, most importantly, protects freedoms of speech and association, and protects viewpoint diversity.
VIII. What Happened to Equity?
The Superintendent’s Special Committee on DEI agreed to the following definition of equity, which was presented to the LCUSD Governing Board at its meeting on Mar. 09, 2021:
“Equity is recognized by LCUSD as a system of fair treatment, fair opportunities, and fair outcomes. Our commitment to equity demands that students and staff be provided with the resources, services, and instruction required for success, based upon their unique needs and circumstances. Likewise, it requires that families be provided with differentiated supports to bolster student success. Implicit in this definition is the understanding that (1) inequities have served as barriers to success for historically marginalized groups and (2) there is a need for continual reflection and responsiveness to prevent and remedy potential inequities going forward.”12
The definition is so problematic as to warrant discarding altogether. The definition’s tortured path to its current version provides insight into its problems. As originally drafted by the district in 2018, the definition of equity began with:
“A system of fair treatment, opportunities, and outcomes.”
Few would deny the laudable goal of providing fair treatment and equal opportunities to district students. But the declaration of providing fair outcomes was quickly recognized as problematic. The Superintendent’s Special Committee on DEI tackled this problem in its District and School Leadership subcommittee meetings in January and March of 2021. Members pointed out that as it was then defined, “fair outcomes” could be interpreted to mean that all students must receive the same grades.
District administrators responded that this was never the intent of the definition, but failed to address the ambiguity in the proffered definition. The first sentence was changed, but only by repeating the adjective “fair” to each of the three antecedents of “system”:
“A system of fair treatment, fair opportunities, and fair outcomes.”
This modification is inadequate, as the adjective “fair” is ambiguous and opens the door to interpretations of “fair outcomes” such as “equality of outcome,” which is the most commonly used CSJ definition of “equity.” The very selection of the word “equity” as opposed to "equality" is an intentional act of CSJ proponents as noted by the New Discourses Social Justice Encyclopedia:
“Notice that, in Critical Social Justice, the meaning of ‘equity’ takes pains to distinguish itself from that of ‘equality.’ Where equality means that citizen A and citizen B are treated equally, equity means ‘adjusting shares in order to make citizens A and B equal.’ In that sense, equity is something like a kind of ‘social communism,’ if we will — the intentional redistribution of shares, but not necessarily along lines of existing economic disparity but in order to adjust for and correct current and historical injustices, both as exist in reality and as have been drawn out by the various critical theories.”13
Most people would be willing to commit to the principle of equality of opportunity, while fewer would be willing to commit to the CSJ notion of equality of outcome. Given equality of opportunity is already protected in both law and district policies and administrative rules, it is therefore deemed too problematic to attempt to include a commitment to equity in the CSJ understanding of the term.
IX. On Disparate Outcomes
In the DEI Special Consultant’s Strengths and Needs Assessment report in the section on “Areas for Growth,” two problem areas cited were a lack of diversity of students and a lack of diversity of staff. As evidence for these assertions, the consultant cited discrepancies between student and staff demographics:
“The need for greater staff diversity in particular was highlighted by data provided by the LCUSD human resources department for the 2019-20 school year. In comparison to the student population, which is just over 45% White, individuals identifying as White make up nearly 70% of certificated staff (i.e., teachers, administrators, and pupil personnel services). This is in contrast to Asian staff constituting approximately 10% of LCUSD’s certificated staff while Asian students make up over 30% of LCUSD’s student population (see Figure 17). Similarly, although the student gender distribution is nearly an even 50/50 split, female employees make up over 76% of certificated staff (see Figure 18). While there was some variation in the hiring on new staff for the 2019-20 school year (most notably with all three newly hired administrators being people of color), newly hired certificated staff continue to be predominantly White and female (see Figures 19 and 20).”14
By asserting that student and staff demographics are disproportionate or discrepant, it is assumed that student and staff demographics should be similar or identical in percentages. That is, the assumption is since the student population is just over 45% White, so should the certificated staff be 45% White. Yet how is this to be achieved when students come from the local community, while staff come from a wider geographic area? The consultant goes on to cite other disparate student outcomes in academic achievement, chronic absenteeism, discipline outcomes, suspension rate, and student feelings about school climate of care.
