What’s Wrong with California’s Ethnic Studies Mandate?

Podcast audio:

In this episode of New Ideal Live, Sam Weaver and Nikos Sotirakopoulos discuss the recent California ethnic studies mandate. They evaluate the ideological nature of the curriculum and its assault on knowledge, the philosophical ideas that made it possible, and why it must be opposed intellectually.

Among the topics covered:

• How ethnic studies emerged from an activist assault on the idea of objective truth;
• Evidence that the proposed curriculum is non-objective;
• How lessons on “narratives” encourage prejudice among students;
• The egalitarian roots of the curriculum and its elevation of the primitive over science;
• Why the government monopoly on education causes violations of intellectual freedom.

Recommended in this podcast are Ayn Rand’s essays “Global Balkanization,” “The Age of Envy,” and “Fairness Doctrine for Education,” as well as the previous podcast episode “Political Battles Over Education.”

The podcast was recorded on April 4, 2024. Listen and subscribe from your mobile device on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. Watch archived podcasts here.