The Megyn Kelly Show - A Teacher Speaks Out： Paul Rossi on Critical Race Theory and Anti-Racist Teachings ＂Demonizing＂ Kids at his School ｜ Ep. 93

00:00:00.480 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.

00:00:12.000 Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show.

00:00:15.440 Today on the program, we have this man who you need to listen to, Paul Rossi.

00:00:22.380 He has been in the news lately. We just taped with him.

00:00:25.040 And I'm stunned by how thoughtful he is, his grace, what he willingly put himself through for the good of his students.

00:00:34.180 You may or may not know the name by now because he is the teacher at this very tiny private New York school called Grace Church,

00:00:43.120 who as a math teacher put out a public letter saying,

00:00:47.460 I refuse to allow you to continue indoctrinating these children. 0.97

00:00:51.260 And spoke up on behalf of his kids who were being told that they were white supremacists by virtue of their pigmentation,

00:01:01.640 not through anything they'd done.

00:01:03.160 The faculty and the students were told that any questioning of the dogma being shoved down their throats in the name of critical race theory,

00:01:11.480 just the questioning was somehow dehumanizing and damaging to, you know, their fellow students and people of color and so on.

00:01:20.020 And here you have this guy who just stood up and said no more.

00:01:25.720 It took a lot of guts.

00:01:27.740 And sadly, they've now taken away his job.

00:01:32.240 It's so infuriating.

00:01:34.300 It's like it's infuriating.

00:01:37.660 I want you to know him.

00:01:39.020 I'm really honored that he gave me his first sit down discussion on this because it's important and it is a long form.

00:01:46.180 These are the moments where I love podcasting.

00:01:48.240 And this could not have been handled on the Kelly file the way we just handled it with Paul, right?

00:01:53.580 Like where you can actually get into it and you can talk about the history and how did he find himself in this position?

00:01:58.700 What did Grace Church do?

00:02:00.000 And how did it go from like the slow boil to the full five alarm fire boil?

00:02:06.240 He's going to walk us through it.

00:02:07.440 And, you know, you may have seen in the news his head of school basically called him a liar and Paul made tapes.

00:02:14.720 And you're going to hear them and you'll figure out for yourself very quickly who, in fact, is the liar in this situation.

00:02:20.840 Anyway, it's my honor to bring this guy to you.

00:02:23.480 We'll get to Paul Rossi in one second.

00:02:26.140 But first this.

00:02:26.900 Paul, how are you?

00:02:33.660 Hi, Megan.

00:02:34.580 It's a pleasure to talk to you.

00:02:36.380 How are you doing?

00:02:37.560 I'm doing well.

00:02:38.380 I'm holding up.

00:02:39.660 Thanks for having me on.

00:02:41.180 Thanks for doing this.

00:02:42.340 I, you know, I've been thinking about you since your letter came out, which I think is truly one of the bravest things I've seen anybody do in this whole school mess that we've been dealing with for months now.

00:02:53.320 And and you're you're the only faculty member I've seen speak out in this way.

00:02:59.520 And that carries particular risks.

00:03:02.140 Right.

00:03:02.600 You're like sort of the the K through 12 version of Jody Shaw in a way.

00:03:06.580 She wasn't she was an administrative assistant. 0.99

00:03:08.960 But you knew very well that there's going to be backlash.

00:03:13.320 And indeed, there has been.

00:03:15.380 So let's just start at the beginning, because you and I are both in New York City.

00:03:19.100 I've got kids that, well, you know, my daughter's still at one of these same Tony schools, not not Grace Church, but another one.

00:03:27.940 And she's leaving.

00:03:29.400 We know I've made that clear.

00:03:30.580 We already pulled our boys from their school.

00:03:33.380 But Grace Church is one of one of the greatest schools in the country.

00:03:36.880 It's very exclusive.

00:03:38.420 It's very expensive.

00:03:39.780 And it's got a bunch of celebrity alums and kids of celebrities there.

00:03:45.860 And just give give the audience a feel for just how elite an institution it is, if you wouldn't mind.

00:03:50.660 Well, I believe that, yes, we do have quite a lot of, you know, celebrities and wealthy children and wealthy parents at the school.

00:04:00.720 I'm not sure that we have as many celebrities as some of the other famous schools in the in the independent school world.

00:04:09.240 Independent school is is the fancy way of saying private school, or I guess it's the not so fancy way.

00:04:15.160 But we are, you know, we're a very high priced institution.

00:04:19.740 I think we're at fifty seven thousand dollars a year now.

00:04:23.640 And there is substantial financial aid.

00:04:25.840 I think we have the, you know, at Grace Church School offers, you know, the most financial aid or they like to they claim so.

00:04:34.000 I'm not sure. I haven't seen the numbers myself of of any of similar schools.

00:04:38.700 So they're trying.

00:04:39.340 I mean, they they like most of these, quote, independent, which, right, is code for private schools.

00:04:44.300 And they've made an effort, a conscious effort to reach out and get more minority students enrolled so that the student body can be more diverse.

00:04:53.880 Right. I'm I'm assuming that's true just based on the numbers I've read and what I've read about the school.

00:04:59.200 Yes, that's right. And so that's kind of what's being offered here.

00:05:02.680 I mean, if you think of an independent school as a kind of engine that moves forward, if it offers different things to different groups and different people that apply.

00:05:12.080 So diversity is something that is really important for applicants that come to the school because that's something that colleges value.

00:05:21.660 But it's also something that I think rightly so.

00:05:24.640 The parents recognize that it's a changing world.

00:05:26.980 And if if if their children can, you know, have experience with friends of all different backgrounds and income levels, that's going to be better for them as human beings.

00:05:36.740 And I think they're right about that.

00:05:38.800 Yep. Agreed. I've been saying that all along, that I really think that the way you raise a non racist is by exposing your children to great people of all races.

00:05:51.340 I mean, just it doesn't I don't think it has to be more complicated than that.

00:05:55.600 Just immerse them in a field of people of all different backgrounds and skin colors and cultures.

00:06:01.940 And then they'll see just like anybody, you know, black people, white people, brown people.

00:06:07.480 They can be awesome. They can be flawed. They can be offensive. They can be loving it.

00:06:11.960 Like that's the way you do it. But of course, we've gone a different way.

00:06:15.420 So let's just start back to you're at your Grace Church, you're teaching math, as I understand it, for how many years?

00:06:22.880 This has been my ninth year teaching math.

00:06:25.700 I started with the high school, the inaugural faculty in 2012 when Grace opened a ninth grade and in a new building just down the street from their K through eight campus, which which they they had had for 100 years or so.

00:06:41.600 So this was a new thing.

00:06:42.900 When did you first start to see the change in curriculum, in messaging and sort of this obsessive focus on race?

00:06:55.620 It's it's a little bit blurry, the timeline, but I I believe it can be traced to, you know, 2015.

00:07:00.900 Although in 2012, we all faculty from from the beginning of the school, we had to complete this training called Undoing Racism with an institute called the bizarrely named People's Institute for Survival and Beyond.

00:07:16.920 And I did that training in the third year.

00:07:20.980 So I did that in 2014, I believe.

00:07:24.420 And that was quite an experience that was very interesting.

00:07:27.080 And that was sort of my first introduction to what was to come.

00:07:30.620 But in 2016, I believe, the school, I could be wrong, I could be off by a year or so, but they changed their mission to include anti-racism as part of their mission.

00:07:46.560 And as they as they informed the faculty and the staff, they did this because diversity, equity and inclusion were no longer enough.

00:07:55.420 It was no longer enough to be diverse, equitable and inclusive.

00:07:58.120 We had to be anti-racist.

00:07:59.880 And this was a decision that was made at the board level.

00:08:03.000 And it was it was laid out before us that there would be no debate.

00:08:05.900 There would be no discussion about it.

00:08:07.640 This was a commitment that we were all expected to make.

00:08:11.680 And and later I found out that I believe it was due to a board retreat.

00:08:16.240 The board of trustees went on a retreat, I think, over the summer with a an outfit called the the Carl Institute.

00:08:24.020 Um, the Carl Institute, um, I think it's was, uh, yeah, there, there, the Carl, Carl is an acronym C-A-R-L-E and it stands for the critical analysis of race and learning and education.

00:08:38.600 So I think this was when, when grace really cast its lot with the new orthodoxy.

00:08:44.940 And since then, um, there have been several, um, hires for, you know, staffing positions in, um, diversity, equity and inclusion and belonging.

00:08:56.340 And they, they've created, uh, office of community engagement, um, various, there's an institutional culture committee.

00:09:04.300 And so there are these several, this, this increase of bureaucratic, um, aspects to how the anti-racist programming is delivered and managed and, um, how it has, you know, spread as a pedagogical priority through the various disciplines in the school.

00:09:23.680 So this is in 16, you said that that's interesting because that's, that's kind of early, right?

00:09:28.040 Like we've all been seeing it explode over the past year, but grace church was on the leading edge of that along with schools like Dalton and, you know, we'll get to how that's worked out.

00:09:38.900 But so you were sort of ahead of the curve on that in a, in a way that we were early adopters, I would say.

00:09:46.200 Not so great.

00:09:46.720 So, so what, what did that look like?

00:09:48.840 Cause I can tell you, for example, at the, at the school, our daughter goes to, they're very bought into all of this stuff.

00:09:55.700 They've got the Pollyanna program on race and what they, what they've been doing though, thus far, it's going to change.

00:10:03.420 But what they've been doing is offering those so-called courageous conversations, retreats with, you know, these controversial figures who, you know, say very racist things and so on, but it's optional.

00:10:17.120 So the parents can do it if they want, they don't have to do it.

00:10:20.720 And I think, okay, that's fine.

00:10:22.880 Optional is one thing mandated for faculty mandated for teachers is something very different.

00:10:27.700 What, what was your experience at least starting in 16?

00:10:32.040 Well, they eased us into it, I would say.

00:10:34.200 And so I think they, they sensed that there might be resistance if they, if they piled it on on us all at once.

00:10:41.220 You know, maybe that's a little conspiratorial, maybe what it was, it was just a gradual evolution of, of the spread of the ideas in the school.

00:10:49.440 But I think it was, there was an early meeting where we all got together.

00:10:52.760 I think it was during a faculty meeting and they said, well, what does, you know, we'd like to ask you, what does anti-racism mean to you?

00:10:58.200 And I, you know, most people, I think myself included thought, well, that's just not being racist, you know, that's being, that's judging individuals as, you know, on their character and not the color of their skin, which is really, you know, what, what the common sense answer to what is anti-racism is.

00:11:16.620 So, you know, I, they said, oh yeah, that's, that's good.

00:11:21.840 You know, and they sort of, they were trying to get people talking and have honest conversations and, you know, not much happened after that immediately, but I really knew that something was headed in the wrong direction when, I think maybe a year later or perhaps 2017, the timeline's a little blurry for me.

00:11:41.940 So I apologize if anyone's checking up on that, but they put a, they handed out this pyramid.

00:11:48.620 So the pyramid of white supremacy or pyramid of racism, not sure what exactly which it was, but it's a pyramid and at the top is genocide.

00:11:59.560 And so with, and there are various levels of the pyramid.

00:12:02.100 So you have, you know, overt white supremacy or overt racism and below that you have, you know, covert racism and then indifferent, there's an indifference layer.

00:12:11.940 And there were things on this pyramid like, you know, there are two sides to every story or things like funding locally sourced schools or things that were part of the democratic party platform or things that were common sense, like, you know, why can't we all get along?

00:12:35.820 Or, you know, things that are essentially commonsensical ways for people to interact with each other.

00:12:43.680 And one of the most disturbing things that they had were two things right next to each other.

00:12:48.240 One of them was, you know, not believing POC, not believing people of color was one of the things on the pyramid. 0.79

00:12:57.880 And right next to it was, but my black friend said, meaning you're supposed to listen to people of color.

00:13:02.580 So this, this hodgepodge of contradictory things and including, you know, making things that I consider to be virtues and devices by arranging them on a schema that puts genocide, you know, in that schema, I refuse to teach it.

00:13:20.320 I went to the, I went to the, I think the then Dean of Equity and Inclusion and I said, I can't teach this.

00:13:26.940 And they went, okay, okay, you know, we're not going to make you do it.

