Don’t expect corporations to join the DEI movement because they care about minorities. They do it for the money. When the wind of change arrives, some people might be surprised by how quickly and completely corps change their minds
In our country, that’s laughably obvious. How can I tell? Companies in their “inclusive” visuals use people of “minorities” not actually present in our country. So the message falls flat. If they really would like to believably support inclusion, they could include some members of the real oppressed minorities which we do have locally. But no, they import their messaging from abroad.
It was funny when Europeans would use BIPOC. Like 90% of us are indigenous and Americans invented that term specifically to exclude us.
The existence of woke Fury hackers suggests the existence of anti-woke furry hackers.
well, it’s full of nazi furries
Among the offenses listed, the civil servants are targeted for things such as donating to Democratic politicians or using pronouns in their online bios.
Totally not Nazis.
At my work (governmental), it was encouraged to include your pronouns. I have a very male name so I didn’t really think it was necessary but once Trump was sworn in and all this shit started to boil up. I have included these on my signature line now. My employer is Washington State government so it isn’t the same thing, but knowing my governor is going to be the biggest pain in the administrations ass, I hope that my little protest can help.
Where are we right now? What are we doing? I’m reading a news and content aggregation system known as Lemmy which pulls the current world to my fingertips. It separates everything into digestible categories so that you can separate based on topic of interest. This can then be used to grasp the context of what society has done with their day, and recap recent events, or just show you a funny comic if you need to be cheered up. I can even browse a community of nothing but cat pictures.
It sounds like an amazing service, so imagine my surprise when I find out that the world around me is just…ya know…batshit insane.
We’re discussing the current ruling government who’s PUNISHING people for having empathy, and basic common courtesy towards other people. DEI has been in the news the past few days as being some controversial concept. So I looked it up, and find out it means “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion”.
What the hell is so controversial about that??? “Hey Tom, wanna go bowling with us later?” “What?” “We’re going bowling after work. Would you like to join us?” “Join you? HOW DARE YOU INCLUDE ME! WE ARE DIFFERENT RACES YOU MOTHERFUCKER!!!” “What…what just happened?” “I WILL NOT BE PART OF YOUR DEI PROPAGANDIST BULLSHIT!!! NEXT YOU’LL TELL ME YOU WANT ME TO TALK TO A TRANS PERSON!!!” “Tom…your daughter is trans…” “HEEEEEE IS A HEEEEEE!!!” “Tom…ok, ya know what? Fuck you.” “That’s more LIKE it!”
I do not understand the world we live in today, where being different and getting along is somehow a bad thing.
They don’t know or care what DEI is. They just know that white men like themselves now have to compete with non-white non-men for jobs.
So now they have to make themselves marketable, or shut that whole thing down so they can go back to living in the boys club. And since self-improvement is “woke”, they choose the latter.
They get it fed to them during their 2 Minutes Hate and that’s all that matters.
It used to be Antifa. They were staunchly against antifa. You know what you call someone who is anti-antifa? Fa. You call them fa.
DEI has been in the news the past few days as being some controversial concept. So I looked it up, and find out it means “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion”.
You realize that’s just a name, right? They can name things whatever they want.
The argument against it is that people are disadvantaged based on the color of their skin or their race. In other words, racism. That’s why some people are upset. People will deny this over and over but they’re simply being irrational and disingenuous because they don’t want to be associated with the word.
Now I’m gonna tell you something about this that no one else will: This type of racism is good. It’s meant to combat other types of much more prevalent racism.
Society just needs to acknowledge that racism isn’t an inherently bad word and then we’re all just better off.
I’m white, straight, and male. I’m trying to get a book published. Every agent that I’ve tried to contact, especially ones that match the type of book I’m writing, has been vocal that their focus is on BIPOC, LGBT, and other diverse candidates. I’ve been turned away at every one. Such racism, right?
Except…most published work in bookstores is still by white male authors like myself. And if I take a step back to look at my whole life situation: I’m not reliant on this book. I’m a well-employed engineer, have my own house and mortgage, and had relatively well-off parents. Little of this is true for these other demographics that have received heavy discrimination even less than a generation ago. All things considered, it is very fair for these agents to champion diverse voices, and they’re slammed with requests all over the place.
