Talk:Diversity, equity, and inclusion

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 18 January 2022 and 2 May 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Katumassd, Spicyeggwhites, LiamG17 (article contribs).

EDI?

In Canada this is the dominant term (same words, different order) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 104.246.130.248 (talk) 14:50, 18 May 2022 (UTC)

Merge back to Diversity training?

There's a lot of talking about doing DEI, and a lot of talking about criticizing DEI, but much less about what DEI actually is and does. Perhaps there isn't enough for an article separate from Diversity training and it should just be a section there? User:力 (powera, π, ν) 20:39, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

I dunno... It kind of seems to be a separate concept. Like, diversity training is part of DEI, but DEI also involves other efforts too. Still, any article on this topic is going to be a massive pain and be plagued by POV pushing on either side; and I for one can't commit much more time to this sort of topic unfortunately. Crossroads ^-talk- 00:21, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

A discussion of what DEI is, in detail, as disclosed from over 100 leaked videos (not for public viewing) from the virtual workshops held by the National Association of Independent Schools' People of Color Conference can be found in "Inside the Woke Indoctrination Machine" by Andrew Gutmann and Paul Rossi on page A13 of the 2022/02/12-13 Wall Street Journal. Yes, it is a thing - very highly-directed and specific. The elements laid out therein should be included in this article and, in fact, the inclusion should go in the opposite direction, with the article on Critical Race Theory (one of the applications of the DEI initiative) subsumed under this one. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2603:6000:AA4D:C5B8:0:3361:EAF8:97B7 (talk) 15:07, 20 March 2022 (UTC)

Tagged for POV issues

This article is written in a promotional, non-encyclopedic way. It reads more like the intro to a training manual than a neutral article. It ignores the fact that DEI has broader applications than organizational training initiatives. EWBlyden 85 (talk) 04:03, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

I agree. There exists a pretty strong debate over DEI, what it means and how it is impacting various institutions, especially universities (with the recent Hamline U outrage, this criticism is more lively than ever). Everyone is entitled to agreeing or disagreeing with the criticism -- at the end of the day it is largely a question of personal philosophy and ideology, not right or wrong -- but it is slightly absurd to not discuss it. A NPOV perspective would discuss the ideological/philosophical background in a neutral manner, and cover the establishment and spread of DEI in organizational culture in historical terms. Finally a portion that sought to provide arguments by prominent advocates and critics, could conclude the article. If nobody opposes it, I might start looking at how it could be made more NPOV and with a more international perspective.--Euor (talk) 13:57, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

Criticism

No criticism section huh? No mention of the fact that this is a controversial philosophy being forced down everyone’s throats 2601:283:4B81:9EE0:E991:8F59:94AB:A28C (talk) 09:15, 25 July 2022 (UTC)

Good manners are a thing only mothers and fathers can inculcate in people; only they have the requisite authority to demand that someone be kind and considerate of others. This manifests the replacement of fathers and mothers with "professionals" as a child's principle teacher of morality and sociability. When half the country seems unaware that honesty is an essential human value, then diversity, inclusion, and equity are irrelevant. 2603:7080:B53F:D6C:30CB:C189:CF9C:8999 (talk) 18:00, 26 July 2022 (UTC)

This space isn’t for people to grind axes, which I think is a fair characterization of what you’re doing here — especially with the rather naked talking point at the end. Encyclopedia Lu (talk) 04:50, 11 January 2023 (UTC)

@2601:283:4B81:9EE0:E991:8F59:94AB:A28C this article is a propaganda piece. I adjusted it. Fantastical farce (talk) 20:02, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

I don't agree with the tone or the politics of the other poster, but I think it would make sense for this article to have a criticism section. Both sides of the political spectrum have criticized DEI, the right for DEI's progresive policies and the left for being a shield against accountability for big businesses. --81.196.3.4 (talk) 12:07, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

I agree the article needs significant expansion to reflect the way DEI is discussed and criticized, but for those that are curious: more modern Wikipedia articles tend to eschew "Controversies" or "Criticism" sections for more specific section titles e.g. "Backlash to corporate DEI initiatives". You can read more in an influential essay (meaning NOT official WP policy) at WP:CSECTION, that gets up a lot. Suriname0 (talk) 19:48, 16 January 2023 (UTC)

• • • a criticism section in the article makes sense, as in the real world (where people actually work in companies with DEI policies), most people who are hired on merit, work their way up the ladder; most of these people view people who were hired to make a company "more diverse", or seemingly "inclusive". That those hires are viewed as less than qualified, less than capable, less than able to be accountal. Basically those having their golden ticket punched only by virtue of their race, gender, or other associated status as so called victims of an unfair white supremacy system and history. In nearly every company forcing DEI policies, this ends up with those hired being less respected and valued by others. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 47.146.38.207 (talk) 22:13, 2 September 2024 (UTC)

DEI needs a history section

DEI needs a history section that describes it either as an HR innovation that legitimates particular organizations, or a chronology of the organizational entities that first set them up, how it spread, etc. There are no dates, places or persons mentioned in the article. 50.4.132.185 (talk) 15:52, 2 February 2023 (UTC)

IMHO the whole DEI thing first started in 2011 with Obama's Exec Order 13583.

