Opinion – Bill Straub: DEI is about a level playing field — and is a lost cause worth fighting for

It was the great defense attorney Clarence Darrow who was credited with positing that lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for. And if there’s ever been a circumstance to substantiate that dictum it’s the scurrilous, ongoing political campaign to destroy all vestiges of diversity, equity and inclusion programs in the federal government and beyond.

White lawmakers, scared senseless over the possibility that providing underserved groups with a needed boost up the economic ladder might better their lives, have set about, successfully for the most part, eliminating DEI initiatives offered at schools and universities and within federal and state governments. Proponents have further applied pressure to dowse all hope within the private sector.

The assault, led by President-cum-Dictator Donald J. Trump, is overwhelming. It is the revenge of the White people. It is despicable and overtly racist.

Trump, as is his wont, without a care for the status of anyone who doesn’t possess his male whiteness — albeit orange-hued — has taken a slingblade to federal programs presenting opportunities to those who have been denied opportunities in the past. Still not satisfied, he is simultaneously threatening both public and private entities who fail to fall in line.

The Kentucky General Assembly, which never strays far behind in keeping minorities and women in their place, just passed a massive anti-DEI bill prohibiting the programs in any form on state university campuses. It has earned the veto of Gov. Andy Beshear, a Democrat, but it will almost certainly be overridden by the GOP-controlled legislature in due time.

Beshear was right. Overriding the veto will reveal the unjust, bigoted institution the Kentucky General Assembly has become.

“We’ve worked hard to make our commonwealth a welcoming place,” Beshear said in a veto message posted online. “House Bill 4 takes us away from that. We should be embracing diversity, not banning it. Kentucky, we can’t turn back. We’ve got to keep moving forward together.”

When, exactly, did the once honored concepts of diversity, equity and inclusion in America turn vulgar? The ideal of equal protection exists in the Constitution, a promise that has only rarely been provided to marginalized groups. People who never had an opportunity to compete for positions because of discrimination based on race or sex were offered guidance under DEI to navigate their way through a maze that had historically been denied them.

DEI programs, in the minds of nitwits, violate Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which holds that policies or programs that are motivated by an employee’s or applicant’s race or sex might be unlawful. In this instance, the Trump administration and its Justice Department maintain DEI discriminates against White folks, who imposed the discriminatory practices against those who sought protections under the Civil Rights Act in the first place.

The Civil Rights Act was adopted to protest the rights of Black folks, not perpetually keep them under the heel of the White majority. Now Trump and his minions are crying reverse discrimination, which is so much horse manure.

“Far too many employers defend certain types of race or sex preferences as good, provided they are motivated by business interests in ‘diversity, equity, or inclusion,’” Andrea Lucan, acting chair of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. “But no matter an employer’s motive, there is no ‘good,’ or even acceptable, race or sex discrimination. In the words of Justice Clarence Thomas in his concurrence in Students for Fair Admissions, ‘two discriminatory wrongs cannot make a right.’”

Of course, they roll out Clarence Thomas who turned his back on the Black community long ago. Whom is being hurt by helping those who need help?

What Trump, Lucan, Thomas and, apparently, the Republican majority in the Kentucky General Assembly, refuse to acknowledge is that segments of the nation’s population have historically been discriminated against because of race, gender, sexual identity and a host of other factors. It has held literally millions of people back denying them the opportunity to compete on the same playing field controlled by the White, patriarchal society since the founding of the republic.

What DEI programs provided were fairly modest. At the University of Kentucky, for instance, the Office of Institutional Diversity, ransacked last August by the gutless president, Dr. Eli Capilouto, under pressure from racist elements in the legislature, sought to attract more students of different backgrounds.

The mission, according to an old post on the university website, was to “enhance the diversity and inclusivity of our university community through the recruitment and retention of an increasingly diverse population of faculty, administrators, staff and students, and by implementing initiatives that provide rich diversity-related experiences for all to help ensure their success in an interconnected world.”

What sin could possibly be derived from that?

In 2021 the university unveiled a DEI Facilities and Spaces Plan that “concentrated on how the campus setting has or had impacted communities—particularly marginalized communities — to reveal systemic challenges and improvement opportunities. This intentional focus on minority or marginalized communities enabled voices that are often ignored, sidelined, and removed in the decision-making process to be at the center of the plan.”

That package included a plan to, among other things, build a multicultural center to affirm and celebrate identity groups and ideas regarding changes that could “contribute to dismantling institutionalized oppression’’ and “celebrate diversity.”

Those are not radical ideas. Now all DEI initiatives are buried on the Lexington campus. Sen. Stephen West, R-Paris, said the bill will assure that students entering Kentucky’s public colleges will enter “on a level playing field.”

But that’s the point, moron. Marginalized groups are not entering on a level playing field. Many folks are still carrying the baggage of historic oppression DEI was instituted to relieve.

Want proof?

According to Morningstar Investor:

• Black households earn 64 percent of median White income.

• Black people are twice as likely to fall at or below the poverty line compared to Whites and other groups.

• A Black person is 36.8 percent less likely to own a home than a White person.

• While 61.8 percent of non-Hispanic white families hold retirement accounts, only 34.8 percent of Black families held retirement accounts in 2022.

There’s more, of course. So, how is that entering on a level playing field.

Women also benefitted from DEI programs. According to the Pew Research Center, women made up 47 percent of the U.S. civilian labor force in 2023 but held only 35 percent of the country’s 10 highest-paying occupations.

In 2022, U.S. women typically earned 82 cents for every dollar men earned.
 
All of this and more establishes a greater need to create greater opportunities for marginalized people through DEI.

Trump insists that by killing DEI he’s placing merit first. But he’s not. By denying individuals an opportunity to exploit their talents, which this system does, the nation is diluting the pool of candidates who could prove superior to those currently considered meritorious, a list that includes a large contingent of mediocre White men.

By adopting this laissez-faire philosophy, refusing to provide a helping hand to those in need, Trump and the Kentucky General Assembly are kicking potentially valuable and talented people to the curb. Do you hear them developing a plan to address these economic conditions?

Of course not.

Trump and this moribund legislature are essentially erasing centuries of abuse that have brought us to this point, saying marginalized groups don’t deserve help because it’s their own fault.

And that’s racist to the core.

If you believe in people getting a fair shot, you have to give them a fair shot.