Days before her likely official gubernatorial launch, Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried announced her support for teaching Critical Race Theory (CRT) in Florida’s schools and classrooms.
Fried is making a major announcement on June 1, which most are speculating is a governor’s race campaign launch, and in preparation for statewide attention, attended a local community meeting on Tuesday night where she criticized Florida Governor Ron DeSantis for saying CRT is “divisive” and should not be taught in public schools.
Fried asked why “slavery” and “Jim Crow laws” should not be taught in schools, but took it a step further referencing systemic racism, a tenet of CRT.
“Unless you teach compassion and teach understanding, and make people know our history, how are we ever going to come together as a society and stop looking at race, and stop looking at religion, and look at us as the United States of America as a united front? The only way to do that combats it head-on, talk about the systemic racism that is in our state and our country, and anyone who says otherwise.”
Critical Race Theory is a set of ideals which gained traction among academic elites in the late 1980s birthed out of the Frankfurt School, a group of Critical Theorists and philosophers in the Marxist tradition.
According to an architect of CRT, Richard Delgado, said he defines CRT as a philosophy and worldview which “builds on the insights of two previous movements, critical legal studies and radical feminism.” The philosophy of CRT makes race the central prism through which the world is interpreted, where white people perpetuate cultural and economic “hegemony,” which oppresses minorities and people of color.
CRT results in people looking for “power imbalances, bigotry, and biases that it assumes must be present,” said James Lindsay, notable critic of CRT.
– – –
Grant Holcomb is a reporter at the Florida Capital Star and the Star News Network. Follow Grant on Twitter and direct message tips.