This points to a fundamental problem upon which the entire DEI program is based. The assumption that disparate outcomes are evidence of systemic racism, sexism, ableism, or other forms of systemic discrimination is contrary to a mountain of evidence on how humans associate when free to choose. As just one obvious example, 96% of the certificated elementary staff in LCUSD are female, while the US population is only 50.8% female. Therein lies another problem – group variances can be quite large, even within the same geographic regions. The DEI consultant’s report indicated that 76% of certificated staff at LCHS was female. Does the fact that only 4% of certificated staff at our elementary schools, or 24% of certificated staff at LCHS, reveal that LCUSD discriminates against males when they apply for employment as teachers? A simpler explanation is that fewer males than females choose to become high school teachers, and even fewer choose to become elementary teachers, such that when LCUSD has to fill a vacancy for a teacher opening, it has to choose from among the available applicant pool at the time, and the applicant pool reflects the distribution of choices from thousands of individuals who probably care not what the demographics are in the field they chose.
The issue of population diversity and economic outcomes has been extensively studied both within the United States and around the world by scholars and key among these findings, though not widely known, is the conclusion by economist Thomas Sowell that:
“Neither in nature nor among human beings are either equal or randomly distributed outcomes automatic. On the contrary, grossly unequal distributions of outcomes are common, both in nature and among people, including in circumstances where neither genes nor discrimination are involved.”15
Sowell has spent a career studying race, culture, migration, affirmative action policies, and how they intertwine with economic and other outcomes around the globe and come to this conclusion through empirical research.
Among Sowell’s findings relevant to California was that Cambodians owned 90% of doughnut stores in California, even though Cambodian immigrants constituted only 0.09% of the U.S. national population and 0.2% of the California population.16 In other words, Cambodians were 1,000 times overrepresented in the doughnut industry if one were to assume that races and ethnic groups should be represented similar or identical to their wider demographic representation. The CRT explanation for this disparity would posit some type of “systemic racism” that favored Cambodians and discriminated against non-Cambodians attempting to enter the doughnut industry. The more benign and logical explanation for the disparity is that human beings left to their own devices tend to choose occupations based a combination of their unique cultural, intellectual, and environmental situation and predilections, and input from family or friend networks. CSUN geography professors James P. Allen and Eugene Turner solved the Cambodian-doughnut riddle around the same time Sowell noticed the disparity:
“Work in a Winchell’s doughnut shop was first arranged for Vietnamese through refugee-resettlement offices in 1975, but other Vietnamese did not follow this lead. Cambodians, however, saw an opportunity, and this business niche began in 1977, when a single Chinese-Cambodian immigrant opened a doughnut shop in La Habra. The business was successful, relatives trained with the owner and opened their own shops, and word of these opportunities spread widely within the community. In Orange County, the majority of Chinese-Cambodians own doughnut shops, and many own more than one. Nearly all Cambodians use the spelling donut because of its simplicity and the lower cost of store signs.
Doughnuts are completely alien to the Cambodian culture, and many shop owners do not like doughnuts at all: the business is simply a practical means of economic survival. Both husbands and wives put in long hours at the shops, but not much English-language ability is needed. Rotating-credit societies within the Cambodian community made many of the loans that supplemented family savings and enabled immigrants to establish doughnut businesses. Before the early 1990s, when the doughnut market became saturated, the financial success of at least some Cambodians was highly visible in the new Mercedes and sporty automobiles that the owners and their families often drove.
Because the shops are widely scattered, most proprietors own homes in nearby white areas rather than in the Long Beach enclave.”17
Incidentally, Allen and Turner found large disparities in occupational niches among most ethnic groups they studied in Southern California in 1990 in the same book, among them:
Southern Californian men of Russian ancestry were 5.3 times as likely to be lawyers as the average male from Southern California.
Armenian men were 16.6 times overrepresented in the retail jewelry business.
Iranian men were 5.9 times overrepresented in retail gasoline service stations.
