Edward Feser, PhD, is Professor of Philosophy at Pasadena City College in Pasadena, California. Called by National Review “one of the best contemporary writers on philosophy,” he is the author of many books including Five Proofs of the Existence of God, By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed, The Last Superstition: A Refutation of the New Atheism, Aquinas, and Scholastic Metaphysics.
His most recent book is All One in Christ: A Catholic Critique of Racism and Critical Race Theory (Ignatius Press, 2022). Ryan Anderson, president of Ethics and Public Policy Center, describes it as “the best book I’ve read on the topic.” And Deacon Harold Burke-Sivers states it is an “absolute must-have for all Catholics who want to be well informed about racism and Critical Race Theory.”
An excerpt:
CWR: “Like Marxism,” you write, “CRT is a grave perversion of the good cause it claims to represent, and it is utterly incompatible with Catholic social teaching.” First, does CRT—historically, politically, philosophically—have a relationship with Marxism? Secondly, what is the crux of the incompatibility you mention?
Feser: Individual Marxists like Antonio Gramsci had a direct influence on the movement. Gramsci famously held that oppressive bourgeois power maintains itself by way of “hegemony” over the cultural assumptions and institutions of society. CRT posits the same sort of thing, except that it puts “white supremacy” in the driver’s seat instead of bourgeois economic power. Gramsci also advocated countering this hegemony by working to get an alternative, revolutionary Marxist worldview to permeate the institutions of society. CRT has adapted this into its own playbook, and the prevalence of CRT ideas in the universities, schools, government agencies, corporate human resources departments, and popular entertainment is the result.
In a more general way, CRT has been influenced by Marxism by way of the central Marxist theme that social life and history are at bottom about the struggle between inherently hostile classes. For the Marxist, these classes are to be understood in economic terms, with the struggle between them being the conflict between oppressive capitalists and exploited workers. CRT alters this by interpreting social life and history instead in racial rather than economic terms, as a war between the oppressive forces of “white supremacy” and oppressed “people of color.”
In this respect, CRT is disturbingly similar to German National Socialism, which also replaced the Marxist’s obsession with class with an obsession with race. The players are different insofar as for the Nazis the alleged oppressors were Jews and the allegedly oppressed group was the German nation. But the basic worldview is in other respects alarmingly similar. For CRT writers, as for the Nazis, absolutely everything is about race, no one can escape the perspective of his or her race, and races are inherently at odds….
The above comes from a Sept. 8 interview in Catholic World Report.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/iangels-demonsi-its-a-thr_b_189053
Remember when The DaVinci Code and its sequel came out and some Catholics claimed it was anti-Catholic and offensive and the Catholic church would not let it film in Churches in Rome.
And Ron Howard said it is not anti-Catholic. I think Catholics will like it. Just look at it as a mystery story.
This is the same kind of thing.
I used to believe that professors always knew what they were talking about. I’m glad I grew up and got educated. His statement is unworthy to be repeated.
Mary, I know Ed Feser as I worked at the same college (Pasadena City College, I in math, he in philosophy) and had opportunity to sit in on one of his classes. Agree with him or not, Dr. Feser is one of the more brilliant philosophical thinkers on the American scene. If you spend time on his blog, you, will find a high level of intellectual exchange between Ed and his detractors/supporters. One thing you will never find is unsupported generalities like yours. His is a brilliant mind but one that is able to communicate difficult ideas simply. If you take such exception to anything he has written, feel free to write him in order to tell him why is statement is unworthy. I am sure he would enjoy the exchange.
Dan, thank you for that comment. The interview is not good. I was thinking about buying the book because I was hoping that maybe he just had a short time and was trying to fit a lot in.
I will check out his blog.
I have no idea what statement you are referring to.
Mary Kate,
Dr. Feser’s comment about the similarity between German National Socialism and CRT is accurate and insightful. According to Nazi theory, all Jews had to be banished from Europe for the sake of civil society. According to the Nazis, the Jews were 100% unreformable and this disease to oppress others was inbred or genetic. Because of this, even the Jewish children had to be banished or killed for the sake of society.
Other than the advocacy for banishment and murder, what exactly is the difference between this component of Nazi philosophy and CRT philosophy?
What is CRT philosophy?
Nazis thought Jews were oppressing the Germans? What?
That was not the issue at all.
Not the issue,
If this wasn’t the issue, what was it?
Hitler felt that the Jews inherently worked against society and had a history of keeping the German people down. In addition, he felt that the Jews were instrumental in hurting Germany both economically through the Great Depression and politically through the Treaty of Versailles.
Hitler and the Nazi were trying to create a master race and wanted to get rid of races they thought were inferior.
Master Race,
It is true that Hitler tried to create a master race, but I don’t think he was trying to kill all inferior races.
For example, Hitler hated Slavs and he treated them poorly, but I don’t think he had any plans to get rid of them like he did with the Jews.
On Amazon, when looking up the books he mentions, you have to click to buy to even see the product details. I have only had this happen once before on amazon and it has been recently. I don’t have the same problem with anti-CRT books.
I find this interesting because no one explains what critical race theory is; they talk about what it is like.
How do you disagree with something that you don’t even know what it is?
