How does ASU West's New College spend faculty meeting time?
Anti-Racism!
I received an email today with the agenda for our next New College faculty meeting. This is the time when we talk about the business facing our College. It includes reports from our Dean and Assistant Deans as well as the directors of each of the schools in our college. As state employees, we are hired for a specific job, and this is the time when we come together and talk about that job. Or at least that is supposed to be what we do.
On our agenda is a report from NewARC. “What is NewARC?” you ask. It stands for the New Anti-Racism Committee. That sounds great, right? We are all against racism. But it turns out that being against racism is not the same as being “anti-racist.” In fact, if you are merely against racism, then the thought leaders of the Anti-Racism movement, like Ibram X. Kendi, will say you are probably still racist.
Ibram X. Kendi claims that the Anti-Racist uses discrimination to stop whiteness. Kendi relies on the oppressor/oppressed paradigm to understand all of history. If there are any economic differences between groups these are, by definition in his system, due to discrimination. If there are differences in who attends what university or goes into a profession, this is because of (you guessed it) discrimination. So what do we need to do? According to Kendi, he wants more discrimination (just the right kind, his kind). His view is the exact opposite of that taught by Martin Luther King Jr., who we will be remembering on Monday. MLK dreamed of a time when we are judged based on our character. MLK preached about reconciliation between humans and with God.
What you will notice is that Kendi’s solution is a non-solution. That is both because it merely perpetuates the problem of discrimination and because it has no real answer about reconciliation between people. It is merely economic. It entirely ignores God. Like other Marxists, he thinks in materialist terms. It analyzes social conditions through an economic and material lens. It does not get us to the deeper levels of the human condition and to what will provide a lasting solution. (I have a previous post on Kendi where I provide some quotes).
Why do we have a committee that promotes this ideology? Are other views also allowed to have committees? As state employees, we are not supposed to promote a specific political or religious view in our official capacities. But this kind of ideology is allowed a privileged position because it uses “social justice” language. It just wants to help make society better, right? But as long as one ideology is allowed to have a committee, the solution is to allow equal time to alternative viewpoints. Let’s see if that is permitted. I’ve requested equal time and have been waiting and waiting for a reply. Nothing yet.
Parents and students, these are the kinds of ideologies your professors promote in their faculty meetings. Legislators, why aren’t alternative political viewpoints permitted? Pastors, we know that only the Gospel can actually produce reconciliation and forgiveness between people and with God. Let’s continue to point out the failings of these false gospels.