by Tamzin A. Rosenwasser, M.D.
Just as Karl Marx interpreted all of human history as a fight between the “proletariat” (oppressed) and the “capitalists” (oppressors) using a method I can only call “Illogical Abstractionism,” so also do the “critical race theorists” use a rigid abstraction to divide all of mankind into one of two groups.
Karl Marx had no understanding of history or the time course in human affairs. He never set foot in the situations he wrote about with such certainty. Stupid. The “revolt of the proletariat” never happened, because the people whose strengths did not include invention of machinery, or founding of factories, (the proletariat) became much more comfortable and wealthier as a result of the existence and work of those whose strengths did include those things (the capitalists). The capitalists provided useful work, and it was an enormous benefit to the workers (proletariat).
Could humanity have managed without refrigerators and automobiles? We did so for millennia. Do you want to return to a world without refrigeration or the other comforts brought to us thanks to capitalism?
To take abstract theories and apply them with deadly force to human beings does not appear to me to be a viable formula for happiness, or for unchaining anybody from any kind of oppression. In fact, we have history as our guide in judging the result of the abstract theories of Marxism as it was imposed in the Soviet Union. In all places where Marxism, Communism, Nazism, Fascism, and Socialism have been imposed, the major result is not tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, but millions of corpses. Where less force has been used, the most benign result of these economic and political systems has been economic stagnation and the blighting of human lives.
At least a few people do well. Not necessarily the people who are so eaten up with the abstract theories that have decided they must be imposed on everyone, but those who survive the brutal political power struggle—like Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Castro, and the Kims in North Korea. They live in luxury while people starve and suffer all around them. Marxists like Patrisse Cullors, the “Black Lives Matter” queen, may hope to remain on top but should remember that the revolution devours its children.
Perhaps a “trained Marxist” knows the story of Lavrentiy Beria, the chief of Stalin’s secret police. He bragged “Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime.” That seems to be very like the mantra of the “Critical Race Theorists.” Several months after Stalin’s death, this slave labor camp supervisor and torturer was summarily executed by his rivals.
Critical Race Theory’s view of the oppressor (whites) and oppressed (people of color) classes quickly leads to logical contradictions. Where is Barack Obama? He is half “white” on his mother’s side, and half “black” on his father’s side, whether his father was the elder Obama or Frank Marshall Davis. So, is half of Barack Obama oppressing the other half? Sounds schizoid, but of course, that’s why we have psychiatrists. The question also arises, which half is which? Does the left half oppress the right? The right side of the brain is not exactly the same as the left half, so right away we run into a problem. Same with the front side fighting the back. There are no eyes in the back of the head, so they are not exactly equal halves. I suppose maybe each cell could line up its mitochondria, and uncurl its chromosomes, and each divide into half. Obviously crazy, but crazier than dividing society by skin tone?
Psychiatry has not made much progress in treating sociopaths and psychopaths. Perhaps that is because those are moral diseases, not mental ones.
More conundrums: Are Arabs people “of color” They enslaved “black” Africans for centuries. In fact, they bought “black” people as slaves from other “black” people in Africa, and sold them to British slave-traders, or took them east to their lands, where they were enslaved. Arabs also enslaved “white” people. Do those “white” people somehow become “black” because they were oppressed? Do “black” people who enslaved other “black” people get transmogrified into “white” people?
Perhaps an easier solution would be for all oppressed people to identify as oppressed victims. It works for gender, so why not for race?
As we see, human beings and productive enterprises are not all that Critical Race Theory, Communism, Nazism, Fascism, and Socialism kill. They also kill reason and logic. They kill love and hope. They also try to kill faith in Jesus Christ, whose teachings led William Wilberforce to get rid of the slave trade in the British Empire. Think about it.