What he seems to be reacting to is not critical race theory but certain individuals (some named, most unnamed) that he disagrees with who have written about critical race theory.
He seems to be reacting to generalizations and then does the same thing.
I’m sure the book is better.
My generalization is that what people are really reacting to is what they perceive as racism, not critical race theory.
It is a theory so it is not going to be strictly true in the real world.
And generalizing again, most of what I see being complained about are sentences in school books or school assignments.
We know that CRT is not taught at the elementary and high school levels. What some fear, I would generalize just to keep up with the apparent genre of this discussion, is that our school children will learn the truth about some aspects of our history. Some laws make it a crime to teach anything that might make a student feel uncomfortable about the actions of people in our history; read that as White folks. They don’t want White kids to have to explain the Trail of Tears, the Japanese Internment, the taking of land from indigenous people, and putting them on reservations where they could not live and feed themselves. They don’t want their kids to consider that Jefferson had slaves, or that Wahington had over 200 slaves. They don’t want their kids to know that their army killed off entire villages in Vietnam in order to “save it.” They don’t want their kids to know that …
Why on earth is it a problem to explain why Jefferson had slaves?
Well duh. They dont have to explain it. All that happened in the past. They didnt commit any of those acts. We don’t believe in collective guilt.
It is disturbing that a guy would try to equate a group who proclaimed themselves a superior race with a group that tries to understand why they have always been treated as an inferior race.
Only to someone who has San Francisco values.
My Fellow,
Hitler’s view of the superiority of Germany and German culture was not the main driver for his persecution of the Jews.
Also, I might add, it is wrong for a person who feels that they’re aggrieved to adopt false views in regard to his opponent. This is one reason why our culture has become so crippled.
https://uscatholic.org/articles/202107/critical-race-theory-and-catholicism-go-hand-in-hand/
https://www.americamagazine.org/faith/2021/07/06/critical-race-theory-catholic-teaching-240972
You want to know what CRT is? A BLM executive embezzled $10 million dollars from BLM, and when other executives sued her to get the money back, she accused them of acting white and oppressing her.
acting white, no that is not CRT
Yes it is… CRT is a scam for grifters to get grants and for elites to advance Marxism
A $500,000 grant from the National Science Foundation funded a 22-page “study” that used Critical Race Theory to argue that physics was racist, in part because it rewards students for getting the right answer and uses whiteboards.
You see, CRT says that if blacks aren’t getting the right answers compared to whites and Asians, it must be because of racism. So the answer is to dumb down standards so that grading and graduation outcomes for blacks are equitable. Truth doesn’t matter in CRT; only equitable outcomes matter. Blacks are committing more crime than other groups? That’s because of racism, not because of anything wrong with the culture of ghetto black inner-city America. If you say something is wrong with black culture, you’re racist.
Good luck getting to Mars in a rocket ship designed by someone who got a degree in physics because of CRT equitable grading policies. Good luck living in a state, such as Illinois, which in January 2023 is eliminating incarceration of suspects accused of violent crimes while they await trial. If you complain about being a victim of crime, well that’s just your white privilege, so check it.
That’s CRT.
Oh ye of little knowledge! Look up the word “critical” as defined in an academic context. It does not mean “criticizing”.
Sheesh. The word “critical” is not being used in an objective sense in CRT. It’s being used exactly as criticizing dominant social structures, laws, attitudes and social mores when there are unequitable group outcomes. CRT means criticizing white culture and dismantling “whiteness” to favor blacks so that blacks and whites as groups have the same outcomes in everything. Blacks being jailed more than whites? Solution is to stop punishing blacks for crime. Yep, that’s what CRT is and amounts to. Blacks not graduating at the same rate as whites? Solution is to lower standards so that more blacks graduate, even if they aren’t learning or achieving. Yep, that’s what CRT is and advocates.
CRT is social poison. CRT is evil. CRT will foment a race war, which is what Democrats want because they think it’s in their political interests to fragment this country and pit races against each other. Don’t fall for it.
One of the mistakes you are making is seeing “white” as biological race; that is not what they are talking about.
CRT proponents see white as an oppressive class. Blacks can be white if they act white, meaning if they don’t support blacks sufficiently against whiteness. What that means practically, is that blacks who are law abiding and want punishment for criminals are acting white. Blacks who want standards at school, the same standards for everyone, are acting white. Blacks who insist that correct answers in math and physics should be required are acting white.
Why are there so few Catholic prison ministries?
Has anyone here been incarcerated?
I was in the ToonTown jail for a minute, posing for a picture.
Has anyone been in the military?
OR worked as a first responder?
Has anyone here been an astronaut? Or a film director?
Pray the Magnificat.
Crt is antiWhitism. Fewer doesn’t want to say that, so it Marxist and socialist and hitler and Stalin. No it’s antiWhite hate.
So fewer covers all bases here. He pats Whites on the head who are genuinely worried about crt, and says, you are right, it’s evil, but it’s bout ideology, not race.
Then he tries to say that racism is bad, but there are no races.
So he can tell the dean at his next performance review that he is an obedient colorblind White, while simultaneously calling out crt so he keeps his in with the conservatives.
Oh, and the cover is extra ghey
It’s been a week and nobody can say what CRT is.