In a polarized world, we have chosen sides on almost all social issues. Of course, the debates are driven by the activists who have no use in understanding the views of the other side. They use all the lessons of propaganda learned over the past four hundred years, rolling out all the feel-good or feel-good commercials with celebrities to justify why their position is the only right position.
So, let’s think about the big D in DEI. Is diversity a bad thing?
I assume some think it is. I also believe those people are only racist extremists. The interesting thing is we find those people of all races. Reporting over the past several years has indicated once in a position to do so some African Americans will demand facilities only open to people of color and impose their will on the general population in a manner like what the KKK used to do. Don’t mistake my example, white supremacists would do the same thing today if allowed. But they are stopped because the majority recognizes that as racism.
We Americans tend to paint our enemies as evil supervillains who would destroy our way of life. This is effective propaganda and has been used by the left to rally support against the right. As I explore the internet for how many white supremacists there are in the US what I find is a whole lot of reporting, mostly generated from information provided by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) that focuses on the number of groups (about 189) and the growth (up 18%) but very little on the total numbers. Some reporting estimates those totals to be between 200,000 and 250,000 individuals with some degree of involvement. Statistically, that means less than .75% of Americans can accurately be classified as white supremacists, yet we hear that as one of the great threats to National Security.
What most of the media seems to be a little less clear about are the other hate groups in America. I imagine if they were reported their numbers would be less than the white supremacists, but the number wouldn’t be zero. The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) does not identify the number of people who hate the Jewish people, but we know that number is significant and growing from the Israel – Hamas war.
My conclusion is diversity can be a strength when attempting to overcome racist and religious hate, but there is a big IF
For our first two hundred years society, without much help from the government, limited advancement to only the white folks. Which made the majority pretty happy? Sure there were some bumps along the way. When the Irish or Germans came over, then the Italians, and Polish, but they eventually integrated into the majority. But the African Americans stood out. What if the government were to mandate only people of one race or ethnic group must have preferential treatment? Would that help utilize the strength diversity offers?
Then along came the “civil rights” movement was focused on correcting the sins of the country as it dealt with the African American minorities. As Dr. King said in his speech in front of the Lincoln monument “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”
With the legislation and judicial directions that came after Dr. King’s speech, we see the attempts of the nation to make right the injustices of the past. To improve the opportunity for the poor to rise from the abject poverty so many in the rural areas lived in they developed welfare programs and mandated preferential treatment in their higher education opportunities. But as is so often the case with government largess the best-laid plans go astray.
Has the government's management of welfare made the African American community stronger and better able to compete with the whites of America? We are now roughly 60 years into Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. Has it built stronger families, better communities, and educational opportunities, or has it created a new class of people enslaved to the welfare programs with little hope of leaving their ghettos?
Have government mandates for the number of minority students a college must accept or the number of minorities a business must employ ended the racial discrimination by others?
From my simple perspective, all it has accomplished is to create a lot of political activists who rage against the man as they attempt to build their personal wealth. Sadly, I don’t see a figure of Dr. King’s stature out to inspire his own race as he works to correct the sins of the past.
Now we come to the issue of modern diversity, as viewed by the left and right today. The political right has viewed the DEI directions of the Obama and Biden administrations as a club to be used to stop any criticism of Democratic priorities and attempt to build a power base that would accept the expansion of government power and authority by making all decisions secondary to having the right type people in the right positions.
Trump, on the other hand, has campaigned against that club, and the lawfare waged by the left against him and his friends. With his election against the Democrat’s diversity candidate, he is using his own clubs to dismantle the deep state, and all the hidden power of the left. Unfortunately, much of the good diversity could offer will be lost in the short term as people find ways to go too far, or to undermine the direction by making the changes so unpopular people are aghast at the arrogance of change.
We are talking a lot about changing diversity for merit. I have only a limited experience with how merit is determined in the working world and none of my experiences confirm my views of merit are the same views held by those who implement such lofty goals.
So at the end of the day, I expect the propaganda wars will continue with each side seeing the other as pagans lost in the wilderness who should be destroyed before the nation sinks into the abyss of climate change.
