You know, I sincerely believe that none of these “CRT” critics are concerned about white children’s feelings. I can’t and won’t speak for Rice, but the white adults who are so up in arms about changing the way we teach history are concerned about their own tender feelings, not their children’s.

When I was a white child in school, I was taught to practically worship our founding fathers as divine forces who could do no wrong, to understand them as people who dramatically changed the world for the better in the space of a few amazing years.

Yawn. Isn’t that a little bit ridiculous?

I bought it, though. I accepted American exceptionalism for a while. I believed people like Paine, Jefferson, and Madison were the greatest people who ever lived or probably ever would live.

If anybody had tried to tell me they were flawed, I would have pushed back aggressively. Because I was taught to identify with them, to believe I was descended at least philosophically from them.

But all people are flawed! It’s perfectly possible for somebody like Jefferson, who did horribly racist, cruel things, to have advanced ideas about representative democracy.

I should not have been taught that our founding fathers were flawless people. Nobody should ever have been taught that. I would much rather have learned the more complicated truth, that while the founders of the United States did advance certain ideas that would eventually help make the world a better place, they also perpetuated slavery and imposed enormous suffering on innocent people for centuries.

If that makes anyone feel bad, it’s because they’ve already bought into a false notion. Teaching kids the truth about America’s founding and history should not cause suffering. It should cause thoughtfulness.

White adults who say otherwise are not being honest. Why Rice is buying into that is more for you to talk about than me.