The scarring effects of discrimination are still felt decades later when we feel them gone. It’s still a hard truth that employment is hard even today, but those with experience in staffing can usually only point to the occasional anecdote when someone was prioritized for their race - and usually have just as many stories of inverse discrimination or nepotism.
What the current situation is has absolutely zero effect on whether or not it is racism. Being turned away for being a white male is not only racist but sexist and exclusive, plain and simple. There is no other rational argument.
Again, I think this is a good thing. It’s also racist. And the fight to redefine the word when it’s convenient does not serve the cause.
This is still diving down a rabbit hole of bad definitions, and devalues both what racism is and how it’s affected people in their lives.
Racism systemically prefers one race over another; not just on an individual occasion like one hiring session. I guarantee you, if an organization’s entire senior leadership of 10+ people were all black men, any diversity consulting would highlight that as being an issue as well. The fact of the matter is, just about every organization currently hires plenty of white men, so that ends up being many levels removed from reality.
If you’re trying to pinpoint statistics around who gets turned away from one particular position, the problem is that companies get so many dozens or hundreds of applicants, you’d be flagging that statistic on enormous groups. Asians over blacks? Women over men? You really can’t make a concrete determination there, and when your source cases are singular anecdotes, it fails the critical definition of being “systemic”.
You’re also disacknowledging the negative reinforcement that accompanies racism, where people are treated negatively a certain way based on no known information of them other than their race. If you’re attacked on the street anonymously, specifically for being white, and the attacker calls you a “fucking cracker!” then I would have no problems labeling that racism. As it stands, even in 2024, other races deal with that situation far more often from police or other hate groups. I would absolutely call much of the “DEI” labeling racism, given that the people making these declarations have not been given valid assessments of their target’s performance on their job.
Racism systemically prefers one race over another; not just on an individual occasion
Incorrect. What you’re referring to is called “systemic racism”, but “racism” alone has an entirely different, very simple definition: discrimination based on race, which is what this is. And it can absolutely be applied to individuals and to policies.
if an organization’s entire senior leadership of 10+ people were all black men, any diversity consulting would highlight that as being an issue as well.
Really? Do you really think that’s true? Do you think anyone would “highlight”, say, a professional basketball or football team that’s 90+% black as “problematic”?
You’re also disacknowledging the negative reinforcement that accompanies racism, where people are treated negatively a certain way based on no known information of them other than their race.
Wrong again, I explicitly acknowledged this already. It has no bearing on this conversation.
the people making these declarations have not been given valid assessments of their target’s performance on their job.
You don’t need to assess performance. The only thing you need to assess is the policies themselves. How they’re applied or what the resulting performance is is irrelevant to a conversation about whether or not they’re discriminatory.
Being able to admit that certain groups are systemically disadvantaged and wanting to do something about it is literally the opposite of racism, what are you talking about?
If “doing something about it” means disadvantaging a group of people based on their race or ethnicity, that is the very definition of racism, what are you talking about?
You should really ask yourself why you see raising up one group as necessarily lowering another. One doesn’t follow from the other.
I can ask myself all day but the answer will be the same. Instead, why don’t you tell me how that works?
There is a finite amount of positions at any job (unless you’re hiring someone to do a made-up job to score points, which would be the textbook definition of “diversity hire”). You can choose to fill those positions with the most qualified applicant, or you can choose to hire one of a specific race. You can’t logically do both.
That’s an entirely different conversation, and a strawman to boot. You clearly aren’t interested in actually discussing this. I can show you study after study proving that a bias exists against equally skilled applicants with an “ethnic sounding” name, but why bother, you’re not serious and I’m done engaging with you.
That’s an entirely different conversation
It is a different conversation from the one you want to have. It is the conversation I was having before you showed up and tried to derail it with a strawman.
I can show you study after study proving that a bias exists
I agree and acknowledge that that bias exists. That bias has no bearing on whether or not discrimination based on race (regardless of what race) is racism.
I think this sentiment is emotionally valid at this moment.
One thing I’ve been doing, and I know most people don’t want to do it or don’t want to hear it, but I’ve been reading the Bible, not because I’m Christian (I’m a UU), but because people in power supposedly believe it.
Okay, when I read this book, not through a pastor or religious authority telling me what to believe, what do I encounter? What is the message of Jesus that we see consistently?
