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PaperclipPerfector  1yr ago (text post)   31025 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 3, 2023

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How corporate America is slashing DEI workers amid backlash to diversity programs

Years after the death of George Floyd shined a spotlight on societal inequities, diversity professionals say some companies are turning their backs on the progress that's been made to address them. DEI positions have been disproportionately hit by layoffs across industries, but particularly at tech companies, which have faced financial challenges as sales slowed from the blistering pace attained during the pandemic.

A LinkedIn study found that chief diversity and inclusion officer positions grew by 168.9% from 2019 to 2022.... Starting in late 2020 -- months after the killing of Floyd set off a racial reckoning -- a host of companies escalated cuts of DEI professionals, a survey of more than 600 companies from data firm Revelio Labs found. Last year, the layoffs accelerated significantly, the study found. One in three DEI professionals lost their roles over a one-year period ending in December, the survey said. Over that period, the study added, non-DEI workers experienced a relatively lower attrition rate of 21%.

At the same time, conservative elected officials such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott began to target DEI initiatives. DeSantis last month signed into law a bill that prohibits state or federal spending on DEI programs at public universities in Florida. In February, Abbott's office ordered state agencies to stop using diversity, equity and inclusion programs in hiring, calling them "illegal." And in June, Abbott signed a ban on diversity offices in state-funded higher education institutions.

In addition, several DEI executives at major Hollywood corporations have left in recent weeks. A common theory is that DEI programs are a luxury program, the first to go when businesses look to trim fat. It looks like the diversity industry may simply be seeing its bubble pop, or the court's ruling on affirmative action may encourage further lawsuits focused on the workplace.

The rapid organizational movement toward addressing inequalities was initially exciting for DEI professionals. But in just a couple of years, that excitement wavered as growth rapidly fell apart.

"The honeymoon is over," Cecil Howard, a DEI consultant and former chief diversity officer at the University of South Florida, told ABC News.

"Right after George Floyd's killing, everybody who didn't have a diversity office quickly created a diversity office," he added. "A few years later, they started realizing, 'We checked the box and things are a little quieter now.'"

This might be teaching the wrong lesson, if the rule is 'unrest will be rewarded with jobs, lack of unrest will be punished by the withdrawal of jobs'. Groups respond to incentives after all.

Also, if positions grew 168% but then fell 33%, they're still doing pretty well.

Well, that might be true, but the people creating the unrest and the people getting these jobs are not the same. Very few of the people who burned the city down got cushy DEI jobs, which mostly went to college educated women(two things underrepresented among the rioters).

Very few of the people who burned the city down got cushy DEI jobs, which mostly went to college educated women

There's division of labour in ideological groups. College educated women can legitimize and sanction things that they don't actually do themselves, or they can draft policies that make it easier to burn cities down.

That’s irrelevant to your worries about perverse incentives, unless you expect rioters to think through those incentives. Do you?

Say there are people who profit from riots, in this case DEI professionals. They might not riot themselves but they might encourage others to riot. Perhaps some of them have power as thought leaders or community leaders. Perhaps people who are thought leaders or community leaders think they might get bought off with sinecures if they can produce some big riots.

Your average rioter doesn't necessarily want a DEI job, I'm talking about people with megaphones who don't throw any stones but might intensify their rhetoric depending on the situation. If they thought they'd be liquidated by the security forces as in China, they'd probably not show up at all.

Perhaps some of them have power as thought leaders or community leaders. Perhaps people who are thought leaders or community leaders think they might get bought off with sinecures if they can produce some big riots.

This seems unlikely. To the extend that older women have sway in urban minority communities (especially as community leaders), it tends to be through church involvement. The folks that get DEI jobs generally aren't the type that attend church services regularly, so far as I'm aware.

It seems more likely that there were already tensions in these communities, and a spark set them off and people just rioted. Humans do this occasionally under certain circumstances. The DEI consultants seem more like outside opportunists, capitalizing on the riots and internal progressive (mostly white) status games.

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