00:13:32.100 It's fine.

00:13:32.680 You know, maybe you need, maybe you're not ready.

00:13:35.380 Right.

00:13:35.740 And so they, you know, there's a, there's always a little back and forth there.

00:13:39.200 And I must say that I must commend them on being flexible.

00:13:41.880 And, and, you know, if people didn't want to do something, they wouldn't push it on you too much.

00:13:45.980 Um, and, you know, but the framework that they, that they use internally is always towards the faculty, you know, you need more training or you're not ready, or maybe we can send you to some professional development that will help you.

00:14:00.440 You know, essentially, um, you're not, you're, you're ignorant is, is the implication that you don't understand what you, what you need to do and that, that we're going to help you.

00:14:11.140 So it's very, it's very cult-like and the idea that someone could actually understand the schema fully and disagree with it is not, is, is not ever considered.

00:14:20.500 Right.

00:14:21.020 It's not an option.

00:14:21.560 I'm actually looking at it right now that this pyramid of white supremacy, right? 0.93

00:14:25.320 That the worst, the top is genocide, mass murder, unjust police shootings, reading from the pyramid now, lynching, hate crimes.

00:14:32.520 That's the farthest end of the white supremacy pyramid, but also on the list, as you go down and the pyramid gets wider is some of the, are the things that you're talking about.

00:14:44.160 And it's so in the, in the eye of the beholder, right?

00:14:47.820 Like what you just said, not believing experiences of POC, people of color.

00:14:54.300 That what comes to mind is the girl at Smith college who said I was kicked out of the dorm for eating while black.

00:15:01.320 Meanwhile, it turned out she was not supposed to be in that dorm.

00:15:04.800 Anybody would have been kicked out.

00:15:06.240 It was made very clear to all students.

00:15:07.800 They were not allowed.

00:15:08.440 It was a closed dorm for the period.

00:15:10.220 She got three sort of low level staffers fired who had done nothing wrong.

00:15:16.540 We don't have to believe it's the, it's like the believe all women thing. 0.90

00:15:20.620 Wait, you don't come with a special truth gene based on your pigmentation or your gender, your, your lady parts or otherwise.

00:15:29.960 Right.

00:15:30.460 And, and that's what it like, it's absurd to say that because I might not believe the quote experience of a person of color.

00:15:39.440 However, I belong on the white supremacy scale.

00:15:43.380 So this is, you, you're trying to say, I'm not going to teach that because it's anti-factual.

00:15:48.660 And their response is sweet Paul, you, you'll get there.

00:15:53.380 You'll get there.

00:15:54.000 Yeah.

00:15:54.280 Like, yeah.

00:15:54.880 Because I, I saw this at our school where one of the slides that was presented at, this is our, our boy's school that we were at.

00:16:01.240 It, what was presented was something like how you bring people along from their white supremacy.

00:16:06.440 And one of the slides was like, they'll be in denial at first.

00:16:09.680 And you just kind of have to work with them until they get over their denial of all of the stuff on this pyramid.

00:16:15.920 And then finally they'll come along and, and, you know, but you have to like, you have to deal with them in their position of bargaining when they're, where they're fighting to let go of their supremacy.

00:16:25.340 Mm-hmm.

00:16:27.000 Yeah.

00:16:27.980 Yeah.

00:16:28.460 It's, it's, um, they've created a sort of a timeline and a scale where enlightenment is at the end of some long journey, which is the work.

00:16:37.520 Um, and you know, this is common of all cults, right?

00:16:40.880 I mean, I think Scientology, Scientology does a similar thing.

00:16:44.800 Um, you know, I don't know if there's any Scientologists out there, but I, I find lots of similarities there.

00:16:49.980 You know, this idea that there are things inside there, you have biases inside you, which are very hard to detect, but, you know, with practice, you're going to be able to detect them.

00:17:00.380 It's very much like Thetans, uh, as somebody described me recently, you know, these, whenever you have a widely distributed, um, set of, set of problems that have low effect sizes and are hard to detect, but they're everywhere.

00:17:14.920 Then you, then you're entering the danger zone, uh, with, with any type of belief system.

00:17:20.000 And, and if you're, if, if they're expressed as a negative thing or they're, they're, they're tied to the negative things, then, then you, it, it leads to, in a general sense, it leads to sort of witch hunts and, and purges and things like that.

00:17:36.100 You're right about the Thetans.

00:17:37.100 So that's, that's a Scientology thing.

00:17:38.960 And in Scientology, if you question any of their crazy beliefs, and I realized a lot of religions have some crazy foundations that, you know, if you really take a hard look, but they literally worshiped a clam.

00:17:51.680 Um, if you challenge any of that, you're deemed, and I quote, a suppressive person, which I am informed by one of the top grand poobahs of Scientology.

00:18:00.320 I have been labeled a suppressive person.

00:18:02.720 I'm an SP.

00:18:03.660 So it's Tom Cruise and I are never going to have a relationship.

00:18:06.160 And that's okay.

00:18:08.560 That's okay.

00:18:09.420 Exactly.

00:18:09.860 But just, just to, to finish it off, looking at the pyramid that they wanted you to teach.

00:18:14.880 One of the things, um, on here is saying, um, I want to remain a political.

00:18:21.140 That's not okay.

00:18:22.400 You, you must get political.

00:18:24.520 And they certainly don't mean become a Trump supporter.

00:18:28.300 Um, another thing is of avoiding confrontation with racist family members.

00:18:34.460 We've seen some of that recently on Twitter saying, oh, now that the pandemic is, you know, coming to a close and people are getting vaccinated, you haven't seen your grandparents in a long time.

00:18:43.840 It is still your duty to get in there and challenge their racism. 0.96

00:18:46.740 So it's like, Nana, Nana, so good to see you, you racist PO. 0.98

00:18:53.620 Gosh. 0.66

00:18:54.400 Well, uh, you know, uh, the, the politics, um, doesn't affect me thing is important too, because it makes sense from, from, from their point of view, because in their view, everyone is already political, whether you admit it or not.

00:19:06.540 Um, so because of our social position in society, um, you are politicized from birth by simply existing while oppressed or, or, or an oppressor.

00:19:18.100 So you, you don't, you, according to them, you don't have the option, you know, um, well, if you, if you do have the option to not think about politics, well, then you are privileged.

00:19:27.520 Uh, so even just saying that trying to even approach things in an apolitical way is, is, you know, a kind of, um, political statement.

00:19:37.980 And part of your white supremacy.

00:19:39.940 I'm looking at one of the other things on this higher up on the list of sins is, um, minimization.

00:19:46.860 And that one of the quotes is we all belong to the human race.

00:19:50.380 And I'm thinking of Daryl Davis, right?

00:19:52.600 Who's like literally he's a black man who's literally gotten grand wizards to leave the KKK just by being amazing.

00:20:01.860 Not, not trying to proselytize, just sort of sitting with them and showing them what a black man is actually like.

00:20:09.100 And he's part of this group fair, which I know, you know, you've, you've been working with two foundation against intolerance and racism.

00:20:15.580 Daryl Davis, black man says that in the promo for fair about, you know, belonging to that one race, the human race.

00:20:21.460 So he too is a white supremacist, according to this, who needs to be deprogrammed of his internalized, I guess it would be internalized hatred. 0.93

00:20:32.680 So this is how insane this stuff is. 0.95

00:20:34.940 So it comes to you.

00:20:36.340 They want you to start teaching it, like teaching it or just understanding it.

00:20:41.140 Cause you, you know, you teach math.

00:20:42.900 So like, yeah, I get the pyramid.

00:20:45.140 That might be helpful in math.

00:20:46.340 Like how is this supposed to affect your teaching?

00:20:48.700 Yes.

00:20:49.480 Well, so, you know, one of the things that all the teachers are expected to do of any subject is to also, you know, most, I would say, you know, 90% of the teachers have an advisory.

00:20:58.120 So it's a small, you're probably familiar with this.

00:21:00.660 It's a small group that you kind of shepherd through their four years at the institution and you hear their problems and you work with them and you're there.

00:21:07.960 You're like a confidant, you know, to, for them to come to, if they have questions about, you know, social problems or academic issues, you can run interference with teachers.

00:21:16.620 And grace builds in a substantial amount of advisory time so that advisors can, I guess I would say, talk about things that are important to the community or the social life of the school.

00:21:30.140 And one, and they're, they're, they're giving me this pyramid was, you know, they said, we, we blocked out time during advisory time, which is maybe 15 minutes a day for you to discuss this pyramid and, um, and start introducing it.

00:21:45.200 And that's when I, I refused to do the pyramid.

00:21:47.500 So they initially said, okay, you know, we're, we're going to bring you along because you're definitely on the pyramid, Paul.

00:21:54.860 I'm on the pyramid.

00:21:55.880 Yeah, I believe in one human race, uh, color me problematic.

00:22:01.400 Absolutely.

00:22:02.740 So then how did it, how did it escalate?

00:22:05.000 Well, um, I would say that because of racialized incidents in the broader society, the presence of Trump and the, and the, uh, the effect that that was having on, um, on sort of, you know, people's psyche, frankly,

00:22:27.000 and also, uh, racial incidents within the school, um, that were, I, I don't want to, you know, I don't want to discount them because there are racist, you know, that does happen.

00:22:40.500 You have different cultures coming into conflict, you know, when you have kids from different backgrounds and there are things that happen, um, but they, they all get fed into this framework.

00:22:51.240 So when, you know, if somebody sings the N word along to say a Drake song or something in mixed company, um, and it gets out, then someone can be, you know, this is a symptom of 400 years of oppression all of a sudden.

00:23:05.340 So individual events that are, that are, that are misunderstandings between, you know, 13 or 14 year olds are being, um, blown up to, to be an, to, to, to reflect some huge, vast historical framework for understanding, um, our country and our country's history.

00:23:28.280 And so the weight of all this just creates a, an opportunity for conflict, um, and, you know, of course, there's also things happening external to the school that are generating conflict, uh, because it feeds into what they're teaching so that it, you know, it, it creates, it can create a lot of, I want to say, um, you know, a lot of upset, a lot of, a lot of anger.

00:23:54.100 Sure. Yeah. I, you know, I was just thinking about this in the context of inconsistent parenting. Now, if you had the loving parent who is kind and, you know, a squish and, you know, is a soft place to fall, who then snaps and responds to a small transgression as though you're a Hitler-esque kid. 0.70

00:24:14.860 And it's very destabilizing and it's very damaging to a kid's mental health. And I see this as an example of that, right? Like a kid, these schools are small and, and the kids are there for 12 plus years with a very small, and the grades are like 50 kids.

00:24:34.540 And so they know everybody and it's supposed to be a safe environment. And suddenly one transgression, like the one you speak of, right? Repeating a Drake song with the N word in it. And you get no benefit of the doubt. To the contrary, you're treated like you're at the top of this pyramid with the genocidal lynchers. 0.93

00:24:54.440 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

00:25:24.440 Right.

00:25:28.440 Right. Well, you know, and they, this really gets to the heart of, of the sequence of the way the curriculum around anti-racism is, is taught and it's, and how it's happening earlier and earlier. You know, Pollyanna, we, we, I think it was last year, we, we actually piloted their K through eight, I believe their, you know, K through eight curriculum.

00:25:52.740 And, you know, as early as sixth grade, they are, they will, they will try to get them to get a social identity before they've even formed their individual identity. So identity development is complex. You're trying to develop your, your personality, your interests, your aspirations, your, your affections.

00:26:13.800 All of these things are internal to the self and you're expressing and they're coming out. Now, what they do is they say, you know, yes, you have this individual identity and everyone is special.

00:26:24.420 But what you also have is a social identity and they talk about race and gender and, and, and how society sees you and, and how, you know, these, these categories have persisted through time, through, you know, yes, real oppressive conditions.

00:26:40.420 And they have been in, you know, in the case of race, you know, one thing I actually agree with on critical history is that, that history is one-sided, but it is true in the sense that, you know, race is a construct that was created to, to, you know, maintain impressive relationships through, through the history of the country.

00:27:02.400 But, you know, there's, you know, there's, they're saying that who you are as an individual is subordinate, subordinate to these social factors because, you know, in the blank slate model, you are, this is, you are affected so much by the society that you're in that you don't even know how you're affected by it.

