In The Middle and DEI: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

I am sure many can relate to this. Whether you are a millennial or an immigrant, you probably have felt or thought about this. Many of us are really stuck in the middle of things. If you are a millennial, you probably have though of the fact that you are part of a unique generation that grew up without internet, cable, for several years and had to deal with analog stuff or actually play and do things outside and in the outdoors. If you were a reader, you probably grew up reading more history and fine literature from around the world too. We were taught the importance of learning language, history and culture. And then the internet came. It was exciting! Pen pals we had that we wrote to and exchanged letters every 2-4 weeks now were a day or two away on email or mere seconds on chatting software like ICQ. You were able to look up people at random from anywhere in the world and talk. We looked up videos and as much as I realize it is wrong now, used torrent and emule to access videos and books we could never dream of getting or it would cost us a ton to get. And before we knew it, the internet boom and the apps took off faster than we imagined. Things we considered science fiction are now around us and normal in every day life. Here comes Gen Z and Gen Alpha. A generation that grew up knowing only the internet. They are in tune with programming, software, apps, social media that it comes with its own sets of problems. They consider it as life. We on the other hand share boomers and Gen X skepticism towards internet and its dangers. We recognize the balance that we need to maintain between online and offline. We help the older generation with their phones, emails, and other computer and phone tricks while trying to keep up with the new generation trends and lingo. We are the last of our kind that know real history and how things were before the digital age and we live in the digital age. Sometimes we yearn for the past while fantasizing about the future but are wary of it too. We grew up at a time where novels predicted how bleak society will become due to technology. Between social detachment, cyberbullying, being monitored and traced or even controlled and brainwashed using technology, all these things we were forewarned of by literary visionaries who dreamt of how this will be. We still are cautious of it while most of the new generation are simply accepting it.

Now if you are a first generation immigrant or may be even second, you probably have also felt something similar. You grew up with a traditional collectivistic culture and was raised to respect your elders and to respect the group, save face and to live by reputation and not disgrace yourself and your family. You may or may not have been in tune with your original native culture and the habits of your country or town. If you dreamt of migrating, you may have started to learn about the new target culture earlier than most or it may have been a sudden change and you found yourself immersed in a new culture and now you are in a trial by fire. If your experiences are anything like mine, you probably made a lot of mistakes and lost acquaintances over some cultural or even religious differences where you behaved according to your cultural values and inadvertently offended others. You probably still struggle a bit internally but you adapted for the most part. You still keep in touch with your heritage and people from your national origin and you want your children to still be connected to your home values but you want all of you to still not to face discrimination because you are different. You probably have an accent and even if you don't look different, your accent and speech pattern or even name give you away and people treat you as a foreigner. Now in a DEI era and a time when it is highlighted and celebrated, you may have been paraded and given opportunities that you are happy about. If you are kudos for you, you were lucky enough to be selected to look the part and fulfill the quota and it is good for your career. Not all of us are lucky after all. I have been in the professional world long enough to notice this and while others may have noticed it or don't even say it, I think it strikes me as funny.

I have seen DEI companies celebrates women, southeast Asians, African Americans, Latinos, Indians and even sometimes. If a company is really progressive about it, a hijabi woman would also be lucky. I have yet to see a company that celebrates and significantly promotes a Muslim man, especially one with a beard. Yes, even in the DEI, promoting Muslims is still a dangerous territory. No one actually says it or speaks about it, Muslims are simply not selected. Companies are smart enough to hire good people regardless of their ethnicity or religion in normal positions. Companies have the right to choose who to promote or put on articles, marketing material and blogposts. I still would challenge them on the proclamation that they are DEI for real. I am not advocating for special treatment, and I am not saying that companies should be mandated to have a specific composition either. I am merely making a personal observation. Someone I know who has been paraded for DEI told me, that they know their company is using them to promote DEI but they also know that they won't go anywhere in the company. They are put on many blogposts, marketing material, sent to events or even given recognition awards but they are never promoted or given high enough rating on performance evaluation to match all the recognition and merits they are paraded for. That person naturally opted to switch the company after years of service because it was clear what their role in the company actually was. Another person I know has been with their company for a long time. He had international assignments, solved problems for the company across the globe, been on marketing material, but they are barely promoted to a manager and hardly recognized for anything. They are still around because their company pays well and it is a stable job and they are satisfied. They recognize things for what they are but they are comfortable and their family is alright so they opted for not rocking the boat. Let's face it though, companies are not like they used to be. Companies want their employees loyalty but no longer give loyalty in return. That is in tune with western culture and that is OK. People are smart, they are recognizing it and they are not as invested in their employers as they are used to. They now coast, look for other jobs and take their knowledge with them. In the end, this is were we all are. In the middle.