Amy Gallagher and critical race theory

A Christian nurse in the UK has claimed the NHS is forcing racist ideology on students by promoting critical race theory in its classes.

Amy Gallagher, who is in the final stages of a two-year course in forensic psychology, is suing the Portman Clinic in north London, part of The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, claiming discrimination on the basis of race, religion and philosophical belief.

She objected to a lecture entitled “whiteness – a problem of our time” in October 2020, where attendees were forced to confront “the reality of white privilege” and in another race lecture the following month, the 33-year-old claimed she was told that “Christianity is racist because it is European” by a talk leader.

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Accused by an external speaker of not being able to work with “diverse populations” and inflicting “race-based harm”, Gallagher told The Telegraph she was bringing the case “to protect my career but it’s also the first test of woke ideology in the courts. The NHS is forcing someone to adopt a racist ideology and it needs to be stopped”.

The Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust told the paper: “We cannot comment on an ongoing legal case. As a trust, we have made a public commitment to work to become an anti-racist organisation.”

What is critical race theory?

Critical race theory (CRT) is a set of concepts first developed by legal scholars in the United States in the 1970s that essentially asserts that: racism is systemic; that key institutions are rooted in white supremacy; and that racial dynamics are the outcome of complex social systems.

In 2020, amid widespread protests over racial inequality following the death of George Floyd, some conservative activists in the US began protesting against CRT, claiming it was infiltrating modern classrooms.

“They’re trying to rewrite history and redesign the future of the United States,” said Greg Abbott, governor of Texas, who last year signed legislation intended to ban CRT in the state’s public schools, adding “they’re undermining the very values and core of what America stands for.”

For decades a relatively obscure and little talked about academic theory, “suddenly, the term is everywhere”, said Jacey Fortin in The New York Times. “It makes national and international headlines and is a target for talking heads. Culture wars over critical race theory have turned school boards into battlegrounds, and in higher education, the term has been tangled up in tenure battles. Dozens of United States senators have branded it ‘activist indoctrination’.”

How it came to dominate the culture wars

In the US, there is a growing “moral panic” of CRT driven by right-wing commentators and politicians who have put it front and centre of the culture wars and war on woke by claiming it threatens the fundamentals of American history and culture.

Since 2020, 17 states have imposed laws or rules to limit how race and discrimination can be taught in public-school classrooms, according to Education Week. Some states now prohibit teachers from saying that people of any particular race or gender are inherently racist or oppressive and “even in states without these laws, some teachers say they are under extra scrutiny”, said The New York Times.

Last month “furious” parents in Virginia gathered outside a Loudoun County School Board meeting to demand “an end to the racist and divisive ideologies being infused into the government schools”, the Daily Mail reported.

The paper said the area “has become the nerve centre for parental activism, with debates over critical race theory ideologies bleeding over into the rest of the United States”.

This week Fox News accused the Biden administration and Democrats in Washington of “pushing for millions in funding for a union-backed model of schools that included some critical race theory concepts” such as “culturally relevant” pedagogy and “restorative justice” practices.

Highlighting the slow drip-feed of fear stories around CRT, The Wall Street Journal also reported that the American College of Surgeons has “made a priority of promoting critical race theory and so-called anti-racism” in recent years.

“Like many radicalised organisations, the college has taken to punishing members who raise concerns over its new agenda,” it added.

How is the debate playing out politically?

Left-wing comedian Bill Maher, who has donated millions of dollars to the Democratic Party, warned that school lessons on CRT and decisions to conceal transgender students’ new identities from their parents are driving liberal voters into the arms of Donald Trump and the Republicans.

“While there’s nothing particularly novel about this particular moral panic,” wrote Nicole Hemmer for CNN, “it is serving a useful political purpose: arguing about critical race theory shifts the conversation away from the continued consequences of structural racism.”

“That conversation opens up challenging issues about equity, affirmative action, reparations, and government intervention to dismantle racist systems – all of which face significant opposition from the right – and can only hurt a Republican Party that has grown dependent on the politics of white racial grievance,” she added.