00:27:19.440 So up next, we're going to discuss this Pollyanna program, which if you're not familiar with this program, Google it because it's probably coming or has already come to a school near you.

00:27:31.040 So it certainly has come to my school here in New York and you, you need to be up to date on this because it has such a sweet name and it has a very different kind of message.

00:27:41.280 We'll get to that with Paul in one second.

00:27:43.000 First, this.

00:27:48.760 Our school uses Pollyanna too, the one from which my daughter is about to leave and City Journal, which is an amazing organization.

00:27:57.720 If you don't read cityjournal.org, you guys should.

00:27:59.740 Oh, I do.

00:28:00.280 Yeah, it's great.

00:28:01.040 Yeah, of course you do.

00:28:02.040 It's, it's affiliated with the Manhattan Institute and it's wonderful.

00:28:04.580 But here's just a quick description of Pollyanna, which is everywhere, by the way, it's everywhere. 0.99

00:28:09.860 It's not just New York City schools here.

00:28:11.600 Quote, much of the content Pollyanna offers is based on its racial literacy curriculum, a suite of lesson plans imbued with the latest in pop progressivism.

00:28:21.900 The curriculum offers middle schoolers.

00:28:23.620 There's a heavily slanted history lesson that calls racism a primary institution in the U.S.

00:28:30.680 thin on academic references.

00:28:32.500 It relies instead on popular articles and left-leaning commentators from Robin DiAngelo to Howard Zinn, right?

00:28:39.300 Who hates America.

00:28:40.060 His history is all about how terrible we are.

00:28:41.840 The course begins in kindergarten and culminates in eighth grade when students spend class time on racial and or social justice projects, turning their lessons into activism.

00:28:53.980 That's their goal.

00:28:55.060 It's not enough just to learn, listen, hear the viewpoint.

00:28:58.860 You must become an activist for this point of view or you're failing, which is a point you get to in your letter to Grace Church, which was, I thought, really helpful when you were pointing out how it's like students who aren't saying anything are singled out and told, we really need to hear from you.

00:29:17.320 Which I do want to get to this, but I just, I want to build it up so people understand, you know, how this happened and how you got to the point of writing this letter.

00:29:25.920 So was there, and when you say that there were racial incidents at Grace Church, I just want to be clear because there have been at a lot of these schools.

00:29:34.440 It's not like, I don't think these schools are teeming with racists.

00:29:37.480 I really don't. 1.00

00:29:38.500 But they're kids and they do stupid things sometimes. 0.99

00:29:41.700 And so was there anything particularly egregious or that, you know, sort of set things off in a faster way? 0.99

00:29:51.800 Well, I, I, I have to say it's, you know, I, I don't have any, I don't have much firsthand experience.

00:29:57.900 And so, but what generally I did a lot of investigating when I, when I heard that there was an incident, I did my best to talk to colleagues and I had many colleagues I was close with, deans and so on.

00:30:06.940 And, and typically these incidents fall into, you know, three or four categories.

00:30:11.220 One is confusing one black student for another.

00:30:14.440 Um, and that, you know, that itself is seen as a racially, you know, hostile act.

00:30:22.440 Um, that is so unfortunate.

00:30:24.620 That's so, I mean, honestly, my audience has heard me talk before about how bad I am with faces and names.

00:30:30.500 Steven Crowder came on this program and expressed his, how wounded he was that he'd been on my program on Fox.

00:30:36.160 And later I had no idea who he was.

00:30:38.560 I'm so bad at faces and names and it has nothing to do with skin color.

00:30:42.620 I've done it to white people, done it to black people. 0.99

00:30:44.980 It's, I, I feel for somebody who finds themselves in that position because now it, it immediately is attributed to race.

00:30:52.420 And it, it, maybe it is, and maybe it isn't, but now there's no room for that discussion.

00:31:00.920 Right.

00:31:01.100 Well, you know, the, the way that it's, you know, again, every part of the schema fits together.

00:31:05.920 So, you know, I would say to you, if I was, um, the Dean of Equity and Inclusion, I would say, well, Megan, you know, we really have to prioritize impact over intent in that situation.

00:31:15.860 That is because these students have grown up in this, in, in circumstances in a racialized America, um, when you confuse a black, one black student for another, then that is triggering, um, for them an entire, you know, it is kind of negating them, negating them, negating their identity in a way where you wouldn't do that to, to, to when you, if you did the same thing for two white students, just as a devil's advocate.

00:31:42.420 Um, and that is actually, I think the biggest problem with the whole thing is prioritizing impact over intent because, you know, our justice system doesn't, you know, discount intent for a very important reason.

00:32:00.220 Intent is central to our understanding of our common humanity and, and our, our, the building blocks of our society.

00:32:08.540 You know, if, if you do something, um, if you, if you harm someone, um, it's a lesser degree charge, right?

00:32:17.220 It's, it's, it's, it's can mitigating circumstances.

00:32:20.300 Okay.

00:32:20.620 That's in the criminal level, but on the social level, right.

00:32:23.320 If I offended you because, you know, I, you know, I, I, I confused you with somebody else.

00:32:28.840 Um, but I, it didn't mean that I didn't remember all the things that you were necessarily.

00:32:33.620 Maybe I, I mispronounced your name or I did something that was just superficially, um, you know, disrespectful.

00:32:40.700 But if, but if you asked me, I would say, you know, that's, you know, I'm sorry, you know, let's, let's move on.

00:32:46.600 And I, I, I'm sorry, I, I hurt your feelings and, you know, I'll try not to do it again.

00:32:50.960 And then you just move on.

00:32:52.020 Um, but what's happening here is that when you have this, um, you fit everything into this massive historical framework of oppression, then you, you don't give people the chance to, you know, redeem themselves by their intentions.

00:33:07.680 Well, and, and not only that, the second layer of it is what about spending some time minimizing impact?

00:33:17.380 What about spending some time looking at whether it's a woman who's had a minor transgression against her or a person of color who's feels slighted in some way and saying, not great.

00:33:29.220 You're good.

00:33:30.080 Let's move on.

00:33:30.720 What we do and, and, and that's not to minimize the offense felt it's, it's a problem solving method.

00:33:38.900 It's a coping method because the reality of life is you can, I've said this before, you cannot whack a mole away all the people who are going to hurt you.

00:33:49.220 You, you can't, they're going to keep coming over and over and over.

00:33:52.900 And the better tactic is to build up your resilience, strength, and ability to shrug off jerks and say, it'd be great if we can, you know, at the school level and otherwise work on awareness so that, you know, more awareness trickles down.

00:34:11.400 But the truth is, it's an individual coping mechanism that gets you through life. 0.97

00:34:16.900 If you can't get rid of all the jerks, they've tried that. 0.99

00:34:22.100 It doesn't work. 1.00

00:34:23.020 They're still everywhere.

00:34:24.740 Yeah.

00:34:25.100 And I agree.

00:34:26.080 And one of the things that I think is important is, is the burden of tolerance in a sense.

00:34:31.100 So if you have two people just to simplify the situation, you know, the one way for, one way for those two people to be tolerant of each other is for them to be, you know, overweeningly careful about offending each other.

00:34:46.320 Right.

00:34:48.100 So the other way is to simply be, you know, have tolerance in a, in a sort of a mechanical engineering sense.

00:34:55.560 That is, you have tolerance.

00:34:56.900 You can withstand the torque of being offended.

00:35:01.480 Right.

00:35:01.920 So, you know, that is, I think what you're talking about with resilience and we definitely need to put more of, you know, to, to, to, you know, guide students and, and sort of teach them how to put more of, how to assume more of the burden of tolerance in a sense to, to be, to be tougher, to be more adaptable in those circumstances.

00:35:22.260 They can be assertive about how they're hurt, but that, but then, you know, say, Oh, that, that hurt me.

00:35:28.160 But, you know, they can roll with it essentially.

00:35:31.200 I think they come into life.

00:35:33.500 I think children come into life with that is their default.

00:35:37.740 You know, they learn on the playground.

00:35:39.820 Somebody does something to you and maybe your eyes well up, but you have to keep functioning because no kid wants to play with the kid who's over there whining and crying.

00:35:49.500 Right. Like they learn it at a very early age.

00:35:53.000 Only in the past couple of years have we switched to no letter, let it rip.

00:35:58.080 Keep crying louder.

00:35:59.580 Everyone else should be crying.

00:36:01.240 You are a victim, right?

00:36:03.040 It's like only now we switch this whole messaging of like, it's better to be a victimized whiner who's constantly complaining that is going to be rewarded.

00:36:12.820 So you see some incidents you're, I mean, like, are you somebody that people have been going to?

00:36:20.400 This is prior to all the craziness that's, that's erupted over the past few weeks there.

00:36:23.780 But like, were you a counselor to students who had been, who felt victimized or who felt accused?

00:36:30.000 You know, um, I, I wasn't, and probably that's, you know, a self-selection bias and that I was, you know, I was known as kind of a tough cookie and math, you know, math teacher didn't, um, didn't give a lot of extensions.

00:36:44.320 I don't think was a little bit rigorous.

00:36:46.500 Rigor is very important, you know, in, in, I think in math and exactitude is important.

00:36:52.020 Um, I believe in, you know, lots of failing over and over until you get it right.

00:36:56.900 And it's having, having that kind of resilience as well.

00:36:59.120 And I, I'm, I'm very nurturing and trying to, to, to guide students to, to do that.

00:37:04.080 But no, I wasn't, I was not what they call a safe space advocate.

00:37:09.300 You know, I think there are other teachers that, that moved into that role.

00:37:12.800 Um, but I did, you know, kids would sort of come to me if they had, you know, other problems, I think, because they felt like I would be an ally for them.

00:37:23.620 If they felt they couldn't express their views in a paper without retaliation, or if they, if they, um, you know, they, they wouldn't, uh, necessarily ask this teacher for a recommendation because they thought maybe they would, you know, sabotage their application, something like that.

00:37:39.600 Um, and I think there was probably some truth to those things.

00:37:43.500 What do you mean?

00:37:44.360 Sabotage their application?

00:37:45.260 Well, you know, write a bad recommendation of purpose because they may have had conservative views, express them in class and, and been chastened for it in some way.

00:37:53.520 And so, uh, or.

00:37:55.320 So you did see that.

00:37:56.120 I mean, cause that's something we talk about sometimes, but.

00:37:58.500 Yeah.

00:37:58.900 You, you've witnessed that in real life.

00:38:02.020 Well, I would really.

00:38:03.240 Being, being concerned about their political views being punished.

00:38:07.220 Yeah.

00:38:07.440 And I would, you know, I wouldn't just take it on faith.

00:38:09.420 That would be like, well, did you cite your sources?

00:38:11.300 Did you have quotations?

00:38:13.520 Did you know?

00:38:14.080 A lot of times what would happen is the teacher would maybe question their sources, right?

00:38:17.680 So if they, if they selected from the wall street journal or something, or, um, you know, something, uh, you know, something like, uh, the daily wire or national review, even some things like that, that are pretty, you know, on the other side, they may have, they may have allowed, you know, you know, something like, uh, Vox or some other similar,

00:38:37.040 similarly late status slate, right?

00:38:40.360 So it, there's a little bit of shading on that.

00:38:44.100 So I think, um, some of that was going on.

00:38:48.420 Um, although, you know, I, I can't remember any specific papers to that effect, but I would

00:38:53.380 really question the kids and be like, are you sure that this is, did you think like, yeah,

00:38:57.520 actually I really think it is, you know?

00:38:59.060 So, you know, there was something going on there and, um, you know, and I would say, do

00:39:04.380 you want me to go talk to the teacher about it?

00:39:06.140 And like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

00:39:07.580 I don't, I don't want to make a thing out of it.

00:39:09.620 Right.

00:39:09.780 Cause they, cause just, just to, just to underscore these kids, I mean, the reason these parents

00:39:14.540 are paying $57,000 a year for their kids to go to the school, including kindergarten, um,

00:39:21.460 it's because they want their kids to get into good colleges.

00:39:23.300 I mean, that's really, that's the end game for most of these New York city parents.

