Brian Peacock wrote: ↑Sat Jun 19, 2021 11:07 am
Pence: “Instead of teaching all of our children to be proud of their country, critical race theory teaches children as young as kindergarten to be ashamed of their skin color. Critical race theory is racism, pure and simple – and it should be rejected by every American of every race.”
When he says 'our children', to that particular audience, we all know exactly what he means, don't we(?)
His point, such that it is, depends on fostering and promoting an understanding that skin colour denotes a distinct and discreet boundary between types of people, but one that goes beyond simply distinguishing between people by skin colour alone - e.g. white people are one type of people with certain and particular attributes and qualities, and black people are another, separate type of people etc.
This idea is given voice by his complaint that an examination of how notions of race have historically influenced or impacted the conditions or structures of current society should not be a source of shame, but nonetheless is being forwarded as something shameful - and that those feelings of humiliation or distress caused by an awareness of wrong or foolish behaviour are unjustified.
By complaining that (let's face it) white people are supposedly being made to feel ashamed of the social conditions, attitudes and actions of past generations Pence is admitting that there's something shameful about that past while at the same time saying that there's nothing people today should feel ashamed of - and where they might or do feel embarrassed or ashamed about the past (about their past, or 'our past' as white people, etc) this is an illegitimate and undue personal burden. To call this burden racism is to clam that it is unjustly prejudiced or biased against not just the people of the past but also against those who identify with them today. In a way he's complaining that because black people don't share the same kinds of shameful burdens from the past with white people then white people are being treated unfairly.
The question is, why should any person feel ashamed of the actions of others, whether historically or contemporaneously, unless one personally identifies with them and/or feels some kind of personal responsibility for their actions - and why would people identify with them and/or feel some kind of personal responsibility for their actions unless white people are all one type of people and black people another?
The other question is why can people like Pence not break their personal associations with generations past by acknowledging the historic and social conditions of those times and moving things forward to ensure that we all try and avoid future generations being ashamed of what we do today? But I think we all know the answer to that one, eh?