It’s a simple word, intended to communicate an equally simple concept. “Inclusion” is the practice or policy of extending equal access to opportunities and resources for people who might otherwise be excluded or marginalized. In other words, it’s an affirmative effort to avoid discriminating against people based upon their race, religion or disability…a commitment to simple fairness.
The goal is to treat people as individuals, to avoid unfair exclusions that aren’t based upon the deficits of a particular person but rather upon the practice of stereotyping all members of a group–a practice properly described as discrimination. What is it about that goal that so terrifies the MAGA cult?
Here in Indiana, our MAGA Governor Mike Braun has proudly announced the elimination of “DEI” from hundreds of state programs and websites. As various outlets around the state have reported, that effort has included cancellation of grants to reduce racial health inequities, elimination of scholarships for Black and Hispanic students, bias training workshops and much more. Programs have been abolished, and references to them in agency websites erased in order to comply with a directive from Braun that ordered agencies to replace “diversity, equity and inclusion,” or DEI, throughout state government.
Instead, Braun decreed that state policies would elevate “merit, excellence and innovation.”
I will just note in passing that the individuals currently governing Indiana fail–monumentally–to exhibit either merit or excellence, and that MAGA’s sole “innovation” has been an effort to return the state to the 1950s. I will also note that the clear intent of substituting “merit and excellence” for “equity and inclusion” is to convey the racist belief that merit and excellence aren’t attributes to be found in minority populations.
The Capital Chronicle dove into Braun’s effort, examining more than 3,800 pages of information released, and listing numerous examples highlighting the fervor of the attack on previous state efforts to ameliorate the effects of entrenched bigotries. For example, the Indana Department of Health has eliminated two positions– a disparities coordinator and a maternal health coordinator–despite the fact, as the Chronicle noted, that “Indiana has one of the worst maternal mortality rates in the world — and Black mothers are more likely to die in the year following childbirth than their white counterparts.”
The linked report lists the elimination of dozens of these efforts, many of them obviously motivated by a desire to exclude minority populations, and others just unintentionally stupid or even humorous. The Indiana Economic Development Corporation, for example, which spends millions of dollars annually in an effort to bring new business into the state, has reportedly “revised its efforts.” I guess that means the agency won’t work to recruit businesses headed by Blacks or women, or enterprises seen as “woke,” despite the agency’s primary mission…
What about the other terms in DEI that so offend our MAGA White Christian male overlords?
Diversity simply means differences. For decades, scholarship has confirmed the benefits of diverse schoolrooms and business enterprises–benefits that are particularly important in a very diverse polity. If I visit your widget store and see no one who looks like me, it turns out that I am less likely to buy my widgets from you. If I am a resident of a city or town entirely governed by folks who represent only a small segment of the population, I’m less likely to participate in political life and more likely to harbor grievances.
And what about that third word: equity?
Equity is defined as the quality of being fair and impartial. Equity does not require giving minority folks extra advantages; it is a commitment to avoid disadvantaging people who don’t share your race, religion or able-bodiedness. When members of a majority group refuse to extend fundamental fairness to people outside their tribe, they are sending a message. They are telling us they don’t want to compete on a level playing field.
They are telling us who they are.
Have some of the DEI efforts of the past few years gone overboard? Have some of them been less than effective–even “tilting” the playing field a bit too much? I’m sure they have. Whenever a society makes an effort to remedy a previous unfairness, some folks will go too far (and others will be too timid to be effective). But the all-out assault on efforts to erase practices that have been unfair and prejudiced isn’t an effort to correct excesses. It’s an effort to reinstate old prejudices, to offer justifications for bigotries, and to reinforce White (straight) male supremacy.
The Trump/MAGA assault on civic equality is an effort to return to some very Bad Old Days. We cannot allow it to succeed.
Maga is a scavenger that exists at the expense of others.
Right wing/Republicans continue to practice primitive tribalism in their pathetic and open exhibitions of overt racism. They’re so backward as to emulate what humans were doing 200,000 years ago to keep their tribes “pure”.
After visiting a foreign country and dining/conversing with Canadians, I am crushed to have to see what we’ve become. Everything Republicans touch dies. RIP Indiana, Texas and all other red states.
All higher institutions in Indiana caved immediately except Notre Dame. In May, AG Rokita “launched an investigation” of DEI discrimination practices at ND and gave them 30 days to respond. ND ignored all his questions and just wrote:
“Notre Dame is a premier Catholic research university, and as such, seeks to serve and reflect the broader Catholic church, which is the world’s most global, multicultural, and multilingual institution.”
Eat shit, Rokita!
There is a vast difference between leadership and management. I consider most leaders to be “woke” in the traditional sense. Leadership is about expanding perceptions, and as Sheila addressed, having a diverse company allows multiple perspectives to inform your product. If a group of white guys is trying to market their product to Islamic women or minority women in general, they will lack the understanding of that market. They have NO experience.
Were unfit managers assigned to head up DEI programs? I would say plenty. Enlightened souls are relatively rare in this world, but forcing one to look through different angles of the prism is what this melting pot is all about.
Sadly, MAGA Republicans are as ignorant as Trump, who just went off on his base by calling them “weaklings” for buying into the Democrat-concocted psyop called the Epstein Case. LOL He is trying to divert their attention to #RussiaGate again.