00:39:28.640 And especially when they get into high school, it's the worst possible time to start alienate,

00:39:34.540 alienating your teachers who have to write the recommendations for you.

00:39:38.380 So I can understand why the students would be like, no, no, no, no.

00:39:41.640 Don't rock the boat.

00:39:42.580 Like I'm going to go along to get along.

00:39:45.100 Well, there's so much other pressure on students that will really squelch and chill their free

00:39:51.340 expression in that situation.

00:39:52.820 Right.

00:39:53.300 Because the morality of the place is so heavily tied in with, you know, critical race theory

00:40:01.300 and, you know, sensitivity and impact over intent that, um, if you, if you were to stick

00:40:08.040 your neck out and take a stand, you know, you could be, you could be alienated on social

00:40:12.240 media.

00:40:12.680 You lose friends.

00:40:13.800 There's a whole cascade of things.

00:40:15.700 Now, I think, I think that what I would love to do as, as someone at FAIR, um, some as, as

00:40:24.260 the work that I've done is work on with some students, work on a student guide where students

00:40:30.360 can stand up for themselves and express themselves and, and really listen to their conscience.

00:40:37.000 Um, because, um, you know, they, to develop an inner strength, you need to hearken to and

00:40:45.380 act upon your deepest instincts about what is true.

00:40:50.740 Um, now we could talk a lot about truth and is my truth and your truth, but I, I really

00:40:57.780 do have, I really have found in my own experience recently, um, you know, standing out the way

00:41:05.100 I've done is that without a faith in my own conscience, um, I would never, I would never

00:41:14.420 have the strength to do what I did.

00:41:16.640 And I, I want to find a way to, to, you know, share that experience with young people who,

00:41:26.780 who are afraid and who feel that they have so much to lose.

00:41:31.320 I agree with you because if you don't have that strong ethical compass, it's hard to

00:41:38.340 take a stand.

00:41:39.180 It's much easier to just swim with the rest of the fish and hope you don't get singled

00:41:43.720 out in any way that might be painful, short-term painful, but long-term strengthening.

00:41:50.980 Um, all right.

00:41:52.260 So, so let me just jump forward to the report.

00:41:56.560 The first report I saw about Grace Church that caught my eye was Barry Weiss's report where

00:42:00.960 she on her sub stack had done a lengthy piece on the New York city schools and beyond.

00:42:06.140 She had talked to folks in LA and elsewhere, and they were saying that Grace Church had

00:42:11.320 banned the terms mom and dad and boy and girl to the point where if you were reading a book

00:42:20.780 that had the term boy in it, like little boy blue, you were supposed to replace it with

00:42:26.940 a proper noun, like little Billy blue, supposed to say, is, is this true?

00:42:35.120 Did you see any evidence of this?

00:42:37.020 And I did not, I did not personally because you know, I'm, I'm siloed in math.

00:42:41.240 So I didn't really have much to do with that kind of thing.

00:42:43.400 And they didn't, they did not introduce it or push it on me as an advisor, I would say.

00:42:48.180 So whatever that's about, I didn't have any personal contact there.

00:42:51.380 All right.

00:42:51.580 So that wasn't your thing.

00:42:52.420 That was, she posted that actually in city journal now that I, I think about it, but

00:42:56.260 anyway, um, so I'm thinking, okay, Grace Church, church has lost its mind.

00:43:00.640 Um, mom and dad is not an offensive term to anybody, trans, lesbian, gay.

00:43:07.300 I know plenty of people in all those categories who would laugh at this and have laughed at

00:43:12.640 it.

00:43:13.300 Um, but this is just an example of how far, you know, I don't even want to say left, just

00:43:18.300 how, how far into the insane camp the school has gone.

00:43:22.380 And what was the final straw that made you finally speak out in this letter, which I want

00:43:28.460 to talk to you about and what, what you said specifically, what was the, what, what was

00:43:32.160 the straw that broke the camel's back?

00:43:34.040 Okay.

00:43:34.460 Well, um, winding back, well, the straw that broke the camel's back was, uh, took place during

00:43:40.820 a February 26th meeting, um, which was, um, called self-care through an anti-bias lens.

00:43:50.440 And we had had some programming during this intersession week where there were no, no academic

00:43:55.700 classes week because during the pandemic, we've had several of these weeks that are focused

00:43:59.960 on a theme and the theme of this week was self-care.

00:44:02.940 And then this was a meeting that happened, um, on a Wednesday, February 26th.

00:44:08.300 I was on a field trip.

00:44:10.140 I was chaperoning, uh, with many other chaperones.

00:44:13.640 And I got on this call, you know, after the kids were on the ice and, and skating around

00:44:18.680 most of them and things were taken care of, there were other chaperones there.

00:44:21.920 I, I felt since the call was mandatory, you know, I had, I should get on because one thing

00:44:26.700 teachers do is they multitask all the time.

00:44:28.760 And especially during the pandemic, we'd been multitasking.

00:44:32.020 And I was also curious, like, okay, what's this going to be about?

00:44:34.800 Let's see.

00:44:35.260 So after some meditation exercises on the zoom call and some, um, I would say mind relaxing

00:44:42.800 exercises, they, the facilitator put up a slide called characteristics of white supremacy.

00:44:49.780 And, um, she brought it up and wanted us to discuss it.

00:44:55.080 And on this slide were bullet points like objectivity, individualism, the right to comfort, which I

00:45:05.460 found curious, given that the whole point of the meeting was a self-care meeting, um, either

00:45:11.960 or thinking and also fear of open conflict was on there.

00:45:15.700 Um, and, um, um, to the best of my recollection, the facilitator was very nice, very, you know,

00:45:23.000 she had a, just a nice manner, very friendly, chatty, um, you know, talked about what are

00:45:30.160 some white feelings that might, that you might feel looking at the slide.

00:45:34.140 Uh, and I thought to myself, what is a white feeling?

00:45:39.340 Um, and there had been some chatter in, in the chat that simultaneously this, the meeting

00:45:44.560 is going on visually and also the audio and audio, but also there's, there are comments

00:45:49.660 in the chat and several teachers had already commented in the chat.

00:45:52.260 And I felt like, well, I, you know, I could maybe ask a question here.

00:45:58.480 And for the past few months before this, uh, emerging from a conversation with my head of

00:46:04.780 school, you know, I was told, you know, you shouldn't try to push your, your doubts on

00:46:08.980 people, on colleagues when they are, you know, busy going about their work.

00:46:13.560 Cause I had had, you know, a little bit of a spat with one of my colleagues over anti-racism

00:46:18.200 and I agree with him.

00:46:18.960 I say, you're right.

00:46:19.500 You're absolutely right.

00:46:20.260 Um, I don't want to do that.

00:46:22.500 I don't want to interrupt people's day with these things.

00:46:25.640 And he said, okay, fine.

00:46:26.660 Well, but if you find yourself in an appropriate forum, you should feel free to, to, you know,

00:46:31.660 raise, ask questions.

00:46:33.000 Okay.

00:46:33.460 Well, since other faculty members had asked questions in the chat.

00:46:37.240 Oh, by the way, I didn't mention the most important thing.

00:46:39.300 This was a whites only meeting.

00:46:42.320 Um, this was a meeting that was mandatory and all white identifying, uh, students and faculty

00:46:50.260 were directed to this meeting while there was a BIPOC identifying meeting at a different

00:46:56.240 zoom room.

00:46:57.120 Later, I found out there was different content there.

00:47:00.180 So I asked, you know, in the, in this chat, I had been kind of loosening the screws, um,

00:47:04.540 on what I felt like I could challenge.

00:47:07.780 Um, and, you know, I, I, I, I thought about the prospect of another meeting in which, you

00:47:13.860 know, so many of these, you know, these students in the chat, their, their, their answers are

00:47:19.820 very ritualistic and, you know, they conform to a very narrow set of, of statements that

00:47:26.340 are all, you know, engineered to validate the ideology.

00:47:29.840 So I thought, well, I know there are students out there that don't feel this way.

00:47:32.880 What if I just ask a question?

00:47:34.340 What if I challenge this thing?

00:47:35.520 What if I say, what do you mean by a white feeling?

00:47:38.760 And, you know, the facilitator, I think she said, you know, those are just things that

00:47:42.300 might be defensiveness or, you know, say, yes, but what makes them white? 0.70

00:47:46.320 That is, you know, I'm, I was thinking to myself, you know, I live in New York, you know,

00:47:50.460 if I have a, if I feel, you know, you know, a pain in New York, is that a New York feeling?

00:47:56.480 Does that make it, you know, so I just didn't understand why this was tied to race, to race

00:48:02.080 in such a blatant way when, you know, all races might have feelings of defensiveness

00:48:05.880 and so on.

00:48:08.020 So, um, I asked that question and then what I noticed was several of the other students

00:48:13.820 started asking other challenging questions in the chat or, and some of the faculty started

00:48:19.520 to say things in the chat that were a little bit wider.

00:48:23.100 Like, well, you know, I don't, maybe I don't really appreciate being reduced to my race

00:48:27.620 or, you know, I don't think I'm ignorant just because I'm white and things like this.

00:48:31.360 And so the meeting started to sort of, I would, you know, to, to someone who was really focused

00:48:37.700 on the purpose of the meeting, which was to get everybody to go along with these ideas.

00:48:42.760 Um, there was a little bit of anxiety because I had sort of derailed it.

00:48:47.760 Gone off script.

00:48:48.100 So yeah, so then, you know, one of my colleagues, um, got on his high horse and gave a little

00:48:54.400 bit of a rant and said, you know, don't all my colleagues understand that we are white

00:48:58.800 and we are here because we are white and we were privileged since birth and we were affected

00:49:02.100 by certain biases.

00:49:02.900 And, you know, I can't believe that this is going on and something like that.

00:49:07.100 And I, I interrupted him and I said, well, I'm sorry that you're stereotyping yourself.

00:49:10.900 Um, and this interruption, you know, I felt like I would need it to sort of defend myself

00:49:16.500 because, um, you know, I was being sort of called out in front of students.

00:49:23.180 I felt like I should defend myself.

00:49:26.860 And then this incident was unprofessional.

00:49:29.800 I admitted that it was a little unprofessional.

00:49:31.840 I apologized after the meeting, but I think, you know, the main problem, the main concern that

00:49:38.460 led to week of subsequent meetings, uh, meetings about the meetings where people were processing

00:49:43.440 feelings and there were, you know, racially segregated meetings about the racially segregated

00:49:49.040 meetings, um, because some of my comments had, had been overheard by, by, um, or had made

00:49:56.040 their way, you know, outside the meeting to some of the black teachers and students.

00:50:01.040 And they were upset by some of the questions that I asked.

00:50:04.020 One of which was, you know, the, the necessity to identify racially at all.

00:50:10.120 I mean, I was saying, you know, why should I be defined by what society thinks about me?

00:50:15.200 Why is it necessary for me to interject in my essence of my being, my social identity?

00:50:22.680 Um, and, and, and they were, you know, there was a tremendous offense that was taken to that.

00:50:28.380 It was just a question that I asked.

00:50:30.860 And I realized later that that is actually extremely destabilizing to question nature of

00:50:38.120 race and why, and why, why do we have the necessity of identifying with it?

00:50:44.080 I mean, it, it, if you lose that, then the entire house of cards falls apart as, as one

00:50:49.140 colleague said later, oh my God, they're going to forget everything we ever taught them.

00:50:52.620 I mean, this is why they're so anti the MLK goal, right?

00:50:57.560 Of colorblindness.

00:50:58.860 That was a hundred percent what he wanted for everybody.

00:51:01.360 And now if you say it, you're a racist, right?

00:51:04.600 They, you're right.

00:51:05.580 The whole house of cards is built on race being everything, the foundation of America, the 0.91

00:51:11.340 foundation of our beings.

00:51:12.660 And what you were trying to say is, yeah, I'm not sure.

00:51:19.280 And that turned into a whole other round of meetings, the teachers, you were chastised.

00:51:27.500 Did you, did you have to apologize?

00:51:30.000 Like, were you reprimanded?

00:51:31.420 What happened?

00:51:32.320 Yeah, I had, I had a long meeting with the, with the head of school and the assistant head

00:51:36.140 of school.

00:51:37.320 And I was, you know, it started out, well, we want to know how you feel about it.

