Walter Strickland's "Cookie Cutter" Teaching

The Purpose of the Episode and Walter Strickland’s Influence

Welcome to the Conversations That Matter podcast. My name is John Harris. We are going to talk about a video today. I'm gonna show you some clips from it, from Walter Strickland. For those who don't know, Walter Strickland is a professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, Vice President of Diversity, I think it is there, for the Kingdom Diversity Program.

We've talked about a lot of problematic things he's said, false teaching, even as it relates to the gospel, putting, combining social justice works with the gospel, liberation theology, standpoint epistemology.

He used critical race theory in a positive way in his dissertation. He was on the committee that really created, honestly, Resolution 9, which endorsed critical race theory as an analytical tool. I mean, there's a lot that we've talked about in regards to Walter Strickland.

So those who listen regularly, you probably feel like you already know who Walter Strickland is, and I certainly feel that way in some sense, and I wouldn't normally go over more material from him, except for the fact that ACSI is still planning on using Walter Strickland's organization, Unify Ed, and they did a Zoom meeting.

I watched the first few minutes of it. Someone has sent me a link. I haven't gotten around to looking at the rest of it. Some people who did watch it told me, and the reason for this Zoom meeting was to try to allay the concerns and fears some people have about Walter Strickland's problematic teachings.

What most people said was that they kind of evaded the issues, and that Walter Strickland basically took the position that he doesn't endorse critical race theory as a worldview, and that's the key phrase there, as a worldview.

That's the same position that so many of the social justice advocates have, that they, oh, we're not critical race theorists. We don't endorse it as a worldview. They will endorse the analytical tools that come from it, but not as a worldview, and we've talked about that and why that's a problem.

But today, I wanted to talk about this video, particularly because ACSI is still using UnifyEd, and there's a specific school that I wanna help out a little bit, if I can, who some of the teachers, as I understand, want to share some concerns, I guess, and basically, they're not having this.

They don't want this, but I think they're having a little bit of a difficult time. That's the impression I get, and so we're gonna play this clip, which is, I'm just gonna warn you, it's about 20 minutes long, so this may be a longer episode, and I'm gonna comment on it as we go.

Now, I've shortened it down. There's a lot of things that I could've put in here. We could've just played the whole clip, which is like 45 minutes, but I cut it in at least half, if not less than that, just to give you a sense for what Dr. Strickland is saying.

We cut out some of the fat, and here's the meat. Here are the things that I think are pertinent for those who are trying to shine a light on this, if they're in a Christian school, and they're concerned about ACSI, advising them on diversity, et cetera.

The reason this video itself is so significant, though, is because it is Walter Strickland giving a talk recently. This is from February 12th of this year, to the Charlotte Christian Schools, and the link is in the info section if you wanna check out the whole thing.

So if you think, oh, John messed something up here, or was that in context, or whatever, you can go ahead and you can go look at that, and I encourage that. So the link is in the info section, but this is Dr. Strickland presenting to the upper school faculty at Charlotte Christian School on February 12th.

This is the kind of thing that ACSI schools can expect, since they're partnering with Unify Ed. So that's why I think this is significant and important to go over, and for those who have no connection to ACSI, or Unify Ed, or Walter Strickland, or Southeastern, or the Southern Baptists, it's still, I think, helpful, because this is the kind of narrative we're hearing all across evangelicalism.

So he's not unique in that sense. He's not coming up with things that I would say are really that unique. They might be packaged a little differently, he may articulate them a little differently, but it's good to be prepared for these kinds of teachings, I think, no matter where you go in evangelicalism, because they're arising from everywhere.

So we're gonna talk about that. A few announcements, though, real quick, before we get to the video. This is a book, I just wanted to mention, this is a book that I've started reading called First Century Slavery in 1 Corinthians 7 .21 by S. Scott Barchi, I think that's how you pronounce his name.