It called for Diversity and Inclusivity training in government ...

... and it mentioned the need for equity. RumiSaid (talk) 18:24, 13 February 2023 (UTC)

I looked further and found an earlier article "Training for racial equity and inclusion" from The Aspen Institute in 2002 which reviewed results of Project Change funded by Levi Strauss Foundation in 1991. All of these seem to be "progressive" initiatives. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RumiSaid (talk • contribs) 16:59, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

And further yet, the terms diversity and inclusion do not appear in the US Constitution although 'equity' does as it relates to a court of equity. However, also checked the Mexican constitution and found all those terms. The Mexican constitution is purported (by Wikipedia) to be the first 'progressive' constitution written. — Preceding unsigned comment added by RumiSaid (talk • contribs) 16:09, 7 July 2023 (UTC)

Diversity emerged from affirmative action lawsuits. In the famous Bakke decision of 1978,diversity became a factor in constitutional law, as the Court ruled quotas were illegal but it was allowable to consider race as a plus factor when trying to foster "diversity" in their classes. See Steven M. Gillon, "The strange career of affirmative action: the Civil Rights Act of 1964" in his "That's Not What We Meant to Do": Reform and Its Unintended Consequences in Twentieth-Century America WW Norton, 2000) p. 152. So I added in the History section from the Affirmative action in the United States article. Rjensen (talk) 16:51, 14 January 2024 (UTC)

500 yeas ago, "equity" referred to a particular set of remedies and related procedures in civil law. (see ‘Equity (Law) at wikipedia.com) 50 years ago, “equity” referred to expectations that one’s contributions would be rewarded similarly to others. (see ‘Towards an understanding of inequity’ by J Stacy Adams ‘63). Today, “equity” is presumed to be the antonym of “inequity” (which is defined as “unfair treatment). (note: without contribution or reward, today’s meaning is insufficient). — Preceding unsigned comment added by RumiSaid (talk • contribs) 03:39, 2 February 2024 (UTC)

Cleaning

I am currently trying to clean up this article, remove the fluff and essay-like stuff, expand it (history, overview), and make it more NPOV. I will add a criticism/controversy section although I know modern Wiki tends to eschew a designated "Criticism" section, because I don't think it is possible to integrate it otherwise. But if someone thiks they can do it after seeing the new version, great! As DEI is becoming more and more politically controversial, not simply academically controversial, I think it is important to have the Wiki page as NPOV and thoroughly sourced as possible. Euor (talk) 09:31, 25 March 2023 (UTC)

Finished it now, added a lot of sources both from media organizations and academia (journals). Only thing I might dislike is that at first glance, the criticism section seems a lot larger than the "normal" section, but this is because so much possible content has a home in other articles (just look at the "Further" tab. Another problem though is that, as mentioned in the article, DEI is a bunch of methodologies, not a single unified one. Anyways, I might try to find more to put in the methods and arguments, and welcome anyone if they wanna help!--Euor (talk) 05:19, 26 March 2023 (UTC)

Reverted intro section

Please achieve consensus here before re-adding reverted lede.

In particular, do NOT remove "claims to": to do so requires consensus in the sources that DEI works. DenverCoder9 (talk) 20:25, 29 April 2023 (UTC)

I don't understand your reversal. When I rewrote the article, I see I changed it to "seeks to", which I personally believe has the about the same implication as "claims to". Whether it seeks to do something doesn't mean it does it (or doesn't). Same with "claims to". Also, mine was directly cited from the most neutral dictionary entry I could find. As of now, the first sentence has no references, which feels wrong for such a contentious topic.@DenverCoder19:--Euor (talk) 15:00, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

"seeks to" is different from "claims to" because it implies intention. It is widely disputed whether corporations adopt DEI because they care about diversity or as a strategy to minimize liability. DenverCoder19 (talk) 02:14, 5 November 2023 (UTC)