00:51:41.440 And, you know, I, I said, actually, you know, I don't feel too bad about it, frankly.

00:51:47.020 And then over, over the course of the meeting, yeah, I, I did.

00:51:52.440 I, cause that's how I felt.

00:51:53.780 I mean, my conscience was, my conscience was exultant is how I would describe my feeling.

00:52:00.340 Right.

00:52:00.500 And can I just say, just as a, just as a, let me meander down this side lane, Douglas

00:52:05.580 Murray makes this point in his, in his writings and his lectures on this podcast.

00:52:10.980 I'm, I'm in love with Douglas Murray.

00:52:12.840 One of the points he makes is if you don't, if you don't stand up for what you believe

00:52:18.900 in, if you go along just to get along when you know it's wrong.

00:52:23.980 And in this case, potentially very damaging to students, you know, who are in your care,

00:52:30.480 it will create self-loathing.

00:52:32.820 You will wind up being disgusted with yourself. 0.59

00:52:36.780 You'll, you'll be a sad little shell of a man.

00:52:39.640 And, but it's hard to do.

00:52:41.180 So, so, I mean, kudos to you for what started as a, it shouldn't have been a massive step.

00:52:47.540 It should have been a small step.

00:52:48.820 It was treated as a massive step.

00:52:50.460 Little did they know what was coming from Paul Rossi, but kudos to you for in the moment,

00:52:55.940 following your conscience.

00:52:56.940 And, yeah, and I, I, I was, I felt, you know, I was on, on sort of a real high for, for a

00:53:05.660 week, week to two weeks after that.

00:53:08.000 And, you know, during this meeting with the head of school and assistant head, as they

00:53:13.420 realized that I was not contrite and I said, you know, I am not contrite, the, the allegations

00:53:19.760 against me started to increase throughout the course of the meeting.

00:53:22.360 So first I had caused upset and then I had caused, you know, I had destabilized the school

00:53:27.920 and then I had caused neurological disruptions and beings and systems and all of these, this,

00:53:34.320 these things just, and then it escalated to where, you know, I had, I had harassed the

00:53:38.740 students by my behavior.

00:53:40.680 And at that moment, just by saying, why does race have to be the prism through which we

00:53:44.740 see everything?

00:53:45.440 I mean, to paraphrase.

00:53:46.900 Yeah.

00:53:47.620 My identification, I phrase it as a personal thing.

00:53:50.420 You know, we're, we're told to speak from the eye perspective.

00:53:52.820 That's one of the norms.

00:53:54.140 And I said, well, okay, you know, why, why do I have to identify as white?

00:53:58.160 Just because society sees me that way.

00:54:01.100 Right.

00:54:01.840 If, if, if we defined ourselves by how other people see us, we don't have a soul.

00:54:08.020 Oh my God.

00:54:08.640 If I did that, I'd never get out of bed in the morning.

00:54:10.800 Exactly.

00:54:11.360 Right.

00:54:11.600 You know, are they right about me?

00:54:13.260 So if I'm, you know, you wouldn't say that about anyone for any other defect, right?

00:54:18.120 You wouldn't say that about, you know, if I lost an arm, would I consider, and people

00:54:21.860 said, oh, there's that one-armed guy.

00:54:23.360 Would I, would it help for me to think, oh, I'm a one-armed guy.

00:54:26.280 I'm Paul, the one-armed guy.

00:54:28.180 No, it wouldn't help.

00:54:29.260 It would actually hold me back.

00:54:31.480 And people who are disabled and successful will tell you the same thing.

00:54:36.380 It is crazy.

00:54:36.900 Cause just looking at your letter where you documented some of this, I'm, I'm reading

00:54:40.980 that you were told to the point you just made, you created a dissonance, which means

00:54:47.280 disharmony for vulnerable and unformed thinkers, disharmony for unformed thinkers and neurological

00:54:57.140 disturbance in students, beings, and systems.

00:55:01.620 What, so what the hell does that mean?

00:55:04.260 That you failed to serve the greater good and the higher truth.

00:55:08.920 It may be true that it's bad to identify everything through a racial perspective, but the higher 0.99

00:55:13.360 truth is just fucking do it. 0.99

00:55:16.580 Yeah. 0.99

00:55:16.780 Yeah.

00:55:16.960 Well, you know, community stability is the highest truth to a, you know, to when you, when you're

00:55:24.980 focused on the, on a community or you have a group mindset, then anything that disrupts,

00:55:30.520 you know, the stability of the group is dangerous.

00:55:33.500 I mean, this is a totalitarian mindset.

00:55:35.580 Let's not, let's not mince words.

00:55:37.200 This is what happens when you prioritize groups over individuals.

00:55:41.640 You, it leads inexorably to this, this mindset.

00:55:44.800 And, and my head was reflecting that mindset.

00:55:47.760 I think individualism is dangerous to that mindset.

00:55:53.140 So then a couple of days later, the head of school reprimands you on like a school wide

00:56:00.940 level.

00:56:02.240 What, what did he do?

00:56:03.200 What, what happened?

00:56:03.900 Oh yes.

00:56:04.720 The, the head of whole school, the whole school, um, had told me that, you know, a letter would

00:56:09.400 be placed in my file and that, you know, at a later faculty meeting, which I wasn't really,

00:56:16.000 I was allowed to, I made a statement, but then I wasn't, my mic was turned off.

00:56:20.800 But anyway, he, he, he decided to.

00:56:22.340 Davison, Davison is the head of school.

00:56:25.160 Yeah.

00:56:25.440 Um, he decided to, you know, have all advisors read the statement to all the students at

00:56:32.740 1030 in the morning on this one, on this day of the week after the meeting.

00:56:36.700 And it didn't name me, but it was clear that, you know, a, a member of the faculty has, you

00:56:43.260 know, was disruptive and unprofessional.

00:56:45.380 And, and then they went through a long description of how important it was, you know, even though

00:56:50.860 race was a social construct, we acknowledge the, you know, oppressive oppression in society.

00:56:56.320 And it, it was this very important statement about the importance of race and how we must

00:57:05.300 acknowledge the, the, the paramount importance of race in society and in our school.

00:57:13.580 I mean, that was the message of it.

00:57:15.520 Um, and we must undo history, uh, the history of that.

00:57:21.140 Yeah, exactly.

00:57:21.880 It's, it's sort of like, I think of it as sort of like the, the far left version of pull

00:57:26.440 yourself up by your bootstraps, but it actually, so it's something that, you know, is a metaphor,

00:57:30.980 but it also, they actually try to do it.

00:57:32.960 I mean, they, it seems like they're literally trying to do this abstract thing instead of

00:57:36.580 using it as a metaphor.

00:57:38.080 Um, but you know, just, and I decided, you know, like, gosh, you know, I'm just sitting

00:57:42.440 here in my office.

00:57:43.780 Um, you know, I have to go to the bathroom.

00:57:46.100 So I'm going to walk around the building and I'm going to, I experienced this thing, walked

00:57:51.100 around the floor of the building out of every room was coming, reverberating this thing.

00:57:55.640 Well, I just shuffled along.

00:57:57.980 Uh, and I thought, wow, this is, this is really surreal.

00:58:02.160 I mean, they're, they're making it sound like you ran through the school with an I heart

00:58:06.400 Derek Chauvin sign.

00:58:09.020 Gosh.

00:58:09.740 All you said was, why does this have to be my prism?

00:58:14.060 This, I'm not sure I want this to be my prism.

00:58:16.380 I'm much more than my pigmentation.

00:58:21.100 Paul did something very smart, which was he decided to keep a tape recording of his

00:58:26.260 discussions with the head of school.

00:58:28.300 The head of school, unfortunately did not realize that Paul had done such a smart thing

00:58:32.820 and publicly denied saying some of the things that Paul accused him of saying.

00:58:38.540 You're going to hear the tapes for yourself.

00:58:40.900 First, this want to bring you a feature we have here on the Megan Kelly show called real

00:58:46.240 talk.

00:58:46.540 And this is where we address something that may be in the news or that's on my mind or

00:58:49.940 something that we just want to get into with you guys.

00:58:51.600 And that today is NBA star LeBron James and his reaction to this situation out of Columbus,

00:59:00.980 Ohio, where the 15 year old girl, McKay O'Brien was shot by the police officer to stop her from

00:59:08.020 stabbing another young woman, right?

00:59:10.620 It's all on video. 0.77

00:59:11.660 You can watch it for yourself.

00:59:12.820 It's undisputed and indisputable that McKay had a knife and was attacking the other girl

00:59:18.360 with it, was about to stab her.

00:59:20.100 So he shot her in defense of others, which is even by a lay person would be a legal defense

00:59:26.160 that would lead to no charges.

00:59:27.460 And certainly by a police officer called to the scene will protect him from any criminality

00:59:33.220 in this case.

00:59:33.680 And that's obvious to any sane person looking at this situation.

00:59:37.480 But of course, the usual crew trying to exploit, unfortunately, an all too common law enforcement

00:59:44.180 encounter where people are hurting each other and the cops get called and try to break it

00:59:48.000 up and it gets violent.

00:59:48.800 And in this case, deadly are trying to make this into a black, white thing, a black lives 0.99

00:59:53.440 matter thing, a police don't like black people thing and so on.

00:59:57.640 So LeBron James, who has 50 million followers on Twitter, 50, 50 million followers, tweets

01:00:07.920 out a screen grab of the officer, the guy who saved this other girl's life, the life of

01:00:15.120 a young black woman, by the way.

01:00:17.020 And the caption he writes, LeBron writes, is your next hashtag accountability, which was

01:00:25.620 an insane and really irresponsible thing to do.

01:00:29.880 I mean, in this climate, right, to sort of sick the mob.

01:00:34.440 That's what he was trying to do on this guy, this cop who was just doing his job.

01:00:38.860 And everybody on Twitter reacted.

01:00:40.700 I mean, everyone who has two cents to rub together in between their ears is saying this

01:00:46.840 is totally irresponsible.

01:00:48.060 What are you doing?

01:00:49.160 I like Steve.

01:00:49.900 I know Steve Krakauer is our EP.

01:00:51.460 He tweeted out something saying, I had to read this three times to make sure this really

01:00:55.320 was LeBron James doing something this this crazy, this irresponsible.

01:01:01.200 And about an hour later, he deleted the tweet, which is good, but too late.

01:01:07.460 I mean, the message was already out there.

01:01:08.980 And the tweet he sent afterward was basically like, oh, people are making a thing out of

01:01:13.540 this.

01:01:14.160 You know, so I took it down.

01:01:15.340 But he was he's not sorry.

01:01:17.320 He still thinks what this cop did was wrong.

01:01:19.900 He still thinks this cop ought to face accountability rather than you can make the good argument.

01:01:26.380 This guy deserves a medal.

01:01:27.440 He saved this other girl's life who probably would have been dead if he hadn't shown up. 0.85

01:01:32.260 And now you've got some people, crazy people like this Brie Newsome. 0.50

01:01:35.260 She's affiliated with Black Lives Matter in some way out there tweeting. 0.93

01:01:38.700 Let the girl's knife fight it out. 1.00

01:01:40.800 Really?

01:01:42.160 OK, is that how you want it to go?

01:01:43.680 I don't know if the mother of the would-be victim would agree with that.

01:01:47.960 I think she'd probably be pretty grateful that her daughter's life was saved.

01:01:51.960 So anyway, the thing about this that is so upsetting is LeBron James is going to use his

01:01:57.500 platform of 50 million, right, to call attention to this officer who was just doing his job.

01:02:03.960 Has he said one word, one word about Jaslyn Adams, who we talked about the other day,

01:02:09.900 the little seven-year-old girl who was shot to death in the McDonald's drive-thru in Chicago?

01:02:14.400 One word about the 45 shell casings found outside of her car.

01:02:18.560 It was clearly an execution.

01:02:20.720 She was in there with her dad.

01:02:22.640 Nothing.

01:02:23.320 He doesn't use the power of his platform to call attention to that violence.

01:02:27.220 Where's accountability for Jaslyn?

01:02:28.840 It would be great if LeBron and others would go into that neighborhood and try to lift people

01:02:33.120 up and set a better example and show the way.

01:02:36.800 Nope.