I don't really actually know anything about him, to be honest with you, other than what's on the cover. I mean, he's got quite the resume. I don't know if his theology is orthodox or any of that. I haven't really gotten to some of the meat of the book, but, so you see how far I've gotten so far, but I will say this about it.

So I'm not giving it like a full endorsement or anything, but I wanna say this. It is a helpful book if you wanna understand Roman slavery during the time of Christ and the apostles. In the middle of that section, and I think he's doing a really good job, and one of the significant things is that you hear people talk all the time about how, basically, Paul's teaching concerning slavery in the ancient world, in the Roman world, the Greco-Roman world, is not really applicable to the slavery that existed in the Western world, specifically in the United States, because it's apples and oranges, two completely different things.

And I'm reading through this, and yeah, of course there's differences, but in some ways, Roman slavery in some areas was actually much worse. And so it's very, the sources seem to be very, it's very scholarly, good sources.

You don't need to know Greek, but it does help, I think, if you're interacting with some of that stuff. So I wanna just throw that out there. First Centralist Slavery in 1 Corinthians 7 .21 by S. Scott Barchi, and some of the material in here may end up in the book that I'm writing now, which I'm in the middle of chapter four, maybe towards a little over the middle of chapter four, writing about standpoint epistemology, which is fun.

So actually, that's not really true. It's actually not that fun. Some of the other chapters are kind of fun. Standpoint theory, you take three Advil so you can understand it, and then you try to explain it.

And anyway, it'll be good for those reading it. I'm trying to keep it at that level where it's kind of like upper high school, maybe lower, more like upper high school. It's more like, I think, an 11th grade level that I'm trying to write at, 10th, 11th grade.

Most Christian books, though, if memory serves me correct, when I used to read a lot more Christian books, especially when I was in seminary, I'd be assigned some of the even pop Christian books at Southeastern.

They tend to be written on, like, the highest levels, it seems to be like fifth grade for a pop Christian book,.

Maybe sixth.

A lot of them are written on like a third or fourth grade level almost. And maybe third or fourth grade isn't what it was when I was going through those grades. But I don't think any of the ones that I read from a pop Christian standpoint a few years ago really entered the junior high category.

So I realize that I'm trying that balance. You can pray for me. I'm trying to, how do I make this book just really accessible to everyone as much as I can, but I don't wanna diminish the truth. Because standpoint theory, let's just face it, this is something that you do need to put a little intellectual work in to understand it.

So I don't wanna diminish that. We wanna understand it. Anyway, that's a little bit of what I've been up to and just wanted to let you all know that.

What else?

Oh, one other thing that I'll mention before we get into the video from Walter Strickland. Of course, the election, the gubernatorial election here in Virginia is in full swing. There's only a few days left before Republicans vote for their primary candidate.

And I noticed that Glenn Youngkin, who I've done a few episodes on Glenn Youngkin and basically showed this guy, he's a globalist. He's not good on gun rights. His church is woke. He's endorsed a book that's basically standpoint epistemology.

And all that to say, Ted Cruz endorsed him. So he's, today, he's actually probably a few miles from where I'm actually recording this. Ted Cruz is holding a rally with Glenn Youngkin, which is kind of an eye-opener for me.

In 2016, I was, I liked Cruz. And I know some of you might not like that. I did, but I did in 2016, at least. And there's still things I like about Ted Cruz, but I just, my eyes are being opened a little bit.

I'm just realizing that sometimes the high and lofty principles you think are out there, they're not, it's not always what they seem. Sometimes, I found out, and it sounds like, and I don't know if this is 100 true, but the explanation that I've been given is that Ted Cruz's wife goes to, basically, is part of the same, how do I say this?

How do I say this?

The same circles that Glenn Youngkin's wife runs in. More elitist circles, I would think. They're fairly well-to-do people. And so they're part of that same circuit, and that's why Ted Cruz's can't.

