CRT at the US Air Force Academy

In an op-ed published by the Washington Post, a professor at the United States Air Force Academy provides an object lesson on how Critical Race Theory is foisted on unsuspecting service members.

Much like the “history” provided by groups like the 1689 Project, professors like Lynne Chandler García defend the teaching of Critical Race Theory under the guise of “understanding a fuller version of American history.” She claims in the op-ed that CRT doesn’t promote division among service members. She writes:

As a professor of political science at the U.S. Air Force Academy, I teach critical race theories to our nation’s future military leaders because it is vital that cadets understand the history of the racism that has shaped both foreign and domestic policy.

the United States was founded on a duality: liberalism and equal rights on the one hand; inequality, inegalitarianism and second-class citizenship on the other.”

This is purposefully ignorant of the truth – that upon the founding of the United States, slaves were not considered “second-class citizens.” They were (immorally) not considered citizens at all. This did not expose a systemic flaw in the document itself, but the wrong definitions that were used to interpret it.

In the same way, modern CRT proponents have shifted the definition of words and concepts like “racism,” “oppression,” and “white” in order to move the ground underneath the discussion and create an alternate history of the United States that sees our past sins as irreparable, systemic, and part of the nature of our citizens. Its effect is to turn Americans against each other.

García repeats statistics referencing disparities between whites and blacks in the Air Force and Space Force in terms of promotions and disciplinary actions, and expects her readers to read systemic racism into these realities without any scholarly engagement or skeptical analysis. She finishes her op-ed with a comparison between the courage required to jump out of a plane or go into combat and the supposed courage needed to read books promoting Critical Race Theory.

Real courage in the Air Force Academy would be to encourage cadets to see each other as instrinsicly valuable people who are more valuable as individuals than when roped into groups based on their skin color, and that the military is a place they can pursue their career aspirations by their hard work and honorable commitment to duty. Instead of teaching military service members that they carry forward an honorable and noble tradition of selfless service, they are being told they perpetuate a system that is racist in origin and they are either benefactors of the sins of the past or victims of it.

Critical Race Theory and the Marxist ideology that underpins it are anti-constitutional and should be taught to service members in the context of their duty to oppose it.