The College Fix

An 18-year veteran professor of Texas A&M University has threatened to leave higher education if she’s not allowed to teach critical race theory.

Wendy Moore (pictured), who according to her faculty page is a sociologist who “focuses on the provocative intersections of race, law, and legal institutions” and “holds [critical race theory] seminars,” is miffed that Texas has banned the theory, or CRT, at the K-12 level … and is now looking at the universities.

Regarding such a move, Moore said “You know when they’re saying we don’t want anything that teaches that the United States is systemically racist well that’s not, everybody’s still teaching George Washington they’re just not teaching that he had slaves.”

She added that it’s “just another invitation to the conservative students who disagree with me to take action against me” and an “attack on empirical facts.”

While a bill to squelch CRT at the university level does exist, it currently has been stalled in the state legislature. But … does it outright ban the teaching of CRT?

Section 3, 2b of SB 16 reads “A faculty member of an institution of higher education may not compel or attempt to compel a student enrolled at the institution to adopt a belief that any race, sex, or ethnicity or social, political, or religious belief is inherently superior to any other race, sex, ethnicity, or belief” (emphasis added).

For me this means that Texas public colleges and universities cannot require students to take CRT-based classes and/or trainings. Teaching about the topic in an optional course should be fine, as long as a professor isn’t penalizing students for not parroting his/her beliefs about theory via grades or otherwise.

MORE: Nearly every U.S. state has introduced measures to combat critical race theory: report

Moore believes the U.S. is “systemically racist,” which is fine, but she or any other academic should not be able to punish students who challenge them, whether in class, on a test or in a research paper. This should be the case with any ethical teacher or professor.

I’m not accusing Moore of doing this, of course; however, for example, we’ve often seen how those enmeshed in CRT chide the quite rational belief in “colorblindness.” Delaware’s 2018 Teacher of the Year did so in a featured National Education Association newsletter article. In late 2020, a San Jose State University professor was called “racist” for her colorblind philosophy. An Oregon State U. philosophy professor even said “Star Trek’s” merit-based approach to its Starfleet is a “blind spot” because “in attempting not to see color, we may end up turning a blind eye to remaining racism.” In a 24th-century utopia. Riiiiight.

In Moore’s own case, her current research “focuses on how color-blind abstract laws of the post-Civil Rights era continue to facilitate racial hierarchy and white supremacy.”

I personally disagree with Texas Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick’s contention that teaching CRT should be “a cause for a tenured professor to be dismissed.” If college kids, who are legal adults, want to sign up for such a course, so be it. Even high schoolers who’re 18-yrs old or have a parent’s consent can have such an option.

The key word is “option.” Currently at Texas A&M, there are no mandatory critical race theory-based trainings for students,  but there’s at least one multiple-session “diversity training requirement” for staff.

Basically, Professor Moore would rather take her ball and go home, so to speak. And the media — just it has with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis’ efforts in his state, and elsewhere so-called “anti-trans” legislation and “book bans” which are anything but — continue to distort, overhype and outright lie about efforts designed to curtail questionable academic theory masquerading as fact.

Just look at how the reporter and chyron in the clip above frame Moore’s predicament: “costing her job.” No, it’s not. At this point, at least, the only thing costing Moore’s teaching position is Moore.

Moore currently is working on a book titled “The Legal Alchemy of White Domination” which looks into “how the United States Supreme Court deploys a structurally decontextualized white racial logic that discursively signals commitment to racial equality under the law, but functionally stalls progress toward racial equity, thereby providing continuous legal support for white domination.”

MORE: Professor fired for critical race theory criticism: lawsuit

IMAGE: Texas A&M screencap

Like The College Fix on Facebook / Follow us on Twitter