I don't know if that's the reason. That's just what I was told to try to explain that. But what we've seen in Christianity, what I've seen with compromise, with leaders that I just thought, there's no way, that person's principled, and then you find out, it gets proven.

Okay, this person's not principled. Obviously, that same thing is happening in the realm of politics, and it's just a reminder to me, I guess, not to be discouraged. I'm not bringing this up for that, because I know it can be discouraging, but it's just a reminder to try to be as discerning as you possibly can.

Ask good questions, and don't be afraid to ask good questions. I'm actually considering, I'm not considering, I'm gonna do it, a kind of like a questionnaire, like maybe 10 questions to ask incoming pastors to try to determine where do they stand on social justice issues.

So if you're trying to hire a pastor, you're on a search committee, something to help you out. Because I think a lot of times, for the sake of not wanting to be rude, for, I don't know what the reasons all are, fear, not wanting to ruffle feathers, people just don't ask questions, or they don't do research into candidates, or even pastoral candidates.

And I know for those who do do that research, it can be frustrating, because some of you have messaged me. But I just wanna encourage that. More research on people when you're not sure, and just ask good questions.

And so anyway, all that to say, let's talk about this video though, from Walter Strickland. And it's, like I said, about 20 minutes long. This will probably be a little bit of a longer episode. And I have it broken down into digestible clips.

So we'll go through it here. And let me find my play button.

Here we go.

All right.

Walter Strickland’s Seminary Story and the “Cookie Cutter” Experience

I remember when I was in my first year in seminary,.

And I have to say this as I play this, the clips are all in sequence, except for this one. This one, I found in the middle of the video, he gets a little autobiographical. And I thought this was really helpful to understand the rest of what he says.

So he's talking about his first semester in seminary, and I'll let him go on.

I found a paper that I wrote, I had written, and it was a book review, and I was critiquing a book that was written by a black man. And I can slam the book pretty bad, to the point where I actually went and found the book, reread the thing, all 307 pages of it, and the book wasn't that bad.

And so I was trying to figure out what happened, and why did I respond so negatively to that book? Well, to that point in my Christian maturation, I was taught covertly, never overly, but taught covertly that persons of color have nothing to add to intelligent theological discussion.

Now, I want you to listen to that language. You're gonna hear it more in this, and you hear it a lot from the social justice crowd. It's this, there's something implicit. This is, it's part of the implicit bias training.

In fact, that's, in some respects, that's what he's doing here. So he's talking about how he implicitly, he caught this view, kind of, right? World views are caught, not taught. You've heard that before.

He caught this view that black people were not good theologians, white people were, and he talks about how much damage that did to him, though no one ever said it. So I want you to listen for that, and then look at the evidence he uses to back that claim up.

You know, here's how it was implicitly taught.

There was simply no representation for me to know otherwise. And so I had well-intentioned and well-meaning Anglo professors and teachers who assigned books written by those who looked like them, with us in the guest chapel speakers who looked like our teachers, and then all the guest lecturers who also was of the same background.

And so at the conclusion of my education, within my education, so the education in my education, I surmised that only people who are of Anglo descent had anything productive to say about theology, because the capstone of my education, especially with college, was about theological studies.

As a result, I discredited news anchors of color, professors of color, politicians of color, even before hearing them. And so when I heard them, and their sets of concerns were outside of the pale, or their faithfulness was expressed in different trappings, I discredited them.

And so the consequence is that I felt that for me to do real theology or to be a real mature Christian like my mentors, I had to mute parts of who God made me, to be more like my disciples. I began to squelch everything in me that didn't cohere with them, and it made me miserable.

So there was a serious emotional effect that came from this dynamic, because in a real sense, I was muting parts of who God made me. So I was an image bearer who was muting and trying to belittle parts of who God made me that didn't cohere to that dominant culture.

And it was really everything that was particular to African American culture. And so it seemed like I was the only person, or at least one of the only people, struggling with what seemed to be like a schizophrenia of my spiritual maturation.

