The Political Insider

On Wednesday, former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice took a surprisingly strong stand against critical race theory during an interview on ABC’s “The View.”

Rice herself was a trailblazer – becoming the first black woman to head the State Department in the George W. Bush administration. 

Co-host Whoopi Goldberg went first – with a very interesting explanation of what exactly is “up for debate.”

“One of the key issues up for debate is how much of a voice parents should have in their child’s school curriculum especially when it comes to subjects like sex education and critical race theory, I thought they didn’t teach critical race theory until they went to like law school or something,” Goldberg said.

RELATED: America’s Students Deserve A History And Civics Education Free Of Political Agendas

Rice: ‘I Don’t Have To Make White Kids Feel Bad For Being White’

Rice responded, “I sure hope not, because I’m not sure 7-year-olds need to learn it.”

Goldberg followed up, “The question is, do parents need more influence here or should they leave the lesson-planning to the pros?” 

At that point, co-host Joy Behar argued that as a former teacher she believed teachers should have more say so in curriculum than parents because they are ‘trained educators.’

It is a pervasive view of progressivism that society should be “managed” by “experts” rather than leaving decisions to regular people. 

Behar said, “You can’t really pit that up against a parent who just is annoyed you’re teaching, you know, ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ or whatever the curriculum says, you can’t have the parents interfering to that extent in the curriculum.”

Behar’s comments are ironic, given that it was some on the left who had recently taken to removing the literally classic “To Kill a Mockingbird” from school curriculums for ‘offensive language.’

“If they’re adamant and they don’t want you to teach what is going to be taught, they’re going to have to homeschool their kids. Because this is not going to wash,” Behar added.

Rice noted that the fact that more and more parents are homeschooling their children should be a sign of dissatisfaction with schools. 

Rice zeroed in on critical race theory. “If I can take a moment to talk about the whole issue of critical race theory and what is and is not being taught, I come out of an academic institution and something that academics debate what’s the role of race and so forth?” Rice said.

She continued, “I grew up in segregated Birmingham, Alabama… I went to segregated schools until we moved to Denver. My parents never thought I would grow up in a world without prejudice. My parents told me you’ll overcome it and you can be whatever you want to be.”

Rice said the goal of CRT seemed to be stoking white guilt more than it empowers Americans of color.

“I would like black kids to be completely empowered to know they are beautiful in their blackness but in order to do that I don’t have to make white kids feel bad for being white,” Rice said.

RELATED: Washington Post Rushes To Defend Biden Over Supply Chain Crisis: ‘Americans Need To Lower Expectations’

Rice: ‘We Teach The Good And We Teach The Bad Of History’

The conversation continued among Rice and the hosts but the former secretary of state did have one final thought on the subject.

“One more thing, it goes back to how we teach the history,” Rice said. “We teach the good and we teach the bad of history.”

“What we don’t do is make 7 and 10-year-olds feel they are somehow bad people because of the color of their skin,” Rice finished.