‘It’s been very quiet and suppressed and discreet behind the scenes. And now they’ve been wide open with all of it,’ said a Loudoun mom.
Virginia’s Loudoun County Public Schools has emerged as a national representation of the critical race theory (CRT) clash between parents and administrators. A local school board recall effort is gaining traction. But aside from figures like Ian Prior at Fight for Schools or thinkers at The Heritage Foundation that sponsor events, what do normal Loudouners think? I ventured out to Loudoun County to walk the streets of Leesburg and Ashburn and see who would talk to me about CRT. Most turned me down, understandably cautious about staking a political claim in media. The owner of one clothing store instructed me to leave after I uttered the phrase “critical race theory,” questioning why anyone should care. A Taiwanese coffee store owner expressed a worry that his bipartisan customers would repudiate him. A woman who said she is a former public school teacher whispered to me in a Giant Food Store through a mask that she probably shouldn’t talk, while her daughter nudged her to keep walking. Here are five Loudouners who agreed to talk to me using their names, and here’s what they had to say about CRT. Suzanne Byers is a physical therapist at an outpatient clinic. She has kids in middle school and has lived in Loudoun off and on for the last 20 years. Byers first became aware of CRT in Loudoun when her daughter came home from school, got in the car, and asked if her mother was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. “I was like ‘Wait, what.’ She was at a lesson in history,” Byers told me. “I asked her what she learned. She couldn’t really tell me, and then I kind of joked, ‘Well, you know Democrats started the KKK, right?’ She was like ‘No.’” “There’s a lot of social justice they focus on in seventh grade,” she continued. “There was an email that went out from her history teacher that said ‘We’re going to be talking about a lot of sensitive subjects.’” Byers says she’s attended recent school board meetings and spoken, but “I don’t feel like I’m being heard.” Like other parents I’ve spoken to, she expressed frustration with the format and would prefer a town hall that is more conducive to free expression. The last straw for Byers was when her daughter was told by her history teacher that 14 years old is a reasonable age to peacefully protest and be excused from school. Her public school was trying to turn her seventh-grader into a leftist activist without her knowledge. “I think it’s been in the schools [before], “she said. “But it’s been very quiet and suppressed and discreet behind the scenes. And now they’ve been wide open with all of it.” Gunar Hawes,30, says he has lived in Loudoun for his entire life.