It’s love, empathy, and support for those who have it the worst. To be like Jesus is to sell your material belongings and share with others. To be like Jesus is to turn the other check when someone strikes you. To be like Jesus is to care for the sick, the downtrodden, the alien in a foreign land.
Republicans have been generally older folks, and what they’ve seen in the last 60 years is a rapid turnover of the world they knew. They are deeply afraid of society. It’s fast. It’s integrated with many people. There’s violence everywhere (even though violence has gone down). People are swearing and using the lord’s name in vain all over media. It powered by essentially magic through technology. They are deeply afraid that the society we’ve built is misaligned in terms of core values.
Fear breeds hate, especially when opportunists see it as a means to grab power. So fear was amplified into a fever pitch via 24/7 news.
Trump comes along, and he naturally spikes all these modern algorithms that don’t care about anything besides “engagement.” Turns out hate is more engaging than love, because Trump supporters watch him and those that hate him watch him. Our systems weren’t built around signal boosting moral people; they are built around “engagement.” If it bleeds, it reads, etc.
Combine this with Democrats being an ineffectual party when it comes to messaging, as well as their own pocket lining, and you get a bunch of pissed off people everywhere: Conservatives want Trump; Liberals angry at the Democratic administration for various sleights; most Americans are too stressed to care. Politics doesn’t matter when you work multiple jobs and barely have time to yourself.
And now we arrive here, where people are more interested in being correct, getting revenge, having any sense of power (even if it’s scoring internet points that don’t matter) and living in fear at the cost of love. Republicans have fully lost the message of their stated savior. The people who shamed me for not knowing Jesus probably couldn’t quote a single Bible verse without google. Church attendance has plummeted because Americans don’t see the value of it, nor have the time. It’s a luxury in our age to have an hour on Sunday and pick community.
I think we can get out of this moment, but it won’t happen with everyone finding their enemy. Humans are 1 race. Acts 10:28
And he said to them, ‘You yourselves know that it is unlawful for a Jew to associate with or to visit a Gentile; but God has shown me that I should not call anyone profane or unclean.
If I take Republicans seriously, that this is a book they care about, and I engage with it and find these quotes, can I show understanding and love while using a text they believe is sacred? Can we reassert these values of love and care for one another? Can we meet face-to-face more and see I’m not some horror ruining society? If I can quote this book without it in front of me, am I satanic and awful?
To your questions: We’re in the post-modern era. We’re talking through a series of tubes. Algorithms have promoted hate. People are profiting off of it. Christians have forgotten Jesus message.
But none of this gets better with more hate. It’s going to take more offline work: go meet your neighbors, have cookouts, care for one another, find the humanity in your “enemy” and remember they are human, even those that hate you/me.
I have an X marker on my license, so I expect to be taken someday. When I am, I’ll be quoting the Bible to my captors because they tell me they believe this book. You may believe it, but do you live it?
Matthew 25:35. What questions does Jesus ask to separate the goats and the sheep? “Did you clothe me when I was naked? Did you feed me when I was hungry? Did you take care of me when I was sick? Did you visit me in prison? Did you help me when I was an alien in foreign land?”
My goal this year is to get through the New Testament and then read the Buddhist Suttras.
Check out Unitarian Universalism if you’ve made it this far. It’s a great organization and welcoming faith community. Its a modern religion that validates many of the world’s religions as true and inspiring of our best selves rather than dogmatically choose one. It gave me the space to have my own relationship with god and religion. I came as an atheist & now have my own beliefs in god & reality that aren’t captured by any single religion.
This is an amazing breakdown and summarizes exactly how I’ve been reading it also. Thank you for this. 💙
I’m glad it can provide some solace. Wishing the best for you, internet stranger.
I also think DEI is awful: Don Jr, Eric, and Ivanka, yuck! The worst of his spawn.
Woke furries for the win.
DEi: Democrats, Education and Immigrants, the three deadly dangers.
It’s probably a coincidence, but so-called “underhanded” techniques like this used to be referred to as “ratfucking.” Anyway, here’s to more left-wing ratfucking.
Furry hackers, they will be the Alan Turing of our struggle against fascism. May you yiff long and prosper.
heck yea
I don’t like the normalizing of using “woke” to describe progressives.
That’s a pretty woke thing to say.
