DEI and racism. | Imamother

amother

↑ OP

Sun, Aug 04 2024, 9:55 am

ora_43 wrote:

... No?

Why would Harris be the deciding vote here? OK, she's famous, but she's not famous for being the single arbitrator of DEI for now and forevermore.

I also think you're wrong about where we disagree. My point in the post you quoted wasn't about what DEI is, it was about what we can assume about individuals vis-a-vis DEI.

All squares are rectangles, but not all rectangles are squares. All ducks are birds, but not all birds are ducks. And all "DEI hires" are either non-white or non-straight, but not all people who are non-white or non-straight are DEI hires.

Someone who looks at a non-white person and assumes "DEI hire" has the logical reasoning skills of someone who looks at a hawk and assumes "duck."

Your company's goals may be wrong-minded and even racist (I'm not going to say for sure without knowing what exactly the policy is and how it's implemented). But your coworker is definitely wrong.

If your point is that not every minority hire is a DEI hire, I'm going to agree with you.

Harris is selling an ideology, a way of thinking and a brand. She's not a random person. There's very little room to suggest that the millions that are following her lead are applying it differently than what she is directly suggesting.

Are you suggesting that the brand that's being sold by the most powerful people in the country is being implemented, but not in the way the sellers want it to be?

I think you're being a little too dan l'kav zchus here. Are you concerned that perhaps it's being applied the way Harris is describing, or as long as we can't prove that every minority is a DEI hire you'll assume it's not going on in a meaningful way?

And with regard to JKP. The people who hired her openly say they are not looking for equal qualifications. They announce it to the world over and over. They say they will push minorities to get to equal footing with white people. So when I see they hired a gay, black, female (who is the ultimate DEI prize) stumbling and bumbling all over the place, my antenna goes up that she is what her boss says she is: A minority who was pushed ahead because of her race and orientation. You don't suspect this?

↑ ora_43

Sun, Aug 04 2024, 10:47 am

amother OP wrote:

Harris is selling an ideology, a way of thinking and a brand. She's not a random person. There's very little room to suggest that the millions that are following her lead are applying it differently than what she is directly suggesting.

It's not that I think that Harris is unimportant or isn't influential. But her supporting one school of thought over another (in this case, 'equal outcomes' over 'barrier removal' DEI) doesn't mean the second ceases to exist.

Quote:

I think you're being a little too dan l'kav zchus here. Are you concerned that perhaps it's being applied the way Harris is describing, or as long as we can't prove that every minority is a DEI hire you'll assume it's not going on in a meaningful way?

I'm not sure which part you're talking about.

None of my answers have been a defense of DEI as Harris describes it. I also haven't said that if calling an individual a 'DEI hire' is bad (which it is) that must mean it's also bad to admit that anyone is hired due to DEI, ever. I explicitly said the opposite.

Are you talking about the part where I said not all DEI is "equality of outcomes" DEI? But again, multiple schools of thought can exist at the same time. I know for a fact that some companies engage in 'barrier removal' DEI because I've met them, same as I know for a fact that some managers could care less about DEI, because I've met them too.

Quote:

And with regard to JKP. The people who hired her openly say they are not looking for equal qualifications. They announce it to the world over and over. They say they will push minorities to get to equal footing with white people. So when I see they hired a gay, black, female (who is the ultimate DEI prize) stumbling and bumbling all over the place, my antenna goes up that she is what her boss says she is: A minority who was pushed ahead because of her race and orientation. You don't suspect this?

This seems to contradict your first statement. She's a minority who was hired under DEI, but that doesn't necessarily make her a DEI hire.

Again she may seem bumbling in some clips but her job is to make the media like Biden, and, relative to what normal media coverage would look like, the media loves Biden. She was on the Obama campaign, she worked with major news networks, she was on the Harris campaign. That's a very similar background to that of the past several press secretaries.

Compare her to the last white man to hold the job (Sean Spicer) and she looks even better. Spicer made an enemy of like 95% of the press fresh out of the gate and went downhill from there.

I'm not a fan of JKP. I don't know too much about her, and to the extent I do, my opinion is slightly negative. But her qualifications are just as impressive as those of any of the women who held the position before her, and most of the media likes her well enough and adore the administration. There's no solid evidence to say that DEI is the only reason she was hired. I get the suspicion - and I agree that when people say "we're going to hire based on DEI" it will inevitably, and unfortunately, lead to suspicion of individual people hired - but the assumption, that's not fair.

↑ Cheiny

Sun, Aug 04 2024, 11:14 am

amother Melon wrote:

Calling someone a DEI hire is suggesting that they were hired solely on the basis of the diversity they bring to the table rather than any other skills or qualifications they may have.

It's like the question: what do you call a female scientist? A scientist. Not because being a woman is a negative thing, but a respected professional doesn't need to be identified by her gender when her coworkers are simply identified by their role.

So what do you call a minority new hire? A new hire.

That would be accurate if they got the job on merit alone because they were the best candidate. But if they were hired for their ethnicity, race, gender, while others who might’ve been more qualified were passed over, they are a DEI hire.

thread locked because it turned political.