Opening sentence on Disability section makes direct assertion

"Far too often, DEI initiatives focus primarily on aspects of race, gender, and ethnicity, inadvertently sidelining disabled people." Should be "【x][y][z] believe that far too often..." or "DEI initiatives have been criticized as primarily focused on aspects of race, gender, and ethnicity, inadvertently sidelining disabled people," etc. It is not wikipedia's place to be making direct opinions or assertations, only to relay them. 2600:1700:7F:8580:11EC:62F8:DB4D:2C0C (talk) 00:58, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

You are right. It was added by someone other than me after my attempt to clean up the article. I am not sure whether the person who added it monitors this talk page, but hopefully they will fix it and ensure NPOV.--Euor (talk) 15:25, 3 September 2023 (UTC)

This entire section was extremely bad. It consisted of virtually nothing apart direct inline WP:ADVERT links, promotion for consulting companies, and bold assertions from random non-WP:RS blogs being repeated in wikivoice. I have trimmed it accordingly; to be honest, the rest of the article doesn't seem too great either. But I will leave that to someone else. jp×g 00:21, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

You should have seen it before.--Euor (talk) 17:50, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

yeesh!!! jp×g 18:12, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

Yes when I found it it seemed like an ad written by the industry, very POV, not NPOV. I tried to make it more NPOV, and added some of the wider controversies surrounding it that were missing. It still is not a great article as you say, but better than it was I hope. One of the issues this article will have is that there is not much written about DEI that is not produced by those in the industry of DEI. Euor (talk) 15:48, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

Merge Diversity (business)

I propose to merge Diversity (business) into this page. Diversity and inclusion isn't a topic specific to business; it's relevant to education and politics as well as other organization types.

At the same time, what is the most common name for diversity and inclusion? Is it actually diversity, equity and inclusion? We should rename this page to whatever is the most common name in the literature. Qzekrom (she/her • talk) 06:31, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Oppose--- In my opinion having diverse approaches to this controversial topic may be wise at the present time. Rjensen (talk) 22:04, 16 January 2024 (UTC)

No, I did not add copyrighted content

I recently added this content. Someone else deleted it, and left a notice on my talk page that it was a copyright violation. But it's not. I wrote the text myself. It should be put back in. The archive and edit summary have been removed, for some weird reason. I'm posting the content here. I think it should be put back in. I added this in the section called "Criticism and controversy," and I called the new subsection, "Air traffic controllers."

In 2014, the Federal Aviation Administration stopped giving preferential treatment to air traffic controller applicants who had passed classes from the 36 FAA-approved college aviation programs across the U.S., because too many of the people who passed these classes were white males. At the same time, the FAA also stopped giving preference to applicants who were military veterans with aviation experience, because too many of them were white males. Under the FAA's new DEI policy, air traffic controller applicants were asked how many different high school sports they had participated in. Under this new DEI policy, approximately half of all job offers for air traffic controllers where given to people who had no aviation experience.

SquirrelHill1971 (talk) 20:53, 21 January 2024 (UTC)

You mistake "The hiring breakdown marks a major shift in FAA recruitment strategy, which is now geared toward trying to keep ahead of a wave of controller retirements while also attracting more minorities and women to the nation’s largely white and male controller work force in airport towers and radar facilities, officials have said" as "too many people who passed these classes were white males." - such a statement is too far a reach. You are implying that the FAA is intent is to discriminate against white men, rather than to have a candidate pool that is more representative of the US population. Based on this and some of your other edits, I have serious WP:COMPETENCY and WP:NPOV concerns regarding your edits on Wikipedia. I suggest you familarize yourself with Wikipedia's policies before making further edits. LegalSmeagolian (talk) 14:54, 22 January 2024 (UTC)

References

Figure cited for 2003

Did US corporations actually spend *$8 billion* on DEI in 2003? 2600:1700:5ABD:8700:DFF6:8C7F:8164:CB21 (talk) 02:10, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

Yes, according to a huge study at MIT --see news at

online For full report see Kochan, Thomas, et al. "The effects of diversity on business performance: Report of the diversity research network." Human Resource Management (2003) Vol. 42, No. 1, Pp. 3-21 DOI: 10.1002/hrm.1006 Rjensen (talk) 04:06, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

To help inform readers, is there a suitable, encyclopedic way to put the $8 billion in context? For instance, the number is about 0.04 percent of US GDP. We need to avoid original research, but are we allowed to contextualize to help people make sense of economic data? ProfGray (talk) 11:52, 3 April 2024 (UTC)

No need--it's a lot of money but we don't have estimates of how much corporations spent on OTHER administrative lines. Rjensen (talk) 01:52, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Tabia Lee

The paragraph about Tabia Lee is unbalanced. Lee is a right-wing activist who became a DEI director with the intent to undermine the DEI program. That is to say, a common troll. She's being framed here as a DEI director who was "cancelled" by wokeness or whatever simply because of her pro-Jewish/Zionist opinions. That's not the whole story. Bohemian Baltimore (talk) 12:13, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