And in hindsight, I probably was nearly alone in that, because at that point in my spiritual journey, I was in a sea of people who embodied the culture that was considered normal amongst evangelicals, that was a part of, or part and parcel to, or closely associated with the cookie cutter.

And so my cultural affinities and experience did not fit into, fully, into the dominant cultural evangelical mold. And it forced me to raise questions, not only about the faith as it pertained to those things, but about the faith as a whole.

I wanna stop there, that's a lot. So let's summarize a few things. This is kind of like Matt Hall's, I'm a racist moment. What Walter Strickland is saying, I adopted implicitly all these views about discrediting news hankers and anyone who was black, looking down on them.

He was saying he was doing that, because he did not see them represented at his school in an evangelical culture in general. So he's talking about chapel speakers, he's talking about teachers that he had.

There weren't enough black people is what he's saying, people that look like him. And so he assumed because of that, that people that looked like him were, I guess, devalued. And so they weren't as smart in some way.

They didn't have the mental capacity, or weren't as spiritual as white people. So he tried to be like a white person. That's what he's saying. And he's saying this did all kinds of damage to him. You heard him mention the phrase cookie cutter.

This is something you'll find throughout this whole talk. Really, this is Walter Strickland's cookie cutter teaching, that there's this cookie cutter mold that evangelicals in particular, people that attend Christian schools commonly have to fit into.

And it's really, quote unquote, white culture. And people like him, they try to fit into that cookie cutter mold, but they're not able to do it because that's not really who they are. That's not really their culture.

And it does all kinds of damage to them. And a few comments on this. Number one, the thing that hits me is I almost wanna cry. It's so sad to hear this. And he's not the only one I've heard say something like this.

I'm gonna let fly something that I've been holding onto for a little bit. I'm not gonna get into details about it, but I wanna say this. Someone did contact me months ago from Walter Strickland's former church.

And this kind of thing happens semi-often. I rarely ever talk about it, and I'm not gonna get into details about this. But his church in California, someone who knows their family on some level, or did, I should say, because I don't know what their relationship is now, but watched him grow up kind of thing.

And is basically shocked to see where he's landed. Because, and this person described for me kind of the setting that Walter Strickland grew up in, the church that he went to, and how there really, there just wasn't anything, at least, now, people could push back and say, well, this person just, they weren't aware of the racism that was there or something.

I don't know. I wasn't there. I'm just saying that this isn't the first time this has happened. This has also happened with Jarvis Williams. I've had people do the same thing, reach out to me about him.

Curtis Woods, the same thing. Even Matt Hall. I've had people reach out about these guys and tell me, yeah, I knew this person before they went off to college. And their conclusion that they have is that, in every single case, pretty much, is that somewhere along the line, when they were leaving high school, going to college, or grad school, they got woke.

There's something changed in them where they had almost like a bitterness about where they came from, about their experiences. And it just, they didn't, it wasn't really there before. They didn't, they weren't aware of it.

And someone, it's like someone took them and explained to them all the ways they were oppressed that they didn't realize. And then it's just like, it dawned on them that, oh man, I've been oppressed. I don't know, here's the thing.

I gotta be careful about this. Because I don't wanna, you know, Walter Strickland is giving his autobiography here. I don't know Walter Strickland on a personal level. I didn't watch him grow up. The only reason I bring this up is to say that, I think when you're watching someone like him, and it's not just him, I think it's good to consider that possibility.

When I was doing my book, here it is, the first one. So I'm writing the second one now. This is the first one, Social Justice Goes to Church, New Left and Modern American Evangelicalism. I had to do the bios of a number of people.

Most of them are elderly or gone. So it makes it a little easier when you analyze people and you have the long, the broad sweep of their life to look at and multiple sources over time. And so I had to do mini biographies.

