May 28, 2021

"A bill signed into law by Oklahoma governor Kevin Stitt bans lessons that include the concept that 'one race or sex is inherently superior to another race or sex,' that a person's 'moral character is inherently determined by his or her race or sex,' or..."

"... that someone should feel discomfort, guilt or distress on account of their race or sex. Nonetheless, educators say the newly adopted and proposed laws are already forcing teachers to second guess whether they can lead students in conversations about race and structural racism that many feel are critical at a time the nation is navigating an important reckoning on those issues.... Paula Lewis, chair of the Oklahoma City School Board, said though the state's new law bans teachers from discussing concepts they weren't discussing anyway, and though its penalties are not yet clear, the danger is the fear it instills. 'What if they say the wrong thing?' Lewis said. 'What if somebody in their class during the critical thinking brings up the word oppression or systemic racism? Are they in danger? Is their job in danger?'"

From "Teachers Say Laws Banning Critical Race Theory Are Putting A Chill On Their Lessons" (NPR).

This is another example of the notion of outlawing something that nobody's doing anyway. I'm not saying that it's true that no one was doing it or threatening to do it. I'm just observing that it's a form of argument against a law. 

Instead of arguing that X should be legal, the argument is don't outlaw X because no one is doing X. You might want the opponents of the law against X to say whether they think X should be illegal, but they don't want to answer that question. They want to accuse the proponents of the law against X of wanting to send a hostile message or scare people who are doing something in the vicinity of X.

Here's where I discussed this concept before: "What is the objection to a law against something that we're told no one is doing anyway?"(discussing the Tennessee ban on transgender hormone treatments for prepubescent children, which "some experts" said was not within current medical practice).

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