I trimmed it significantly; the incident doesn't seem to actually have much coverage and the amount of quotations we were devoting to it was probably undue. --Aquillion (talk) 17:55, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Jews and antisemitism

@User:Jaireeodell I think having the section simply titled "antisemitism" reduces the subject of Jews and DEI to the narrative/POV that DEI is antisemitic. Does DEI never address or incorporate Jews in a positive way? Do Jews never support DEI? Is there no other relationship of Jews to DEI other than DEI being antisemitic? The whole section has a certain ideological slant and it definitely needs more content. Maybe the section could simply be called "Jews" or "Jewish community" or something similar. Bohemian Baltimore (talk) 14:37, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

This part is a subsection of the section titled "Criticism and controversy". Positive aspects with references would belong to History, Methods and arguments or Political and public reaction. HudecEmil (talk) 16:18, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

If there is an ideological slant that needs to be corrected in this section, wouldn't it be better to find a reliable source that speaks to other assessments of DEI or of the views of Tabia Lee? I think it's too much to expect for a change to a section header to do this work. -- --Jaireeodell (talk) 17:18, 19 April 2024 (UTC)

• I have made some effort to clean up the section (it relied too heavily on using opinion-pieces and low-quality sources for statements of fact; and there were a lot of WP:SAY issues where eg. one side in a dispute would be described as "saying" something and the other as "alleging" the opposite.) --Aquillion (talk) 17:55, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Copy notice from Multicultural and diversity management

HudecEmil (talk) 08:55, 19 May 2024 (UTC)

A Global View?

When reading through the article, it does seem that the topic (and the discussion around it) is very much focused solely on the United States. It would also be good if the article could signpost other articles dealing with similar issues in other regions. DrFrench (talk) 20:44, 25 July 2024 (UTC)

Globalism / Communism

Why is there no discussion on how and why DEI is another form of unifying the social divide by forcing collectivism through smoke and mirrors?

This is clearly another tactic of controlling the mass population. 206.84.247.108 (talk) 22:29, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

If you're looking for an online encyclopedia based on far-right conspiracy theories, you should refer to Conservapedia. 81.36.113.93 (talk) 16:18, 30 August 2024 (UTC)

Diversity & Inclusion

I note that there seems to be a backpedaling from DEI to D&I (which seems to predate it). A subtle example is Microsoft, who was said to have fired its DEI team, yet issued a statement saying they are committed to diversity and inclusion. The "Equity" bit has gotten a lot of bad press due to the culture war, and from what I have seen it is the cause of most of the controversy (due to the belief that equity requires focus on outcomes in many frameworks, as seen in a source used in the article). I therefore wonder whether or not we ought to keep an eye out for whether this shift appears to be general, and perhaps split DEI and D&I eventually. Euor (talk) 00:56, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Similarities with other regimes section?

In discussions about Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) frameworks, there are various perspectives regarding their impact on media and representation. Some critics argue that DEI initiatives can inadvertently create a hierarchy that influences how characters are portrayed in media, potentially leading to predictable outcomes based on the characters' group affiliations. This perception of a hierarchy where characters from certain groups consistently prevail over others can be concerning to some viewers.

One example that has been highlighted is the portrayal of the character Fred in the recent animated series "Velma," a spin-off of "Scooby-Doo." Critics of the show argue that Fred was depicted in a manner that seemed to focus excessively on his flaws, portraying him as immature and subjecting him to body and intellectual shaming. These characterizations have sparked debates about whether such portrayals reinforce stereotypes or unfairly target specific groups.

This kind of portrayal has drawn comparisons to historical propaganda, such as Nazi Germany's portrayal of Jewish people in their media. During that time, Jews were often depicted as comedic villains or malevolent figures in propaganda films and literature, contributing to widespread negative stereotypes. Similar patterns have been observed in other regimes where media was used to dehumanize or villainize specific groups, such as in wartime propaganda.

Critics argue that analyzing current media trends in light of historical propaganda techniques is crucial to prevent the repetition of past mistakes. By examining these similarities, society can strive for more balanced and equitable representations in media, ensuring that all groups are portrayed with nuance and respect. NamelessHorse (talk) 00:19, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Didn't earn it

I didn't see the term "Didn't earn it" in the article but I have seen it used and once I can clearly identify sources I can ask where it should go or if it should.— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 21:55, 4 August 2024 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 19 August 2024

Should have worldwide view. 64.189.18.44 (talk) 20:35, 19 August 2024 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. PianoDan (talk) 20:39, 19 August 2024 (UTC)