Mainstreaming Bigotry in Corporate America
The more we speak of diversity, equity and inclusion, the less tolerant we become.
A couple of posts caught my attention on LinkedIn recently.
They are indicative of a rising tide of racial animosity that is increasingly fashionable on LinkedIn and in Corporate America, in general.
First, let’s take a look at post from one Darian Lane, a writer at Smith Young Talent.
Click this link to read his post.
Darian’s LinkedIn post is about a Business Insider article on Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced former Founder/CEO of Theranos.
What Elizabeth Holmes did - defrauding, lying and misleading investors with her fake technology and company - was indefensible, to be sure.
But this post is indefensible as well. Saying Elizabeth Holmes’s behavior is “In typical white women fashion…” is a nasty lie.
In fact, Holmes’s behavior is such an anomaly, her Silicon Valley ruse so ridiculous and noteworthy, the world still can’t stop talking about it. Elizabeth Holmes is atypical in every way imaginable.
So, to say her actions somehow typify all white women is ridiculous.
In any case, you know just how wrong this post is by simply substituting “white women” with any other ethnicity in the line “In typical white women fashion…”.
For an experiment, let’s do exactly that, shall we? Here we go:
“In typical black male fashion…” (negative behavior goes here).
Wow, that felt ugly.
Let’s try that again.
“In typical Jewish fashion…” (negative behavior goes here).
Yuck. No thank you.
Let’s try this one more time.
“In typical Muslim women fashion…” (negative behavior goes here).
Not one of those statements is okay. And we all know what would happen if you said any one of them. (And, in fact, it would be racist if you did say any of the above).
Saying “In typical white women fashion…” is wrong too - no matter who says it.
The collectivizing of groups by identity and assigning a particular - usually negative - behavior to them is always wrong.
All white women are ______. All black people are _______. All Asians are _______.
It’s called stereotyping, of course.
As Americans, we decided making generalizations - especially negative ones - about entire groups of people was a very nasty and dangerous thing to do.
Over generalizing about groups of people is a very natural human tendency, of course. Ingroup bias - our tendency to view our own group favorably vs other out groups - is a problem everywhere in world for as long as there have been people.
Turns out, we are all tribal by nature.
But tribalism, if unchecked, prevents us from seeing individuals - each capable of good and bad.
Stereotyping also, as we all know, can lead to real people getting hurt. History is replete with examples of violence against individuals, all fueled by nasty generalizations about whole groups of people. (The black historical experience in America, is the obvious and glaring example).
So, why did it suddenly become okay again to hold an entire ethnicity responsible for the actions of one person who happens to share their skin color?
When did it become okay to stereotype again?
The answer? Since Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) was mainlined into corporate life.
Again, DEI quite literally insists that we must categorize and stereotype people based on external traits.
DEI says: All white people are ______. And all black people are ________. And all Latinos are ______." And so on.
Let’s fill in a couple of those blanks now with what DEI asserts.
All white people are “privileged”. And all black people are “marginalized” and “oppressed”.
Now, are some white people privileged? Of course. Are some black people marginalized? Absolutely.
But it’s also true that all poor people are “marginalized”, no matter their skin color or gender. And all rich people are “privileged”, at least to some degree, no matter their skin color or gender.
Point is, life and people are complex - there’s always shades of grey.
But DEI does not deal in nuance.
In fact, it’s incapable of acknowledging complexity, because this simplistic ideology sees the world through a monochromatic lens.
DEI declares: Group A is “oppressed”. Group B are “oppressors”
And you had better agree or you’ll be told your “white fragility” is showing. Or, worse, you’ll be called a racist.
DEI teaches us to avoid seeing individuals, and only see group identity. DEI then tells people they must accept sweeping statements about whole groups of people.
No wonder suddenly people feel free to say things like:
“In typical white women fashion…”
The author of this LinkedIn post seems to feel quite confident declaring that all white women are like Elizabeth Holmes. So confident, in fact, he posted it on LinkedIn for all the world to see.
And why wouldn’t he?
DEI, after all, asserts America’s “systemic racism” is a by-product of “whiteness”. Being white increasingly is becoming synonymous with some sort of disease or genetic disorder.
“Whiteness”, DEI would say, needs to be “deconstructed” and eradicated from society so we can achieve a more diverse, inclusive and equitable world.
Which is why Coke is teaching its employees to be “less white”.
Can the answer to past discrimination really be the embracing of new forms of discrimination?
Yet this thinking is endorsed and sanctioned via DEI programs by Fortune 500 companies, like American Express.
No matter the altruistic-sounding labels (Diversity Equity & Inclusion), this is racial poison.
And it’s giving people license to spew bigotry.
If corporations can teach their employees to stereotype, why can’t people espouse these nasty views out in the open on LinkedIn?
And so, people do.
It’s worth pointing out that all the folks below thumbed-up this post that inferred all white women are like Elizabeth Holmes - ie that they are embezzlers and racists who “blame the brown man for everything”.
Now to the second ugly LinkenIn post, where we see the same grouping of people by identity and then unpersoning them collectively, rather than seeing them as individuals.
Tetiana Novokhatska who works at Medecision suggests all Russians are essentially rapists, war criminals and basically subhuman “wild orcs”. And consequently, Tetiana says, all Russian culture should be blotted from the earth because of Vladamir Putin’s army’s actions in Ukraine.
Her outrage at Vladimir Putin and the Russian military is understandable, of course.
Yet, once again we see the normalization of stereotyping by group identity, applied this time to an entire nation and culture.
All Russians are __________ . All Russian culture is ________.
Fill in your pejorative.
2500+ LinkedIn users enthusiastically thumbed-up this particular post, despite its unhinged assertions.
This post ignores the reality that almost all cultures are responsible for crimes and heinous acts against humanity, at one time or another.
We would need to turn in our German cars by Tetiana‘s standard, after what the German people did to the Jews. Stop all tourism to Australia, after what European settlers did to the Aboriginals. And boycott all products from China given they currently have concentration camps filled with Muslim Uyghers.
This is shallow and, frankly, shameful thinking.
But shallow and shameful thinking - which encourages people to make sweeping negative generalizations about other groups of people - is exactly how DEI teaches people to view the world.
The truth is, we are all individuals - capable of doing good and bad - made in the image of God, with intrinsic worth.
The authors of these posts are also individuals - capable of positive or negative actions. Both have incredible worth, despite their regrettable statements.
And, yes, Elizabeth Holmes has real worth, despite her past crimes.
And the Russian people are not all like Vladimir Putin, nor are they all responsible for his reprehensible acts of aggression in the Ukraine.
And finally, all people - regardless of their skin color, gender or nationality - have incredible worth.
In fact, people - despite their imperfections - are the most valuable thing of all in God’s eyes.
No individual is responsible for someone else’s actions just because they share that person’s immutable external traits.
Stereotyping groups of people is always wrong. Period.
Any ideology, like DEI, that raises itself up against this truth, must be opposed and torn down.
And it must be opposed before the mainstreaming of ethnic hatred results in something far worse than bigoted LinkedIn posts.
Brilliant