And what I found with all the social justice advocates of the 70s was pretty much the same story, just about all of them. Everyone I did a little mini biography on, it's like somewhere in high school or college, they ended up having a teacher or a series of teachers, or they rubbed shoulders with the New Left somewhere, and they got woke.

Jim Wallace called it an awakening. They didn't use the word woke, and they just became aware of all these systemic biases that they weren't aware of before, and implicit bias in this case. And Walter Strickland's talking about this, that he didn't know about it, and these are his words.

He didn't see it at the time, but now he's looking back and realizing that's what that was. I was, Walter Strickland's saying, I was a white supremacist in some ways. I was looking at things that way.

And so this, it strikes me as sad because you can see that there's an identity issue here with someone like him. And I'm gonna just tell you what, I don't attribute that identity crisis to implicit biases that were subliminally taught to him, because he didn't see black people in chapel at school.

I attribute it to the social justice ideas that he imbibed from people like James Cone. That's what I attribute it to. And it's just a pattern I've seen over time with people who were content for the most part, and then they get woke and they're not.

And I challenge you, what woke person do you know that has contentment? And I know in a certain sense, we all realize there's things that could be better. We live in a sinker's world, but I would say that marks people who are woke or on the social justice train.

That becomes part of the purpose of their life is just how, what's been done to them, how bad it's been, how their victim, they're very, they navel gaze a lot at their victim experiences and how bad it's been for them.

And it's sad for me because it's like they're stuck. And I know Walter Strickland here, he's at a Christian school giving advice to teachers, but he sounds like someone, he's saying he struggles with this.

It sounds like in some ways, he's kind of still stuck on this. This is something that he kind of hasn't moved past. And he doesn't want other people to go through the same experience that he's gone through.

And so what's the solution to that?

The only solution would be,.

Well, you got to bring in a bunch of black people in. And I guess, but what is that? Here's the thing I just wanted to challenge people with. Let's say you do that. Southeastern has done this. They've been doing this for years.

Okay, so your chapels then are going to be multi-ethnic. You're gonna, let's say 50 of the chapel speakers, let's say are gonna be black. And then 50 are gonna be white. Even if the ratio of students, let's say you have 10 are black, but we're gonna make sure that they're overrepresented in chapel.

That's kind of like what Southeastern does. And we see that being done everywhere now. What does that say about other ethnicities then? Does that now teach Asian people that, wow, man, I don't see Asian people represented up there.

I guess they're simply not intelligent. I don't see women up there. I guess they're simply not intelligent. I don't see fill in the blank. I'm a blind person. I don't hear people who are blind speaking.

Does that mean that they're devalued? So just take the logic to its ultimate conclusion and you'll realize that we live in a world where you are not always going to be represented or people that look like you or share your hobbies or whatever the external factor may be.

We live in a world that just, that's the reality of the situation. You're not gonna see mirrors of yourself.

Everywhere you look.

And that's something that adults just learn to live with and they don't consider it to be a problem. And it shouldn't drive them to think that they're not valued or that people who are look like them aren't valued.

I mean, you could just take this to any characteristic. Now, I realize some identity factors are stronger than others, but I mean, look, people who dress a certain way, people who wear glasses, people who have braces, people who grew up in a certain region, people with certain accents.

I mean, the list just goes on and on and on. I don't see people like that. Therefore, they must not be whatever. Usually the reason that people are brought to chapel or people are, I mean, there's a couple reasons, but usually in theory, what most people would say is that there's a qualification that if, and there's a convenience, convenience and qualification.

So if like someone is speaking in chapel at a Christian school, I mean, I happen to be related to some people who have taught at Christian schools and stuff. So I know a little bit about this. It's because there's maybe a pastor in that area who's local, there's the convenience factor.

And on top of it, they're qualified to speak about it. So usually you're looking at a certain pool of people that are theologically Orthodox, that agree with the school, that can help. So there's limitations there.

