Listen up. I just hit my limit. One too many articles and conversations about funders and companies who are turning away from their “commitments” to diversity, equity, and inclusion. Because it’s too controversial, or because it’s “not working.”
It’s soapbox time. Just for a minute. Here goes:
Yes, it’s appropriate to recognize the backlash. It’s appropriate to rethink *how* we work for justice, in the face of predictable opposition.
It is never appropriate to rethink *whether* we work for justice.
What tipped me over the edge this morning was an article (I won’t repost it) recommending that we all simply refocus on how diversity can bring people together instead of dividing us.
That is, in my opinion, a common error in prescribing what we should do next. It’s fine as far as it goes, I guess. But that’s not very far at all, because it’s based in encouraging a simple understanding of diversity as “who’s at the table,” rather than focusing on how to bring about the sort of justice that needs to underpin real *belonging.*
Because: you can have lots of people at a table – but who’s got the power to *run* that table is what the work of justice really depends on.
The divisiveness that we’re seeing is not “caused by” DEI efforts per se. It is caused by people with power reacting to the idea of sharing power equitably with folks they’ve traditionally been able to ignore/exploit. Blaming DEI is like blaming someone who gets assaulted for having “asked for it.”
This reminds me of when it first occurred to me that the Civil Rights movement was not, in a way, about Black people. I know, right? That’s what we were always taught in my social-studies classes. But nope.
The Civil Rights movement was about white people who had held power for centuries and who were willing to fight, kill, bomb, arrest, disenfranchise, etc. etc. etc. in order to keep that power. There would have been no Civil Rights movement if white people hadn’t made it necessary. The Civil Rights movement didn’t spark violence. White resistance to justice sparked violence.
Do not blame the push for justice for causing division. In fact, do not blame at all. Accept that this is the work. And then go keep doing the work.
Thank you for visiting my soapbox. 