Jamaicans were 3.4 times overrepresented in hospitals and other health services.
Chinese men were 5.1 times overrepresented in wholesale professional communications equipment while Chinese women were 3.3 times overrepresented in apparel and accessories manufacturer.
Chinese men from Vietnam were 6.2 times overrepresented in the US Postal Service while Chinese-Vietnamese women were 6.9 times overrepresented in electrical machinery manufacturing.
Filipinos were 3.6 times overrepresented in hospital work.
Koreans were 16.7 times overrepresented in retail liquor stores.
Samoan men were 10.6 times overrepresented in detective work and protective services while Samoan women were 9.4 times overrepresented in manufacture of furniture and fixtures.
Vietnamese men were 4.9 times overrepresented in manufacture of electrical machinery while Vietnamese women were 6.4 times overrepresented in beauty and nail shops.
Guatemalan-Salvadoran men were 5.3 times overrepresented in automobile parking & car wash services, while Guatemalan-Salvadoran women were 9.8 times overrepresented in domestic service in private households.18
The ubiquity of disparate outcomes does not in itself disprove systemic discrimination. Disparate outcomes can result from systemic discriminatory policies and laws. The lack of home ownership by Blacks due to Jim Crow laws in the southern United States is well known, but less well known is that similar laws prevented Mexicans, Filipinos, Chinese, and Japanese immigrants from owning houses in most parts of Southern California in the early 1920 to late 1940 timeframe.19
X. Towards an Apolitical, Humanist Vision of Diversity and Inclusion
Given the problems in critical race theory and its application to “social justice” across our society, many are reluctant to commit to the currently proposed Commitment Statement on DEI and Definitions and Framework for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in the La Cañada Unified School District. This should not be construed as an acquiescence to do nothing to address documented cases of racism & homophobia, or to address the problem of students and staff feeling marginalized and disrespected. To the contrary, it is believed the LCUSD community should commit to reduce individual acts of racism, sexism, homophobia, or any other acts of discrimination based on outward immutable characteristics, and to work towards a school environment where students and staff feel safe and respected, regardless of their identities or beliefs.
If the district is to commit to actively promote diversity and inclusion among its students, then it must protect viewpoint diversity in its definition of diversity and not use an expansive definition of inclusion that means the opposite of its plain meaning. Further, the district must find non-partisan, ideologically neutral solutions to defined problems that do not condone racism as a mechanism for righting past wrongs.
Basing the district’s DEI plan on critical theory and its application to racism (i.e. critical race theory), sexism, ableism and other forms discrimination is unacceptable to many in our community. CRT is but one of several philosophies or belief systems that attempts to explain the current state of affairs in the world. There are many others. Primary among those is the Humanist view that recognizes the value and agency of all human beings as individuals, free to believe, act (within limits) and associate as they wish, not as society, groups or any other individual impose upon them. Humanism is neither partisan nor religious (i.e. there are secular humanists as well as religious humanists.)
Others may choose to view the world through philosophies or belief system different from CRT or Humanism. Humanism is presented here as but the most prominent example of philosophies that respect the dignity of all people and respect their liberties, and is in stark contrast to CRT, which views the world through the lens of power imbalances between identity groups such as race, sex, gender, or ability, where all members of those groups are assumed to believe only one way. Martin Luther King, A. Phillip Randolph, Bayard Rustin and the other architects of the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s took a humanist view on race relations. In this view, as espoused in King’s “I have a dream” speech in 1968, all people were to be judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin.
The Humanist critique of racism is based on reason – attributing meaning or intent to an individual based on the pigmentation in their skin is an error in logic. Clearly melanin does not form belief or affect thoughts in the brain. So to have prejudice against all people of a group based on their skin color is an irrational belief. In other words, skin color is meaningless. Humanism values the dignity of all people regardless of their skin color or other physical appearances.