And that's generally the stand. Now, look, in theory, can people use standards that are partial and there's bigoted reasons that they're not choosing? I'm sure that's possible, but Walter Strickland even here is saying that this is something that just was implicit.

This isn't like they purposed like, hey, we're just gonna find people who look this way to be in our chapels. So someone who thinks this way, like Walter Strickland, and if you cater to someone who thinks this way, it seems like what you're doing is you're actually, you're not doing them a service because they have to live in the real world and you're creating an expectation within them that they're not valued unless they see people that have whatever identity factor they value platform somewhere.

And the thing that the solution would seem to be, bringing someone back to their worth is because they're made in the image of God. He's given them a purpose and abilities and all these kinds of things.

Don't find it through the eyes of other people. But Walter Strickland's kind of assuming that off the top, that he found it through the eyes of other, or what he thought was the bigoted perspective of other people, and that's where he's finding his worth.

And he's even assuming that, that they were bigoted in some way. So there's an assumption going on here and then you kind of blame other people for your own insecurities and stuff. There's a lot more I could say about that, but we need to get through it.

So we're gonna keep going here. Hopefully you can kind of see how this problem emerges and how this problem just is not, this isn't something you see represented in scripture either. You don't see this kind of a problem and or anything like this being a problem, because they could have said that, right?

What's up with all these Jewish men, being platformed in the early church and writing, why are they the apostles? That, I mean, you could say that it just makes me feel devalued, right? I mean, this kind of logic that he's using could be completely flipped to counteract the Bible itself, to challenge the scripture.

And I hope no one would do that, but this is the kind of logic that could lend itself to that. So let's see here, let's keep going.

And so it's taken me 30 years to be more comfortable with myself, but I still struggle with this, if I'm honest. And so my conclusion is that, while I have a better sense of who I am today, I have, I've had so many unique experiences that I've taken the best of all these worlds of experience and tried to sort of take them onto myself, but it's still been a struggle with being comfortable with who God has made me as a Christian.

Here's the

That's so sad. That's just so sad. Does your heart not want to just... I mean, look, I've critiqued some things that Walter Strickland said, but there's part of me that just wants to hug the guy and just be like, you are made in God's image.

You know, there's... And I, look, I realize he's promoted false teaching and I couldn't, I'm being hypothetical here, but I would, my heart just kind of like snaps for that. It's tugging at me a little bit.

30 years, he's saying 30 years, that he's dealing with this. And I think of, well, I'm going to keep going because I don't want to get bogged down in this, but it's just sad. So let's keep going.

Minority Students, Suspicion, and Cultural Captivity

And the challenge has emerged from some surveys that I've done, both qualitative and quantitative analysis with students around the country. And this is what I've found. As long time minority students get older on campus, as they go throughout their years, sometimes there's schools, I've been at school that call these folks lifers.

And so as these lifers or close to lifers get older, they are convinced that their teachers care about them. So that's the first point. They're convinced that their teachers care about them. But as they grow, they're less and less confident to share their struggles with their teachers.

I want you to ask yourself right now, what would you attribute that to? How do you interpret that? So he's saying that minority students feel comfortable with their teachers when they're young, but then as they get older, they feel less comfortable with their teachers, confiding in them.

Let me throw out one possibility. When you become aware of the media narrative around you and the bigotries that may exist around you, that may make you suspicious of someone that you formerly trusted because you're realizing maybe that they're not...

For instance, let me give you an example of that. The police, right? If you are immersed in a setting where the narrative you're hearing all the time is that the police are racist, the police are racist, the police are racist, they're out to get you, you will wake up one day and you will actually believe it and you will function that way.

There was actually a video I just watched. Some of you might've seen it online where a lady gets pulled over recently and she starts calling this policeman a murderer and just verbally abusive to this police officer.

He takes it very well. But why did this person... She didn't have her driver's license. I forget what the issue was. It was something small. He kind of pulled her... Oh, she was on her phone. You know, there was a legitimate reason for him to pull her over.

