We Mustn’t Let What Happened to Labour Happen to Critical Race Theory (For Jess Green)
There’s been lots of chat on Critical Race Theory, so I wrote this poem after a piece I heard performed by Jess Green at an open-mic night in Kettering, Run Your Tongue open-mic (2018).
when I was doing my undergrad at university,
it was by chance I found out about Critical Race Theory
that there was scholarship that articulated my encounters
with Britain, as numerous just pass racism off as banter
I found out my life is also grounded in an academic position
pioneered by the likes of Richard Delgado and Patricia Williams
but Kemi says that critical race theory is regressive and racist
and she’s showing how Whiteness is more than white faces
in that debate, you saw this was more than denial
as she then proceeded to put Black Lives Matter on trial
but when you follow the theory in theorisation
you will find writings from Angiolini and Macpherson
and Sofia Akel’s research into Goldsmiths education
racial disparities in policing, prisons and healthcare
this framework of seeing is unpicking the affair
between race, racism, power and the law
I can hear Tories splashing with the turning of oars
saying white privilege shouldn’t be taught as facts
with anti-capitalism oft seen as equivalent to reading the Riot Act
see CRT leaning into how society operates in relation to race
see CRT leaning into unpicking Britain in the context of nation and state
see CRT as vessel to discussing decolonising the curriculum
see CRT as a way to make young people love their education system
see CRT leaning into how we discuss the school-to-prison pipeline
see CRT leaning into how POCs are left to die on the faultlines
see CRT leaning into race and racism’s intersections with class
see CRT exploring its intersections with Britain’s colonialist past
see CRT looking at race intersecting with LGBT, culture and disability
see CRT lending a lens to how we interact together with our community.
Labour is lost (for now), protect CRT.
