Conservatives made national headlines after school board meetings addressed Critical Race Theory being taught in classrooms. While most parents and teachers have felt obligated to outlaw the discriminatory teachings, others have sworn to teach it even if it’s against the law. The state of New Hampshire recently prohibited this discriminatory practice, even though a few dozen educators have already sworn to teach it even if they end up arrested.
It started with the “Zinn Pledge to Teach the Truth: Despite New State Bills Against It.” The website includes a complete list of teachers who signed the pledge to teach Critical Race Theory no matter what. The website includes a Martin Luther King Jr Quote and their pledge to “refuse to lie to young people about U.S history and current events.”
The site claims that the bills against CRT aim to “prohibit teachers from teaching the truth about this country,” which they say was founded on the dispossession of Native American slavery, structural racism, and oppression. CRT pushes the belief system that our country’s entities and institutions are systemically sexist, racist, and privileged.
Many instructors teach in conservative areas and signed the pledge saying that they would refuse to lie to young people. The educators find it acceptable to even conceal these beliefs from the parents who employ them. The pledge is named after Howard Zinn, who taught a class in Marxism at Communist Party Headquarters in Brooklyn.
Many teachers added their signatures with comments like “I will never stop teaching for justice” or “I will not let the White establishment silence me.” Some educators called anti-CRT laws an “attack on academic freedom and on the teaching of an important subject.”
But some teachers have panicked about facing retributions with their name being online. So far, the Zinn Pledge website has removed nearly 37 signatures of teachers who are not as “courageous” as they once were.
Seventh-grade teacher Romelo Green signed the pledge from Brookhaven, New York, but panicked after realizing his name was online. He contacted the Zinn Education Project and The Daily Wire to remove his name from the list.
When Daily Wire asked on what grounds he wanted his name removed, Green was all over the place. At first, he said he “may” have signed it and that he was looking for classroom materials when he found the site. But according to historical internet digging, Green didn’t “accidentally” sign the pledge. He typed out an entire paragraph talking about why he agreed with teaching CRT in the first place.
Green finally admits that he “just didn’t want people to know” because his views have changed and that he just wants his name removed. Green admits that he would not change his teachings methods, but simply avoid the phrase “Critical Race Theory.”
College senior Emma Niebaum also signed the pledge before admitting she didn’t even know what CRT was. She later retracted her testimony.
Others such as Ivy Liu, the board director of the Rocky Mountain Black Conservatives, have fought hard to outlaw the curriculum. Liu, an Asian-American and mother of five, said she felt obligated to fight the curriculum that is based entirely on racial identity. She said students were even asked to engage in racial bias and stereotyping activities. She said after doing extensive research, she found that CRT is really just a “doctrine principle” that pits one race against the other.
Most of the teachers looking to push this indoctrination are stealing taxpayer’s money to promote personal politics. If you break the law, then you need to be fired. Teachers breaking the law today are not examples of what students need (nor want) in the classroom.
