Talking About Diversity
Some people have a very limited view of diversity. Most people avoid the topic completely in the absence of EEO, HR, and “progressive” mandates. I thought seriously about staying out of the fray but here I am!
Jumping Into The Pool
There are a few reasons that I have made the leap. I am one of the “And People.” My nature and nurture make me an embodiment of The Mosaic. My children have the same gift/curse. It is also not lost on me that many people have made a significant living out of the topic – some deservedly so. I regard myself as an equal opportunity critic when speaking truth to power. This means that it was important for me to enter the field in order to confront the Diversity Mafia. I have the most experience with this group at the independent school level. They are often the Talented Tenth who somehow got discovered and marched on to claim their elite education birthright. They know all the diversity buzzwords and jargon and control the red velvet rope against those who don’t. Their class fears are as strong as the those of the oligarchs whose “accomplishments” they worship.
Taking The Cheap Way Out
Albert Einstein stated, “The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them.” Yet the purveyors of the party pablum insist on fighting the battle of diversity on the fields of cultural and identity diversity. School administrators and diversity coordinators love to put on the cultural events that celebrate their efforts at open-mindedness. Like reform efforts in public school accountability, these events are cheap and easy to do and everyone feels that they have done their part to make the tent bigger.
Fairness
I have worked with too many children who will never get the chance to see their cuisine sampled, songs sung, or humanity dignified. The common denominator for these children is their poverty. We allow private schools, elite colleges, and Fortune 500 companies to conflate race and ethnicity with deprivation. The five year-old of any race, growing up in a poor household will never have the chance to be invited to the dance.
Most people in this country will profess and believe they are open-minded on issues of race, gender, ethnicity, etc. It’s generally not popular to be a bigot. Ask people to contribute to a system that ensures educational equity for all poor children and they avert their eyes while their fingers point to the nice wall displays for Black History Month.
As the author Walter Benn Michaels asserts, “celebrating diversity shouldn’t be an acceptable alternative to seeking economic equality.”
We should not allow discrimination. Stereotype rigidity and the “Stereotype Threat” (see the research by Claude Steele) are very real problems and have to be addressed. This should not prevent debates on ideas and ideologies.
Most people don’t have access to the elite education that will open the doors to the American Dream. No one should be let off the hook just because their school or business seems appropriately diverse – there’s still that tiny, nagging issue about equality.
