Diversity: how important is it?

The editorial today insists that corporations must have diversity on their boards.  (It will take more than symbols to achieve corporate board diversity, February 21)

The very motto of our country is e pluribus unum.  Out of many, one.

Why does our country even have a motto like that?  A very wise man said that a house divided cannot stand, and our ancestors knew that. 

It seems that all our political leaders and all the activists shouting loud who seem to get the attention of the media are acting against the core beliefs of our country.  They are all trying to divide our country into myriads of groups all competing for a share of the pie.  Our ancestors believed that the pie was always growing, by the way, as our country created wealth, but that belief has gone by the wayside too.

Every human being is an individual, unique, and with their own stories.  It is a mistake, an enormous one at that, to say that, hey, all my neighbors are white, they all lived privileged lives, I have nothing to learn from their experiences, they are all just like me in every way.  I am deprived in my core being if I don’t have more people of other races in my inner circle.  Like that one characteristic is more significant than a person’s education, culture, religion, personal interests, and personal background.

We are told not to stereotype, but that is exactly what diversity advocates are doing.  All blacks, for example, are similar in so many ways, that we need black people to represent them on our corporate boards, our police forces, our teachers, and our elected officials.  And the same for an ever-increasing number of other demographics. 

They say that diversity is our strength, that it enriches us.  At the same time, diversity is more likely to divide us.  Most people, everywhere, at all times, tend to develop closer relationships with people most like them.  Not just ethnically, but interests, culture, education, religion, age, and family status. 

Our society will be healthier and happier, not just overall but individually, when we just stop being so race and ethnic conscious and just see each other as human beings.  Stop with the counting and the constant analysis and the labeling, insisting that every group must have their certain numbers of representation for a society to be just.  Those people who do the constant counting will never be happy or let society be happy, because they are always looking for more evidences of something else to fault society for. 

 

critical race theory - again

A reader thinks that any objections that people might have about critical race theory are dreamed up by right-wing media people to generate ratings.  (A real reckoning with race, February 20)

Nope, there can’t possibly be anything remotely wrong with it.

The reader then lists a number of questions to prove how beneficial CRT is for everybody to learn. 

The problem is that we are to assume that these are the only things that CRT teaches and promotes.  And some people are also finding it problematic how these things are taught.

For example, we have all heard of the Ku Klux Klan.  Mobs of hooded people with funny outfits wreaked violent havoc on black communities.  That was evil, yet it was often and long tolerated by public authorities.  And that was evil as well.

Now, please, those of you who are proponents of CRT, tell us: does CRT teach that all white people are racist at heart, inherently and immutably?  Please tell us that it doesn’t, though I doubt you will.

And what about America itself?

Is America itself inherently and immutably racist, built on racism, such that our founding documents are racist documents, seeking to perpetuate this evil to all succeeding generations?

This, dear reader, is our concern.  We are not afraid of the truth. 

But CRT does not limit itself to the truth.  That is why it is called Critical Race THEORY.  It starts with facts and builds a comprehensive narrative about the good and mostly evil in our country.

Is the United States a perfect country?  No.  And guess what?  Perfect countries don’t exist.  Why?  Because they are all composed of people.  People are inherently and immutably flawed.

Does that mean that those flaws include racism?

That depends on what you mean.

It is a fact of life that not everybody will like everybody else.  And that lack of endearment can often be generalized to whole groups of people.  And that, my friends, is nothing new.  That has existed from the beginning of humankind.

But is that racism?

The real issue with racism or supposed racism is not whether people like you, but whether they are keeping you from pursuing and achieving your dreams.

There is more freedom to pursue your dreams and achieve them here in the United States than anywhere else in the world.

And many of us think that too many people today are spending all their time trying to find fault with our country, such that too many people are missing those opportunities to achieve their dreams.  And that is because they are spending too much of their time blaming other people for things that might appear to them as obstacles. 

Don’t waste your life hoping that things will be better in the future such that you miss the present and what it has for you.

That’s what concerns the rest of us about CRT. 

An Open Letter to the Self-Appointed Word Police of the World

Another day, another life ruined because somebody said the forbidden word.  (UIC professor in ‘absolute hell’ after alluding to slur in class, February 17)  It doesn’t matter the context.  They could have read it aloud from an old book.  They could be quoting somebody else who used the word. 

The word police then spring into action, and they are not content until that person loses their job.  We never hear what happens next.  Are the word police only content with that person losing that first job, or will they try to prevent that person from every having a similar job again?  Will these people be able to get a job in a fast-food restaurant, or will their crime follow them the rest of their lives?   Is there life after saying the forbidden word?

I don’t know when the forbidden word became forbidden.  I am afraid to look it up.  Google or somebody might be monitoring my computer watching out for these word abuses.  Not spying on us, just keeping an eye out for such egregious acts of vocalization to protect society from the evil that lurks around us.

I’m trying to figure out whether this absolute and unwavering punishment is a form of payback to just anybody and everybody so that people can vent their unresolved feelings of bitterness and anger for things that happened a long time ago, or do they think they are actually helping people when they are able to punish somebody for their audacity, intentional or otherwise, to voice this word in public.

I submit that the word police are in fact not helping anybody, but, like a person who keeps picking at a sore, the wound never heals.  The word police only create anger and resentment where it probably didn’t exist before, as it works its way through society destroying one life at a time.

 

how newspapers can solve the problem of political campaign funding

A Sun-Times editorial gave a needed call for reform in our election process.  (Give candidates who aren’t wealthy, or backed by the rich, a chance to be heard, February 17)

The fact is that the money needed today to run for most political offices has gotten totally out of control.  And when people make contributions, often those donors are able to exert influence over those candidates.  Not good.

All this also makes it harder to get more candidates to run for office.  Not good either.