The level of idiocy in the White House and Washington has never been seen before. It’s the same for most of the Red States, especially in Indiana. I honestly believe that the oligarchy has also gotten more idiotic, so they surround themselves with even dumber minions (politicians). This didn’t happen overnight. We are a plutocracy and a kakistocracy, which is not a good combination.
“What is it about that goal that so terrifies the MAGA cult?” How about, for one guess, their fear that they have such little teeny peenies/brains, too small for proper function? Or, is it that fear a loss of the control that their type has long been accustomed to? Well, sure, but maybe both, actually.
It’s like the childhood game of “King of the hill,” simply put.
IMHO they don’t want to go back to the 1950s, but rather the 1850s. Tariffs, subservient women, and special places where white gentlemen could drink bourbon and smoke Cuban cigars and not be bothered. Black and Asian men were allowed in only as servants. Hallelujah! They’re still fighting the same war we thought they lost in 1865. There’s an old quote that might be prescient: “Hold on to your Confederate money. The South will rise again! “
Loretta Ross- Google her- Calling In- her recent focus – shares an apt story- working a long time ago against White Supremacists- he came to her employer- age around 13- small- bullied- tattooed a Swastika- others feared him- left school- then a son had a cleft palate-and his buddies told him he needed to kill his child. A good analogy- metaphor for the manipulation of others. Fears- divide us.
Oh Loretta Ross received a MacArthur Genius Grant. Check her out!
as i round out the turn,i seen a rainbow, everyone created equal,and no color barriers. we all the same! it must be a republican change of view!
then i woke up..
Two questions come to mind.
First, who gets to decide? Depending on the definition, merit, excellence and innovation means whatever the decider wants.
Second, what are they so afraid of? Looking at the state level GOP now in control of all areas of government, they fear loss of status, loss of control, and loss of face. The fear is not just among white men. If you look at the women who actively support the misogynists, xenophobes and racists so prominent in our state government, you see those same fears.
As far as state universities are concerned, ND is private and very wealthy. Public universities are at the mercy of the super-majority GOP led government who also have the backing of a corrupt and criminal federal regime. They control the purse strings for those institutions. The political appointees to the boards are beholden to the regime and are fully invested in the grievance and fear that drives their agenda. Alumni of those institutions can certainly withhold their financial support to express their disagreement with policies. When the governor states that he wants IU to be more like Purdue (as reconstructed by Daniels) you know that education will be limited to job training to meet the needs of corporate donors who are happy to foist the cost of training employees to their specific needs onto the taxpayers.
Once again, trades are necessary for the economic and infrastructure needs of the community and businesses. Once certified, those in trades are required to re-certify as technology and needs change. Those certifications take time and money, sometime significant amounts of money, like loans. Guess who gets to pay for that? Guess who profits from those loans? Essentially, many in the trades will become indentured through debt throughout their lifetimes.
As dump becomes more and more unstable and obviously disinterested in actually governing, the real malignant, incompetent, sociopathic and seditious appointees that our illustrious Congresspersons and Senators have so enthusiastically approved, are deliberately destroying real government and replacing it with patrimony and bribes, privatizing for their profit and control.
If we have fair elections, which becomes more questionable with each passing legislative session (see TX most recently), it may take decades, if ever, to repair the damage. Certainly, our status as a world leader has been destroyed for the foreseeable future. Why would any country trust an alliance of any kind with the U.S. again?
JD, the lack of trust in the US government has been evident for decades, which is why BRICS has expanded. The smart countries are ditching the dollar because the US uses it as a means of control, and if the US doesn’t like what you’re doing (i.e., not listening to the US), they can sanction your assets. When UN jurists issued an arrest warrant on Bibi, we seized any of their assets located in the US. Who would be dumb enough to hold money in US banks?
As for Trump, he’s accelerating our demise by decades. Even our allies don’t trust Trump or the US government. Why should they?
We are going further into debt, and fewer countries are buying our Treasuries. Many are opting for gold instead. What do you think will happen when we start floating our debt, but nobody wants to buy it?
In China’s eyes, the US has already defaulted on its debt. Trump’s dummies in the Treasury are floating the idea that other countries should buy our debt without interest to prop us up like we propped them up. LOL As a result of that approach, China/Russia claims the US has already defaulted on its trillions in debt.
As a born Hoosier, who now lives in another “red State” I have to admit that I think Indiana has gone farther down the rabbit hole than South Carolina, I will never move back to Indiana, I fear it is going down the path of the Ku Klux Klan.
“Inclusion” is the law to include special ed. students in general ed. classrooms to the maximum extent appropriate. Giving people equal protection of the laws is a legal requirement guaranteed IN THE CONSTITUTION. But that old fashioned notion of ‘law and order’ just doesn’t have the same appeal it used to have with Republican political leaders. They don’t think they have to follow the laws they don’t like.
Andra mentioned the KKK, which called to mind the masked marauders of ICE, snatching people off the streets, at courts, in schools… I’m beyond ability to stand for hours in protests, but if I could, my sign would read:
COWARDS AND CRIMINALS
WEAR MASKS
WHILE DOING THEIR DEEDS
The Rump gets what? $9 billion to build a bigger ICE-force? The parallels with Hitler’s SS are chilling.
The chances that our fearless leader will prevent the midterm elections rise as his popularity falls. Neither he nor the traitors behind his movement intend to lose power. We are in the grip of the curse, “May you live in interesting times.”
Interesting indeed….