01:02:38.040 And to his credit, Jason Whitlock, who I love and who's been on this program, as you guys know,

01:02:43.460 called him out for it.

01:02:44.440 This is Jason's tweet the other day was, 0.99

01:02:46.400 Black teenage girl tried to stab a Black teenage girl. 1.00

01:02:49.780 Seven-year-old Black girl gunned down at McDonald's drive-thru. 0.98

01:02:53.280 Silence.

01:02:54.200 No tweets. 0.99

01:02:55.360 You're not tired of young Black people killing each other. 1.00

01:02:58.600 Silence. 0.99

01:02:59.480 No desperation.

01:03:01.080 How come?

01:03:01.660 Because LeBron's cover-up tweet, after he removed the first, was, 0.98

01:03:05.720 I'm so damn tired of seeing Black people killed by police. 0.65

01:03:09.460 Took the tweet down because it's being used to create more hate. 0.99

01:03:12.320 This isn't about one officer.

01:03:13.740 It's about the entire system.

01:03:15.060 And they always use our words to create more racism.

01:03:17.640 I'm so desperate for more accountability.

01:03:20.220 For whom?

01:03:21.460 For whom?

01:03:23.140 Accountability for whom?

01:03:24.760 Whose deaths matter?

01:03:27.740 Which Black lives matter? 1.00

01:03:29.600 And if LeBron James is going to get politically active, with which I have no problem,

01:03:34.860 he should be more informed and more responsible in doing it.

01:03:38.840 And we'll get back to Paul in one second.

01:03:40.380 First this.

01:03:40.860 As I understand it from your letter, where you went public with this,

01:03:52.200 you were reminded that your contract with the school requires you

01:03:57.100 to participate in restorative practices designed by the Office of Community Engagement

01:04:02.880 in order to, quote,

01:04:03.840 heal your relationship with the students of color and other students in your classes.

01:04:09.180 Now, because you asked that question,

01:04:12.340 now you have to embark on a mission of healing for all of the damage that you caused.

01:04:18.500 I mean, it's getting insane.

01:04:20.080 I'm going through it piece by piece,

01:04:22.180 because that's how people will understand how insane this is.

01:04:27.140 It's madness run amok.

01:04:29.820 And the fact that there aren't thousands of Paul Rossi's speaking out,

01:04:34.320 because this is happening at thousands of schools.

01:04:38.000 It's not just New York City.

01:04:39.440 Thousands of schools across the country.

01:04:40.920 Ames, Iowa, we just talked to Scott Walker about is that's what's crazy that that you

01:04:47.000 right now stand almost alone in having pushed back on it.

01:04:52.960 All right.

01:04:53.140 So this all happens.

01:04:54.680 You do your walk.

01:04:55.720 You're like, what's going on?

01:04:58.120 I mean, I don't know if you felt like I've talked about how.

01:05:01.580 When NBC was putting me through the ringer, I felt like I was being gas lit.

01:05:07.060 I don't know if you can relate to that, but it's like, wait, what did I say that that's

01:05:13.480 so awful?

01:05:15.820 And then there was a moment that you wrote about in your letter where a student came to

01:05:20.200 your to your office.

01:05:23.600 And do you mind if I just read from your letter?

01:05:25.860 Because it was so beautifully said.

01:05:29.040 One current student paid me a visit a few weeks ago.

01:05:32.440 He tapped faintly on my office door, anxiously looking both ways before entering.

01:05:38.420 He said he had come to offer me words of support for speaking up at the meeting.

01:05:42.560 I thanked him for his comments, but asked him why he seemed so nervous.

01:05:46.080 He told me he was worried that a particular teacher might notice this visit and quote,

01:05:50.380 it would mean that I would get in trouble and quote.

01:05:53.220 He reported to me that this teacher once gave him a lengthy talking to for voicing a conservative,

01:05:58.940 conservative opinion in class.

01:06:00.680 He then remembered with a sigh of relief that this teacher was absent that day.

01:06:06.420 I looked him in the eyes.

01:06:08.420 I told him he was a brave young man for coming to see me and that he should be proud of that.

01:06:13.520 Then I sent him on his way and I resolved to write this piece.

01:06:18.460 And you went public in a way that has now cost you your job.

01:06:24.300 Are you officially fired right now, Paul, or is it just fired from teaching?

01:06:30.920 Yeah, I've had all my classes taken away, my math classes, my advisory.

01:06:36.280 I was in the middle of putting grades in a couple of days ago and they cut off my access to the intranet.

01:06:42.880 Intranet, so I couldn't get my grades and I'm going to try to get the comments in through a colleague who can maybe put them in there.

01:06:55.380 Luckily, I was able to get the actual marking grades done.

01:06:58.700 But yes, they also had an offer for me to participate in a task force or a subcommittee of the Institutional Culture Committee where I would report to the assistant head.

01:07:13.120 But I don't think I would be allowed to participate in the committee itself.

01:07:18.440 So it was kind of like a rubber room situation like they have in public schools.

01:07:26.660 And I would serve out the remainder of my contract, which is I think at this point it's four to five months on my current contract.

01:07:33.480 Maybe not that much, four months or something like that.

01:07:35.420 And that was, of course, after initially they said, all right, we're not going to – because you wrote this piece.

01:07:38.840 You came out publicly and started to document some of these problems, which was incredibly brave.

01:07:44.720 And just said – the headline was, I refuse to stand by while my students are indoctrinated.

01:07:53.600 And this is, of course, unacceptable.

01:07:57.480 You're not allowed to do this.

01:07:59.800 And at first they said, all right, he's not going to be disciplined because they knew that that was wrong.

01:08:05.560 And then almost immediately they switched.

01:08:08.580 And the school came out, Davison, head of school, on April 18th, sent out a letter to students and faculty saying,

01:08:16.040 Numerous students, parents, and faculty have expressed discomfort with Paul's continued presence at the school.

01:08:22.840 Just you writing this, just this discussion.

01:08:26.440 Paul has declined his contract so will not be returning in the fall.

01:08:31.320 Students have requested to be removed from his classes.

01:08:35.360 As soon as I read that, I was like, you know, any school with a spine would say, thank you for your request.

01:08:41.000 The answer is no.

01:08:42.060 You'll go to class.

01:08:43.780 This is your class.

01:08:44.700 He's your teacher.

01:08:45.460 He teaches math.

01:08:46.480 You listen to his math.

01:08:47.700 You're not unsafe.

01:08:49.020 You're fine.

01:08:51.120 And then it is clear to me Paul cannot be effective as a teacher at Grace anymore.

01:08:54.800 I've informed him he's relieved of his teaching duties.

01:08:57.400 He's been asked not to come into the building.

01:08:59.680 I mean, truly, it's like now you've crossed over into ISIS territory.

01:09:03.200 Stay away from the building.

01:09:05.360 And that your letter contains glaring omissions and inaccuracies.

01:09:09.940 So Davidson decides to go on the offense against you.

01:09:15.240 Rossi's got to screw loose.

01:09:17.600 Rossi's not telling the truth.

01:09:19.740 You know, the school stands, the faculty, the students, the parent body against Rossi.

01:09:24.760 And then what happened?

01:09:25.760 Oh, well, you know, I wrote a letter basically disputing the claim that I was a liar.

01:09:35.840 And I asked, you know, I was wondering, well, if I've done all these omissions and inaccuracies, well, what are they?

01:09:40.620 I, you know, I published, I published some things that I, you know, that we had a conversation in March.

01:09:49.700 Um, and that, you know, I, I, you know, I, I have to defend what, what I, what I said, or, you know, what, what happened?

01:10:00.260 Um, he's pushing me against the wall here and he's calling me a liar.

01:10:03.660 And I will not stand for that in, in, in no, no uncertain terms.

01:10:08.320 So I, you know, I wrote a subsequent letter and reply to his letter to the community saying that, you know, he, it definitely went against things that he had told me in conversation.

01:10:22.100 And, you know, I said what those things, what, what those things were.

01:10:26.540 Um, and that in fact, he did agree with me in many cases with my objections and that it showed hypocrisy, frankly.

01:10:34.200 Right. So you come out and you say, um, he, behind the scenes, the head of school expressed to me, quote, grave doubts about some of the doctrinaire stuff that gets spouted at us in the name of anti-racism.

01:10:48.960 And you said, when I told you, this is your letter, that they're fighting a revolution and we'll hollow out grace and move on to the next institution, you acknowledged, quote, they've hollowed out a bunch of other ones ahead of us.

01:11:00.100 And you go on and he, he comes out and says, you misquoted me, you attributed to me things I, I never said.

01:11:08.660 And that is when you drop the hammer of the tape, which was just, I'm sorry, but so smart.

01:11:16.700 It's lawful in New York state to tape somebody as long as one party to the conversation is consenting.

01:11:21.200 And you were that party and you've got it. And let's just, let's start with this, with this, um, the first claim about, um, white, whether, whether people are being linked to white supremacy just because of the pigmentation they're born with.

01:11:40.280 And your exchange with Davison on that, this is our first soundbite. Go ahead and run it.

01:11:44.900 You can, you, you can have, and I'm happy to keep debating and I don't actually have any doubt because I've known you for nine years of your sincerity in your belief.

01:11:57.200 And I also, um, have grave doubts about some of the doctrinaire stuff that gets spouted at us in the name of anti-racism.

01:12:11.100 Like what?

01:12:12.260 And, and, and so I don't disagree entirely with some of your points of view.

01:12:18.240 Can you elaborate?

01:12:20.480 Because that would help me. It would help me understand like what's going on.

01:12:23.860 Um, I think that one of the things that's going on a little too much, and we've talked about this, is that, um, the demonization of being white, um, and, and the attempt to link anybody who's white to the perpetuation of white supremacy.

01:12:46.720 Thank you. Thank you, George.

01:12:49.320 So there is no question that there is an entire strain in here that, um, caused them a misinterpretation.

01:12:59.400 Now I am so much.

01:13:00.520 Wait, wait, wait a minute. But what about impact over intent?

01:13:04.420 Don't those kids get the benefit of impact over intent?

01:13:07.040 Exactly. What about the white kids who are linked to white supremacy because of a pigmentation they were born with over which they have no control and you, you're putting it back on him.

01:13:20.860 The whole, you've said at this entire interview, they told you it's about impact.

01:13:24.660 It's about impact, not the intent of the speaker.

01:13:27.240 And what about the impact on these white kids who are tarred with one of the worst sins of our country's history, white supremacy, through no fault other than a gene that they are born with?

01:13:41.440 Mm-hmm. Yeah. 0.95

01:13:43.700 And moral inferiority, which I think is, which I think is just so damaging to the spirit, um, just as much as moral superiority is, is also damaging to the spirit.

01:13:57.840 Do you think, what do you think he, his reaction was when he found out you taped him?

01:14:06.140 Um, I can't, I can't imagine. I can't imagine.

01:14:11.320 Was that scary to release that?

01:14:15.680 Yeah. I feel like it was the right decision.

01:14:19.460 I still feel it's the right decision.

01:14:21.620 Because what I think it needs to be said here is that you cannot have a public face that says one thing, uh, and you're talking, you're saying different things to different people.

01:14:31.540 Um, and then in private, you know, placate people endlessly, um, and, and try to manage things or, or to make, to make claims that are moral when you don't believe those things in private.

01:14:44.860 I think that that's wrong and people need to know it.

01:14:47.060 Um, and I don't think that he's unique in this respect and based on whatever, I don't think that, that this is something that is, you know, that is confined to, to George Davidson.

01:14:57.820 I think a lot of these institutions are actually extremely hypocritical in the way they deploy these virtuous, seemingly virtuous belief systems.

01:15:09.820 But that comes down to the main thing is that this is affecting kids.

01:15:14.420 Okay.

01:15:14.960 You, you cannot play games.

01:15:16.920 Now, if you, if, if he knows that this is going on, he has a duty to shut it down like yesterday immediately, because how can you possibly allow one day to go by when, with kids being demonized like this?

01:15:32.620 Wait, and let me, so let me pause you there.

01:15:34.840 Let me pause you there.

01:15:35.700 Cause I want, I want people to hear that soundbite.