The biggest expense for political campaigns is media advertising, which certainly is an enormous help for any candidate.

The solution offered by the Times is to spend more money.  Taxpayers would now help pay toward the campaigns of those who don’t have their own money to spend or a rich benefactor.

I submit that there is another alternative, and one that doesn’t require taxpayer money.

And that is the very medium that made this suggestion.

Newspapers. 

Newspapers should see it as their duty to fully inform the public about at least all the major elections.  And not just these obligatory articles just before the election. 

Give candidates access to the papers and their readers. 

Of course, anything they submit must follow certain guidelines.  No hit pieces on their opponents.  Just thorough discussions of the problems with their proposed solutions.  They don’t need to be full-length pieces.  Just let them know that the papers see it as their responsibility to help political candidates.

The Sun-Times hit on a major problem in our election system.  It can wait for other people to do something about it, or it can lead the way to getting this thing fixed.

critical race theory

A professor thinks that politicians (read Republicans here) who are opposed to teaching critical race theory in public schools are ignorant of history.  (Anti-critical race theory laws based on ignorance of history, February 17)

I think the professor is missing the point of the objections.  It’s not the facts of history that are in dispute; it’s their interpretation and application to today.

History exists in two forms.  You read the daily newspaper, and you are seeing history unfolding before your eyes.  But what you are seeing is an infinite number of data points.  Particular, individual events.  This is history in its rawest form.

What historians do is to take all these individual points of information and construct a picture of what is happening in a city, a nation, or the world.  Is history going in a particular direction?  Can we say a city, nation, or the world is improving or getting worse?  But what measures?

History does not tell us that.  The historian looks at the events of history and reaches his own conclusions based on what he sees as good or bad.  Conceivably, different people can look at the same events and reach different conclusions. 

The kind professor is not here to answer questions, but there are two basic teachings of CRT that I hope he would denounce as utter falsehoods about it.  I doubt he will though.

The first is that the United States is an inherently and irredeemably flawed nation, based on racism.  America is not a good nation, but one built on oppression and power. 

The other teaching is that white people are also inherently and irredeemably flawed, as in racist. 

And the whole American system is built to favor white people at the expense of all other peoples. 

I would say to this: name a country anywhere in the world where a person of color has a better chance of pursuing and fulfilling their dreams than in America.  Name a country in the world where people of color have a higher standard of living. 

There are around 200 countries in the world today.  More people want to come to the United States than to all the other countries put together.  My question is: is CRT presenting an accurate picture of the United States?  If you are not showing why so many people want to come here but only focusing on the worst parts of our history, I think you are failing in your understanding and teaching of history.

affordable housing in wealthy neighborhoods

The lack of affordable housing is a crisis throughout our nation and the leading cause of homelessness.  We learn this from a Wilmette Life column.  (New state law expands tax breaks for affordable housing.  But will it have effect in wealthy towns?, February 18)

I didn’t know homelessness and affordable housing were needs in wealthy towns. 

The proposed remedy for affordable housing is to give developers a break on their property taxes if they offer rental units at reduced rates for poorer people. 

It seems though that lawmakers have other things on their minds in addition to affordable housing and homelessness.  Things like equity, wealth creation, and diversity.  They will get more done more easily if they focus on one thing at a time.  Their efforts look to me to be just government meddling in places it has no business meddling.

Offering reduced rents in wealthy neighborhoods won’t give anybody wealth creation nor the mere fact of living there. 

You want to create wealth through increased home ownership, then reform the property tax system.

Two-thirds of property taxes goes for public education, and we keep hearing of public schools in poorer areas not receiving enough funding.  Shift funding for public schools to the income tax, and suddenly houses in rich neighborhoods become affordable, all without government intrusion.  Property taxes are absurd in the first place, because they don’t take into account a person’s ability to pay them. 

No need to try to ram down diversity in areas that don’t want it.  It’s not the government’s job to ram anything down on anyone anyway.  Just stop making things harder on people like taxing fixed assets.  That one act will open up housing more than all their other programs combined, and it won’t stir up trouble doing so. 

funding religious schools

When our kids were young, we wanted to send them to a private school, but we couldn’t afford it.  But we had to pay our property taxes which included thousands of dollars for public education.

So in essence, if we wanted to send our kids to a private school, we would have to pay double for our kids’ education. 

I don’t see any way to call this fair.  And the fact that the school was religious is irrelevant. 

A Tribune reader (Funding religious schools, February 10) thinks that doing anything to help parents in their desire for a private school education, er, private religious school education, is blatantly unconstitutional.  Something about establishing religion.

First, it should be said that helping parents, whether through vouchers or tax credits, is not the same as funding religious education.  The help is not so people can send their kids to religious schools, but so that parents can send their kids to a private school.  To exclude religious schools is punishing parents for being religious.  THAT is unconstitutional.

The confusion is over the establishment clause of the Constitution:  Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.

What does it mean to establish religion?

It certainly doesn’t mean that government, and by extension government entities, like public schools, should or need to avoid any mention of God, as though it were preferring religion over atheism. 

Our very nation was founded on a belief in God, because it was God who created all people equal and it was God who gave human beings unalienable rights.  Without God, you don’t have unalienable rights, and without unalienable rights, you don’t have the United States of America.

So what does it mean? 

Europe, then and now, has state churches.  The Queen of England is the Head of the Church of England.  That’s not coincidental.  The Church is part of their government.  Establishing religion was for government to pick a particular Christian denomination and fund it through government revenues.  This is proven by the fact that the prohibition of establishing religion was to Congress and not to the states.  The states themselves established state churches, until they realized they were causing the same problems our Founders wanted to avoid by that First Amendment.

If the government was giving money to religious schools, I would say no.  Definitely.  But giving parents a choice in educating their children, by all means.