Comment by dbspin
3 months ago
Here's another way to think of it... Very real substantive criticisms of the whole DEI project and identity politics have been rubbished for years. It was in fact impossible within the liberal left either in the academy or journalism to criticise this stuff without being labelled racist or misogynist.
Meanwhile countless people have experienced being excluded from funding, employment opportunities etc. Countless more have sat through (demonstrably ineffective, and even counterproductive) mandatory reeducation in the form of diversity workshops, antiracism training and so on. This is absolutely a major part of why we got Trump in the first place. The lefts complete unwillingness to address the failure and unpopularity of these policies. It's not a case of Trump demonising otherwise good initiatives. Quite the opposite. Rather, Trump an opportunistic populist, seized on valid criticisms to promote himself as the sane alternative.
Policies that served to derail opportunities for substantive change (Bernie in the US, Corbin in the UK) in favour of shiny new posts in HR at every university and corporation. Vivek Chibber is brilliant on this stuff, I'd recommend you check him out for a more cogent critique.
https://jacobin.com/2025/01/elite-identity-politics-professi...
> Very real substantive criticisms of the whole DEI project and identity politics have been rubbished for years.
That's a fair point, I've certainly seen aspects of this. I see similar criticisms coming from the left being thrown at the current Labour government as well as the unhinged people calling Harris "Killer Kamala" and Biden "Genocide Joe" (ironic given what Trump just proposed in Gaza). I don't think the far right has the monopoly on idiots and lunatics.
I should counter, however, that many of the criticisms of DEI were also masked racism/misogyny/ableism. Trump's rhetoric should make that blindingly obvious. We'll now get countless people being discriminated against by a hostile federal government and the people who voted for that also need to take accountability for their vote.
This isn't to excuse the poor engagement from the left (especially whilst in government!), merely to point out the nuance of the debate and why "DEI bad" isn't a useful framing.