01:15:37.640 So you came out in your letter on April 19th and you said, Hey George, um, you said, you admitted to me that Grace Church is demonizing white people for being born and that the school is making white students feel less than for nothing that they're personal, personally responsible for.

01:15:55.620 You said this in a letter and he came out and said, you misquoted me and you attributed to me things.

01:16:00.520 I never said, nor ever would say, and this is the soundbite number three.

01:16:06.460 Let's listen to what he said and whether you were right.

01:16:09.380 Let me ask you something, George, because I think those are, I think there's something very different about having a single experience where you make sense of it.

01:16:18.580 Right.

01:16:18.960 And having a teacher, an authority figure, talk to you endlessly every year telling you that because you have whiteness, you are associated with evils, all these different evils.

01:16:31.120 These are moral evils.

01:16:32.500 It's not the same as taking like a physical thing because it doesn't affect your, your, your moral value.

01:16:38.160 The, the, the, the fact is that I'm agreeing with you that there has been a demonization that we need to get our hands around in the way in which people are doing this understanding.

01:16:53.800 Okay.

01:16:53.920 So you agree that you were demonizing kids. 0.95

01:16:55.840 We're demonizing, um, kid, we're, we're demonizing white people for being born. 0.98

01:17:03.580 And, and are some of our students white people? 0.87

01:17:06.220 What?

01:17:06.900 Are some of our students white people?

01:17:08.940 Yes.

01:17:09.660 Okay. 0.98

01:17:09.940 So we're demonizing white, we're demonizing white kids. 0.88

01:17:12.740 Why don't you just say it?

01:17:13.420 We are using language that makes them feel less than, um, for nothing that they are personally responsible for.

01:17:22.300 Shame on him.

01:17:24.500 Shame on him for letting that happen.

01:17:28.280 I, I have to tell you, Paul, I'm infuriated when I listen to that.

01:17:31.800 He can blame it on the board.

01:17:33.660 He can blame it on the faculty.

01:17:35.760 He can try to blame it on the movement, the culture.

01:17:38.680 I don't care.

01:17:39.720 He's the head of school.

01:17:41.640 And he knew he admitted to you on tape that they are demonizing children at that school, white children for being born.

01:17:54.500 And he understands that it's making them feel less than in an age when the teenage suicide rate is climbing.

01:18:02.420 It's it's it's now the second leading cause of death among kids between the ages of 15 and 19, especially in this pandemic year.

01:18:11.660 And he sat by, let it happen.

01:18:15.080 And then when you called him out publicly on it, lied.

01:18:18.880 I realize he already said he's leaving that school.

01:18:22.120 He said it in January.

01:18:24.000 Um, he should be fired immediately.

01:18:25.920 He should be fired.

01:18:26.940 He should not be allowed to walk out of that school with his head held high.

01:18:31.460 He should be ashamed.

01:18:32.660 Well, you know, I, I agree with you.

01:18:38.820 Um, and I think that I'm more of an, I, I, I'm, I'm more of an anthropologist or, you know, I, I like ideas.

01:18:47.000 So I think about what this means.

01:18:49.140 Um, you know, that, you know, this term between a rock and a hard place.

01:18:53.320 Mm hmm.

01:18:54.340 Okay.

01:18:55.260 Well, this is like the same, but also opposite.

01:18:58.440 So imagine being pulled in two different directions by two different constituencies and needing both of them to get along.

01:19:05.780 So, so much that you say one thing to one side and one thing to the other.

01:19:09.140 And then it reaches a point where you, where you're, if you're exposed that the thing that you say to one side is not what you believe or the other side, what happens is you, you really just get pulled in half.

01:19:22.980 And these independent schools run, you know, on as this sort of engine, right?

01:19:27.480 So you have different constituencies, you have under-resourced kids and the parents of those kids.

01:19:33.840 And then you have, um, you know, wealthy donors and other kids and parents.

01:19:38.840 And in order for the whole engine to move forward, um, you, you have to sort of have things to offer, right?

01:19:46.280 So, so for the, you know, for the wealthier families, you get, uh, exposure to diversity and different things and they get, they get out of their wealthy bubble and then that, but then, and then for the under-resourced families and kids, they get opportunities and social capital and, you know, access to, you know, private school or private, uh, universities and colleges that are, that are offer great educations as they move on.

01:20:10.760 And so, but for that whole engine to function, um, you know, there it's, there are cultural issues, there are differences.

01:20:17.780 And so these, this, this, this sort of outrageous, what sounds like outrageous is this anti-racism is sort of just a way for the institution to get, to, to, to just keep moving.

01:20:28.860 Um, and I think that it is, it is, you know, it's just breaking down to the point where it's going to fly apart because, um, you know, you cannot, you cannot have unity within a culture that doesn't treat people as equals.

01:20:45.280 You just can't do it.

01:20:46.500 It won't work.

01:20:47.740 It'll break down.

01:20:48.640 And that will, and that's a microcosm of our country.

01:20:50.840 I look at the things that I went through at grace as being a microcosm of our country.

01:20:56.040 And we, we must break out of this racial madness. 0.90

01:21:01.000 We must understand that we are, we, we have so much in common at the spiritual level and at the individual level.

01:21:09.180 And we are all God's children essentially.

01:21:11.180 And we have to proceed according to universal principles of humanity and, and, and dignity.

01:21:18.940 Yeah, yes.

01:21:21.380 And not, not wide swath assumptions, always pejorative in this case about people based on skin color.

01:21:28.340 It's something we've been fighting for most of our history to stop.

01:21:32.960 And it doesn't make it any better because the group you're doing it to is white. 0.92

01:21:37.660 And I have to say, I like, I, I don't excuse the board of trustees.

01:21:41.380 I mean, generally the way it works is the board of trustees goes around and raises the money, gets money from people to donate to the school.

01:21:48.360 And the administration, they're the ones who set the agenda, the academic agenda.

01:21:52.800 But this board of trustees is on notice.

01:21:55.560 You've come out in a very public way.

01:21:57.040 Now he's on tape admitting their approach and forgive me.

01:22:02.580 This is me.

01:22:03.140 This isn't you, but I am going to name them.

01:22:05.020 I, I want this board of trustees to be held accountable for what's happening here.

01:22:09.400 Not just at Grace Church, but at all the schools.

01:22:12.400 So I am talking to you, Chair Olivia Douglas, Vice Chair Ann Mello, Treasurer Tom Janess, Secretary Karen Greenfield Sanders.

01:22:21.160 And there's just a few more who need to be named.

01:22:22.900 There's our old pal Jim Best, the guy who just got bounced out of Dalton as head of school for doing exactly the same stuff,

01:22:29.720 going way too far in this crazy anti-racism program, which is, of course, is a misnomer because it's a very racist agenda.

01:22:36.900 I'm looking at all of you.

01:23:03.380 You're now on notice that actual racial discrimination is happening in your school based on skin pigmentation.

01:23:11.840 And students are being made to feel less than in the middle of a suicide crisis amongst teens.

01:23:18.280 What are you going to do about it?

01:23:19.760 I'm just I don't understand, Paul.

01:23:22.980 I understand people don't want to be called racist.

01:23:25.460 They want to be supportive.

01:23:26.860 They want to be, quote, allies.

01:23:28.760 When it's when it's at this point, everyone has to stand up.

01:23:33.380 The time for polite silence is over.

01:23:39.180 Well said.

01:23:40.120 Well said.

01:23:41.060 So what's going to happen?

01:23:42.160 Are others going to follow?

01:23:43.460 Like, do you have you heard from any teachers at Grace Church or elsewhere who are thinking about following in your footsteps?

01:23:51.400 Well, I set up an email and fair helped me set it up teaching for truth at gmail.com.

01:23:59.300 And I've received, I think at this point, over a thousand emails from around the country.

01:24:05.040 I've received people who have told me so many stories about what they're going through.

01:24:13.080 And it's in many instances worse than what I'm going through.

01:24:16.980 I, you know, I'm a normal, regular guy.

01:24:23.940 Okay.

01:24:24.140 I'm a math teacher.

01:24:26.260 I, you know, I don't have as much to lose as some other people.

01:24:30.980 I don't have kids.

01:24:32.060 But, you know, anybody can do it.

01:24:35.380 Anybody can stand up and in whatever small way you have, listen to and prioritize the thing inside yourself that's telling you this is wrong and act on it.

01:24:47.600 That is the place where I drew my strength.

01:24:50.200 It was, it was something within me that's, that, that had been trying to get my attention for years.

01:24:55.620 And, you know, I, I would, I would think about it and I would think about it and ruminate about it.

01:25:01.300 But what it really wanted, it didn't want me to, it didn't want me to agree with it.

01:25:05.980 It wanted me to do something about it.

01:25:08.320 It wasn't just satisfied with me saying, oh yeah, that's true.

01:25:11.100 That's true.

01:25:11.540 And I could think all kinds of ideas.

01:25:13.460 It wanted me to, to do something about it to, to, to, to stand up, you know, in some way.

01:25:21.260 And anyone can do it.

01:25:22.460 Anyone can do it in, in a way that's, you know, that, that makes sense for you.

01:25:28.980 You know, um, we have a duty to the truth and we have a duty to our families and, and, uh, and how you balance that out is up to you, but try to balance it.

01:25:43.080 And you might be surprised and you will get stronger the more you listen to, to the truth and you act on truth.

01:25:50.720 Well, I don't think it's any accident that, you know, now we've seen Andrew Gutman, the parent at Brearley, which is one of the most elite all girl schools, one of the most elite schools in the country.

01:26:04.040 Nevermind all girl schools, um, speak out. 0.98

01:26:07.120 He's a parent saying, this has got to stop.

01:26:09.460 Same thing saying, we no longer believe that you have our children's best interests at heart, any of them.

01:26:15.320 And that the, the obsession with race must stop.

01:26:20.900 It has to stop.

01:26:22.140 And in his case, the, the head of school responded, I think, similarly to the way Davison first responded to you.

01:26:30.000 Her name is Jane Freed. 0.86

01:26:31.200 She's a complete coward, um, who basically just called his letter deeply offensive and harmful and promised to double down, promised to double down. 0.98

01:26:40.200 And then, and then played the old, everyone's afraid now they're afraid of Gutman. 0.98

01:26:44.060 You know, they, they felt frightened and intimidated by his letter, same way as it was like, we need schoolwide meetings on Paul and his crazy talk about how he feels as an individual.

01:26:55.140 This is what they try to do.

01:26:56.260 You, you've, you've made them feel unsafe with your offensive and harmful language, as opposed to saying words are how we identify and solve problems.

01:27:08.560 And a difference of opinions is as American as apple pie.

01:27:13.820 Groupthink is what the Chinese do. 1.00

01:27:16.300 It's not what America does, right?

01:27:18.640 The people's Republic of China makes you not say the certain things that they don't want said.

01:27:23.940 That's not what we do here.

01:27:25.020 You can go live in North Korea if you want to live like that. 1.00

01:27:28.240 Um, but I do think Gutman speaking out, I think it's very encouraging that Dalton booted the head, Jim Best of school.

01:27:35.380 They can say all they want that he left voluntarily.

01:27:37.640 That guy got booted out because he went too far.

01:27:40.620 Um, now the head of Grace Church is going, not because of this, but, you know, we'll see what they replace him with.

01:27:47.840 But these schools are on notice now.

01:27:49.580 They're on notice and the more people who follow your lead and the lead of Andrew Gutman, you know, the parent, um, who pulled his kids from Brearley, um, the better off we'll be.

01:28:03.320 The stronger we're going to get in this fight in which a very short time ago we had nothing.

01:28:08.860 We had no one.

01:28:10.180 We just had scared parents.

01:28:12.080 Scared.

01:28:14.920 Yeah, and scared kids.

01:28:16.680 I mean, I want to say something to the students, um, to my students and to students all around the country.

01:28:23.680 Uh, um, one of the things I want to work on at FAIR is, is a student guide and, and there's a, there's a student, um, who's come, come forward to help me with that, to, to help students take a stand in their classes or to take a stand in their papers or to, to write from their conscience.

01:28:45.400 And, you know, to back it up with scholarship and facts and all those things, but to never compromise your, you know, your thinking for yourself about things that are important, so important to the world, because we need to have a diversity of views.

01:29:03.500 We need to have a diversity of opinions.