Why is she... And he was Hispanic too, but she was saying how he really wanted to be white, that he's not a black person, he's a wannabe white person and he's a murderer and all these things. That didn't come from her experience with that officer.

It came from some kind of an understanding she had before she was ever pulled over. And that's, I think, what's happening a lot of the time is people are conditioned into thinking certain things are racist or sexist or homophobic or whatever, when it's not those experiences that are actually in the collection of data that is leading them to draw those conclusions.

It's a narrative that just keeps repeating itself over and over and over. I know of a person who basically did not wanna leave their house because they're afraid the police were gonna get them. This is recent too.

And it's a Christian person, but did not even wanna leave their house. And it's just like that. That just cripples you through life, that kind of thinking, but it's conditioned. It's not based on experience, it's based on conditioning.

And so that certainly is, that's at play as well. And I wonder if that is what would make sense of this. Now let's see if Walter Strickland considers that a possibility.

And so this is in contrast to a slight decline amongst majority students, but there's a big drop-off that's very drastic with underrepresented students.

And here's my

Underrepresented means minorities. And when he says majority students, he's talking about white students, just for those who don't know.

Explanation of this after having interviewed some of these students who have taken these surveys that I've gotten some of this data from. And so minority students feel like their teachers care for them, but as they get older, they feel increasingly so that they can't communicate the challenges of life as a minority to their beloved teacher because they are convinced that it might disrupt their relationship.

They don't wanna communicate these challenges that are specific to being a minority, either on campus or just in life, to their teachers that they love because they are convinced that it might disrupt the relationship.

Again, why though? Why would they think that that would disrupt a good relationship they had? Why would they think that that would cause a problem?

And so let's explore this just a little bit. So the next breakdown you have on your outline is cultural assumptions of the cookie cutter. And so to be clear, most often, the faith does not become culturally captive intentionally.

It becomes culturally captive because it's not guarded against.

So here's, he goes on, and I've chopped this up a little bit, but there's a problem he's saying with the environment of the school, that there's some kind of, that this Christian school has become culturally captive, that Christianity isn't solving this issue.

It's not, there's some problem that someone like Strickland has to come in and address because they're part of this majority culture. That's basically what he's saying. Now, I just gave you an alternative explanation that might make sense of that data.

And it may not have anything to do with the school, but Strickland's placing the blame, to some extent, on the school. And that's a pretty serious charge, that they become culturally captive, that the culture is essentially taking that Christianity and distorting it in some way.

So the question becomes, what culture has become normal at your school? Or specifically, what culture fits best into your school's cookie cutter? So this raises the question of normalization of the dominant culture.

This is where you're gonna start to see, okay, the problem is still being identified, but the problem is you're endorsing this culture. You're endorsing, quote, unquote, white culture, quote, unquote, majority culture.

You're making that the status quo. That's the goal that everyone has to shoot for. And it's not fair to certain people who aren't part of that culture. That's what he's trying to say. And so what would this be?

And he'll give some examples, but I'll give you an example, though, that he doesn't give. I know of a church where there was a family who said, you know what, hymns are not part of our culture. You need to stop singing hymns.

That's the kind of thing we're talking about, where that's part of the majority culture. This is the way we've always done it. Well, now to make room for us, you need to stop all of that, and you need to cater to us and what we desire.

It's got, honestly, a ring of selfishness to it. It's got an air of wanting to be catered to and wanting everyone else to kind of cater to you instead of seeing how you can, here's the situation, how do you fit in?

And these aren't issues that are like sin issues. These are more things that are just tradition and over time, style, those kinds of things. I'll just tell you where I kind of land a little bit. I'm of the mindset, and I've been a praise team leader, minister of music, and those kinds of things.

I'm of the mindset that I do think there are standards in music. We're not gonna do a podcast on music right now. I do think there are certain things. Singability is one of the major ones. You wanna be able to sing, and for everyone to be able to sing.