When racists invade the private schoolhouse and public school boards

The Monday Musings!

Since January of this year, each week I have taught a history/civics class to a group of extremely intelligent Black middle school students at the Rise Anyabwele Academy, an online private school founded at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Ol’ Hobbs’s notes from a February class session

While my lectures have been age appropriate, the subject matter has encompassed many of the same topics that I explore within this blog, including the ghosts of racism past and how they impact the social and political order in the present. What has been a joy to me this semester is that my students already are well versed in matters that some adults are woefully deficient or, said adults having some knowledge, they tend to debate their feelings on social media in ways that reveal a lack of context and nuance.

My latest experiences as an educator inform why I was disturbed to read an article and series of Tweets about a middle school civics exercise that's caused considerable race based angst at the famous Boston Latin School (BLS), one that is among the most diverse in that city. 

Boston Latin School

The assignment required the 13 and 14-year-old students to "write about stereotypes about their neighborhoods - with the goal of then discussing and dealing with those biases." This task seems simple enough and, more crucially, strikes me as an excellent way to break through barriers that exist between races and other demographic designations.

Accordingly, one child responded by writing the following piece about West Roxbury, a majority white (and relatively wealthy) enclave in Boston:

To understand West Roxbury, you would have to be white and rich. The blue lives matter flags on almost every damn house. Those local stores on Centre street that are mad expensive for no reason. The Trump supporters. The anti-maskers. The old white people. The slightly racist white people. The Trump supporters. The anti-maskers.

To understand West Roxbury, you really gotta be there. The kids that play lacrosse, baseball or hockey, or all of the above. The CVS that laid off my sister. The Ohrenburger which I attended for 1 and a half years. The white girls who only wear white air forces. The Irish people. The people who get starbucks daily. That one star market I like time and time. The YMCA where Bryce Johnson gets those big gains. The 35 bus which I take almost every day. To understand West Roxbury you really gotta be rich and white."

Now, the child who penned this piece surely understood the assignment and wrote about stereotypes involving the economic (wealthy), political (Republican), ethnic (Irish), and social (pro-police) backgrounds of West Roxbury. To his or her credit, the child provided a range of areas for the class to discuss both implicit and explicit biases—as well as stereotypes—all in hopes of finding common ground or solutions. 

The problem is that certain parents and community members found the post to be "offensive" and, as is typical these days, screenshots were shared to Facebook and Twitter; right on schedule, the cries of white victimhood against people of color (POC) on social media were raised to a fevered pitch! While I will not give any spotlight to the racists who weighed in, I do highlight the Tweets of one poster who is just as perplexed by the faux outrage as I am:

Yep, instead of standing their academic ground and defending both the assignment and the perspective of the minority child who wrote the piece, Rachel Skerritt, the Head of School, and Jonathan Mullern, the Associate Head of School, issued apologies to the Boston Latin community. Their formal apology read, in pertinent part:

“It came to our attention earlier today that student assignments written about various neighborhoods in Boston as part of an 8th grade civic action project were recently posted in our school library. The intent of the assignment was for students to write personal pieces that consider stereotypes about the neighborhood in which they live, with the ultimate aim of countering biases from within and outside of their communities. However, the impact, particularly in some selections depicting West Roxbury and South Boston, was one where students saw stereotyped and disparaging statements about communities to which they belong...We deeply regret and apologize to members of our school community who were hurt or felt less welcome at BLS as a result of this display..."

When I read the school's apology, all that I could do was shake my head in disgust at the rank cowardice on display by the school's leadership. 

Still, I am not surprised by the school’s apologies because we exist in a time when white grievances matter more than the legitimate grievances of real victims of race based discrimination. All across America, the attack on teaching real history, done under the anti-Critical Race Theory banner, is just one side of a twisted coin; the other side consists of some whites claiming to be the victims of "reverse" discrimination by Blacks and other racial minorities. 

The logical flaw in the latter is that whites not only remain in the numerical majority in America, but they also continue to own over 90 % of Fortune 500 companies; 94 of the 100 members of the powerful U.S. Senate are white; the Federal judiciary is nearly 75 % white, which means that three out of four judges that interpret the laws of our land are white men and women! Not to mention that from bank loans, to land acquisition, to per capita income, those measures are skewed heavily in favor of whites over Blacks and other people of color. 

Thus, the idea that whites are in jeopardy of being “replaced” by people of color is not only patently false—but it is intellectually insulting. Sadly, because we exist in what I call the modern “Know-Nothing" era, one in which the loudest and most ignorant voices in the room push political agendas in Washington, statehouses, and among local school boards and civic leaders, racist right wing gibberish is increasingly becoming formal law and public policy.

From my point of vantage, the Boston Latin child’s poem allows for the intellectually curious to take a deep dive into the "why," such as, why are so many wealthy people Republicans instead of Democrats? Why do so many wealthy people automatically side with the Blue Lives Matter (Pro-Police) cries whenever Black Lives Matter is raised as a rallying cry following the death of an unarmed Black person? And yes, even the humorous inquiry into why do wealthy people pay $6.00 for a cup of Starbucks coffee when they can get a canister of Maxwell House crystals and drink coffee for days for much cheaper?

But nope, the Know-Nothings only want academic discourse that gives no thought to the historical plight of non-whites—while pushing the sophistry that questioning white privilege and white supremacy are akin to be being unpatriotic—and discriminatory against white people. Which is why I remind, again, that if we think our nation is now filled with blissfully ignorant types who head into election day voting based on what they saw on TV or heard on the radio, instead of their own deep contemplation of the issues and candidates for office, things will only get worse if parents and educators don't start pushing back against those who wish to run the school house (despite lacking the aptitude, credentials, or empathy to educate children from diverse backgrounds).

Thank you for subscribing to the Hobbserverion Point—have a great week!