This alternative Humanist vision of racism and how to address it and other forms discrimination is not a novel one, and has been espoused by many modern thinkers across vastly different domains of expertise, among them philosopher Coleman Hughes20, cognitive psychologist and linguist Steven Pinker21, economist Glenn Loury22, linguist and associate professor of English and comparative literature John McWhorter23, political science professor Adolph Reed, Jr.24, and the aforementioned economist and thinker Thomas Sowell. It should be noted that these thinkers span the present political spectrum from Marxist scholar Reed to conservative economist Sowell, though most would self-identify as progressives or liberals. The Humanist response to racism, sexism, homophobia, or other forms of discrimination is to condemn them and discrimination in all its forms and commit to equality of opportunity and equal treatment under the law across all aspects of society.
In this view, diversity and inclusion do not require re-defining from their plain meanings.
Retrieved from Wikipedia on 04/12/20: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_race_theory
Thompson, Sherwood. Encyclopedia of Diversity and Social Justice. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Kindle Edition, p. 65.
Christopher Rufo in “How Critical Race Theory is Dividing America,” The Heritage Institute, Oct. 26, 2020.
Robin Diangelo, “White Fragility: White It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism,” Beacon Press, Boston, 2018. p.24.
Robin Diangelo, “Addressing Whiteness in Nursing Education,” Advances in Nursing Science, Vol 33, No. 3, pp.244-255.
Ibram X. Kendi, “How to be an Antiracist,” One World, New York, p.9.
For example, Sidanius published a book on “The Diversity Challenge: Social Identity and Intergroup Relations on the College Campus” in 2010. The quote from Sidanius is from, “Do Affinity Groups Create More Racial Tension on Campus?” in Diverse Issues in Higher Education, Mar. 10, 2009. https://diverseeducation.com/article/12376/
See item 9.c on the agenda for the LCUSD Governing Board regularly scheduled meeting on Mar. 09, 2021: https://agendaonline.net/public/Meeting.aspx?AgencyID=80&MeetingID=76643&AgencyTypeID=1&IsArchived=False
“New Discourses: Social Justice Encyclopedia - Definition of ‘Diversity’.” https://newdiscourses.com/tftw-diversity/
As retrieved from Apple MacOS system dictionary.
Downloaded from LCUSD Governing Board Regular Meeting agenda for Mar. 09, 2021:
Christina Hale-Elliot, “Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Strengths and Needs Assessment” as presented to the LCUSD Governing Board at its regularly scheduled meeting on Aug. 11, 2020: https://4.files.edl.io/9b19/08/26/20/211805-0db8aeef-0756-47b7-81cd-11efe50c9caf.pdf
Thomas Sowell, “Discrimination and Disparities,” second edition, Basic Books, New York, 2019, p.19.
The 90% statistic was first gleaned in Thomas Sowell’s “The Quest for Cosmic Justice”, Basic Books (1999) and the census figures are from 2000.
James Allen and Eugene Turner, “The Ethnic Quilt: Ethnic Diversity in Southern California,” The Center for Geographical Studies, Northridge, CA, 1997, pp.222-223.
Ibid. Table 8.6 - Leading Industries of Employment, 1990, pp. 216-221.
Ibid. p.255.
See for example “Coleman Hughes @ Lafayette, ‘Anti-Racism and Humanism, Two Completing Visions’” on YouTube at:
Pinker’s view is espoused in his most recent book, “Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress”, Penguin Books, New York, 2018.
See for example, “Economist Glenn Loury calls for ‘trans-racial humanism’,” Minnesota Public Radio News, Oct. 1, 2019. https://www.mprnews.org/story/2019/10/01/glenn-loury-on-racial-equality
McWhorter elaborates on his views on racism and anti-racism in his most recent book “The Elect: The Threat to a Progressive America from Anti-Black Antiracists,” which may be downloaded in serial form from: http://johnmcwhorter.substack.com/
The characterization of Reed as having a humanist view on solving racism was made by Coleman Hughes in a talk given at Lafayette College in March 2019. Reed is a vocal critic of anti-racism. See for example, Michael Powell, “A Black Marxist Scholar Wanted to Talk About Race. It Ignited a Fury,” New York Times, Aug. 14, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/14/us/adolph-reed-controversy.html