01:29:05.140 That's how we progress as a country.

01:29:07.360 That's, that is a great necessity.

01:29:10.620 And so, you know, I think that having some support through, through FAIR to do that is really important in that way that'll give strength to, to students.

01:29:21.860 Well, and just to underscore the, the organization, because I love FAIR and I'm on the advisory board, you've mentioned it a couple of times.

01:29:28.720 So FAIR stands for Foundation Against Intolerance and Racism.

01:29:33.560 And if you want to check it out, go to fairforall.org, fairforall.org.

01:29:39.580 That's the organization that Paul and I are talking about.

01:29:42.500 And, and we're trying to make this into kind of what the ACLU used to be, an organization that actually does fight for civil liberties, irrespective of political position, right?

01:29:54.360 Irrespective of political correctness, the ACLU used to stand up for the right of even white supremacists to go out there and say all the crazy stuff they want to say. 0.69

01:30:03.000 The crazies at the Westboro Baptist Church to go out there and say all the crazy stuff they want to say. 0.86

01:30:07.340 Why? 0.97

01:30:07.840 Because this is America.

01:30:09.480 That's why.

01:30:10.260 Not because they agreed with any of it, because this is America.

01:30:13.440 And FAIR is focusing on education in particular as well, which is obviously sort of ground zero in this fight right now.

01:30:23.020 So what does this mean for you?

01:30:25.160 So, I mean, I'm sad that you don't get to teach math.

01:30:28.240 I'm, I'm sad that this, I don't know, that this, you know, this soft place to fall inside the church community is now gone, effectively gone and not going back.

01:30:39.040 So what's next for you professionally and personally?

01:30:44.120 Well, you know, I think, you know, the way I got into teaching math was through tutoring.

01:30:49.680 And I had, I had been tutoring, you know, my, my background was in the humanities in college.

01:30:56.460 And I, I always loved math in high school, but I came back to it for, you know, in tutoring for standardized tests and tutoring for enrichment.

01:31:03.000 And so it's, it's, it's so wonderful to, I've started doing it again to tutor with, you know, working with the kid one-on-one and you really can understand how they think and you can help, you know, almost in a mentorship kind of way.

01:31:17.760 And that's, that's, that I think could be very rewarding.

01:31:20.320 And, you know, there, there have been offers coming in from schools.

01:31:25.080 I will say this to teachers, if you stand up for this, you know, I, there, there's a school in Coral Gables that wants, you know, to hire me.

01:31:33.220 There's schools that, that are reaching out to me now.

01:31:36.440 So.

01:31:37.420 That's wonderful.

01:31:38.560 You know, things, things will happen when you, you know, when you act in accordance with your deepest beliefs.

01:31:46.280 And I think, I don't know whether it's like the universe or what, but, you know, I think as you grow stronger, good things happen.

01:31:55.240 So you, so, you know, and also you may lose friends, but you will make better ones, you know, because.

01:32:00.320 That's right.

01:32:00.600 It settles where it's supposed to settle.

01:32:02.920 It, it, it, it's almost like a cleansing, you know, it, it cleanses you of this veneer of people you thought were in your corner and replaces them with people who actually are.

01:32:13.220 They don't have to agree with you on everything.

01:32:15.380 They just have to agree with you on certain foundational principles like free speech and the ability to disagree.

01:32:21.320 Even if you are disagreeable at times, the ability to disagree and still go on in a, in an adult respectful relationship.

01:32:29.280 And in, in certainly in the, in the case of education, that the respect for students and the unwillingness to demonize whole groups of them based on things well beyond their control.

01:32:41.200 Yeah, absolutely.

01:32:41.680 And it's fun.

01:32:42.080 And it becomes fun to disagree with people that you share the same foundational principles with, because then, then it's like, it's almost like there's a camaraderie and, in, in difference, you know, and you can, you can see each other's differences and respect those because you know that you share those foundational principles and that you, you would have each other's back if anybody challenged those things and tried to take them away from you.

01:33:03.900 But what a, it's such a, it's such a, but I have to say, so I feel about Andrew Gutman, who wrote the letter after pulling his, his child from Brearley.

01:33:15.580 And you, he's, his little, he., he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he, he,

01:33:37.720 That was the reason I spoke out after pulling my kids. I got them out. I got them to what I consider safety. I really feel like I protected my kids. That's really why they're gone out of those schools.

01:33:49.080 You did the right thing, for sure.

01:33:50.300 And now we do have an obligation to worry about the kids who are still there, still being hurt, kids who completely want to be supportive of diversity and positive race relations and a totally realistic assessment of our country's history and the sins of the past and the sins of the present and the fact that we haven't solved racism.

01:34:13.140 But don't want to do any of that by just creating more racism and creating more division and breeding little racists. That's what's going to happen if these lessons continue to stand. That's the thing that really scares me.

01:34:29.820 Yeah, I don't understand how you can be anti-racist but also pro-race. I understand people. How does that work? If you constantly are so aware of race, at what moment is it going to come when you actually come to terms and it all flips upside down and now suddenly race is as meaningless as eye color?

01:34:50.440 Which I think is actually the only sane, you know, way to, you know, future that makes sense is to dismantle, actually yes, dismantle this folk taxonomy that race is, you know, which, you know, there's hundreds of ethnicities of white people, hundreds of ethnicities of black people and they vary, you know, within more than they do between. 0.84

01:35:12.380 And so we know that race is a social construct and really, you know, a falsehood ultimately. So how do you get there when you're constantly being, you know, pro-racializing and pro-reifying, you know, this fundamental delusion that people have?

01:35:31.160 No, you can't. It's staying in the cult. You can't, you can't get out of the Scientology cult, you know, by, by continuing to label people suppressive people and relying on the Thetans and doing the sessions with the Campbell's soup cans and like you've got to take a step away from the cult.

01:35:50.280 I don't know what that is, but I don't want to know. I don't think I want to know.

01:35:53.580 It's a thing. Wait, I want to ask you before I let you go. I do. I'm interested in how you got to be this way because I do think.

01:36:01.160 Whatever moral code was imprinted on you made you one of the ones who said, no, no, I'm going to stand up. I'm not, I'm not going to have the regrets, you know, that Douglas Murray talks about. So is it a religious code? What, like, where are you from? And just give me a feeling for your background.

01:36:22.040 I, um, I grew up in Ithaca, New York and my father.

01:36:25.180 That's why I like you. Yes. I'm from Syracuse and Albany.

01:36:27.920 Oh yeah. Great. Um, my father, uh, was a law professor at Cornell university. He taught evidence and civil procedure since I believe 1968. And I think he retired, uh, I'm not exactly sure, but he, maybe seven, eight years ago.

01:36:42.520 Um, now, um, perhaps a little bit longer. And, you know, he always was a true civil libertarian. He was, and, you know, to this day, he's, he was a fierce liberal, um, in, you know, the age of Kennedy.

01:36:59.160 And he, he, he was a Reagan Democrat. And then he became a conservative in his later years, but, but, you know, the first amendment, uh, and sort of not just the legal quality of it, but the social good that comes of it is he is a fierce defender of it.

01:37:16.340 And he always, he always, he really did transplant those values to me. And, you know, I've tried to, I've tried to nurture the, you know, that in myself. And, um, and, you know, I think he, he, he taught me how to write. He, he taught me how to question.

01:37:35.400 He taught me really how to think for myself. And I'm, I'm just eternally grateful to, to have him as a father. Um, and he still gives lectures at 88. He's, he's in a assisted living facility and he gives lectures to, to, um, the P and he's, and he's, you know, people really love him there. And, uh, he, he actually gave a, he gave a speech about, you mentioned the Skokie trial.

01:37:59.480 So he's about to give a speech about the, uh, the Skokie trial.

01:38:04.140 That's amazing.

01:38:05.300 In about a few weeks.

01:38:05.620 Yeah.

01:38:05.900 He's got to put it on zoom so we can, we can all see it. You're, you're not the only one grateful to him.

01:38:10.860 Yeah. I would, I would, I've been trying to get him, you know, set up and he's like, no, no, I just like a room. I just want to be, you know, I just want to talk to the room.

01:38:18.820 So, uh, yeah, he's, he's an, he's an old school teacher, I think, which is, he really valued teaching in a, in a world that was became more and more about publishing.

01:38:28.440 Um, and so I, you know, that he's also a big reason why I think I, I really enjoy teaching.

01:38:35.680 Yeah. Well, I mean, uh, growing up in upstate New York, I'm in Syracuse and Ithaca or more Western New York, but I do think, I don't, I've always said this, but I think that it's sort of similar to growing up in the Midwest.

01:38:46.040 You have a sensibility about you, about life that I find very appealing.

01:38:50.820 I think most people in those categories also have a connection with nature that is important.

01:38:55.460 Like when you grew up surrounded by trees and in Ithaca, the gorges and just water and fresh air and time outside under the moon, under the stars, under the sun, it's just, it makes you smaller in a good way.

01:39:12.480 It makes, you know, you appreciate your time here in a, in an important way.

01:39:19.840 And, and I, I don't think it's any accident you're from Ithaca and had that dad wound up choosing the course you just chose.

01:39:27.600 Hmm. Yeah, maybe so. I used to love the woods. I was, I was a kid that used to play in the woods with my neighbor, with the neighbor kids.

01:39:35.420 And we had, you know, we, there, gosh, it was, we used to have these big rusty iron bars and we would play army and we would just, you know, smash each other with them.

01:39:44.960 Yeah. You know, just for fun, play, play nights. And, you know, it was, it was a wonderful childhood, you know, in these, and these woods where, you know, it was, it was sort of the last, I think the last time when, you know, the kids would play together, you know, after school.

01:40:02.640 And then they would go home for dinner, but they were unsupervised. I mean, we were essentially unsupervised and, you know, having the freedom to, to work out our differences, you know, and to sort of a little bit rough and tumble. I, I, I'm sad. I mean, I'm grateful to have grown up then, but I'm sad that a lot of kids don't have that today.

01:40:21.380 Yeah. Well, it is one of the, one of the side effects of me pulling the kids, Doug and I pulling our kids from the New York City schools is we're going to move to the Burbs and our kids are going to get a childhood like that. I'm happy for it too. The woods is, I can relate to that. That's, I spent a lot of my time in the woods too. And I can't wait until they play games like the ones you just outlined instead of Dodge the Rat, which became a thing here in New York City over the pandemic.

01:40:48.500 Yeah, right, gosh.

01:40:49.180 Yeah, that's no, no one, no one wants to play Dodge the Rat.

01:40:55.580 I know, it sounds kind of fun actually.

01:40:56.280 But you can get really good at it with the streets empty.

01:40:58.820 Yeah.

01:41:00.360 Listen, I'm so grateful to you for speaking out in every way and for speaking to me and our audience and, and rooting for you and looking forward to working with you at FAIR.

01:41:11.980 Likewise, Megan, thanks so much for having me.

01:41:13.800 Our thanks again to Paul Rossi for today. I want to tell you that on Monday, we have a great show. We were going to air it this week, but we postponed it because the show of Invert came out.

01:41:26.820 We wanted to get you a reaction on that, but it's such a good show and it's on climate change.

01:41:32.040 And what I think you're going to love about this is this is one of those areas where I just haven't been that studied.

01:41:38.580 You know, I just, I'm not as well as, I'm not as well informed as I should be.

01:41:43.340 And I kind of think sometimes that's a benefit to the audience, because if you are in the place I was before we did this interview, you're going to leave being like, oh, okay, I get it.

01:41:56.120 And I don't feel alarmist about it, but I did learn and I understand the options better.

01:42:02.400 And our guest is amazing. Walks you through it really clearly.

01:42:05.740 He authored the book Apocalypse Never.

01:42:08.240 Really cool character.

01:42:10.020 Very well respected.

01:42:11.100 So anyway, we're going to get into it on Monday.

01:42:13.320 I think you're going to feel again, you know, like we say in the Kelly file, like cool water over a hot brain when you're done with that hour.

01:42:19.040 I promise you, you will.

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The Megyn Kelly Show - April 23, 2021

A Teacher Speaks Out： Paul Rossi on Critical Race Theory and Anti-Racist Teachings ＂Demonizing＂ Kids at his School ｜ Ep. 93

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