Awareness isn’t hatred

I’m writing in response to Steve Hintyesz’ letter of July 7 (“Teaching self-hatred”) where he contends that “Critical Race Theory (CRT) pushed on our children basically teaches that children of a certain skin color are inherently racist oppressors, just because of the color of their skin.” He blames CRT for the situation on the Marieval Indian Residential School where hundreds of indigenous bodies were found buried. He likens the psychological damage caused to these indigenous children who were raised to “learn to not like who we are” with a history curriculum that teaches the truth of our history. I challenge him to meet with teachers and actually look at the curriculum.

CRT originated in the 1970s as a legal perspective that emphasized the role of systemic racism (as opposed to the individual sort) in replicating inequality. It does not espouse that white people are “inherently racist oppressors” due to the color or their skin.

I grew up in the ‘60s and ‘70s, and in all my U.S. history classes, I never learned about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, where an angry mob of white people killed as many as 300 Black citizens, burning “Black Wall Street” and displacing thousands of blacks who lived there.

Winston Churchill said “Those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it.” I believe that it is important to allow teachers to teach truth in our history, not so that we and our children will “feel badly about ourselves,” but that we will gain wisdom from learning from our country’s past, and be better equipped not to repeat the same mistakes.

Colleen Robisch

Otis Orchards