Overcoming DEI: How DEI silences Black People

One of my underrated (and sometimes very misunderstood) gifts is my ability to engage in dialogue with people who have different worldviews and customs. Because of my particular wiring, I often struggle to engage people who need to beat others into submission to their beliefs of ideas rather than get a deeper understanding of difference (no matter how tragic, unjust, vile we think). This article will explore some of the layers of anti-Blackness in the fabric of society, but instead of the normal “white versus black” argument (which I think is tired and needs to be put to rest because frankly it hasn’t gotten us anywhere close to where we should be as a community) and instead, I want to focus on non-white individuals’ layers of anti-Blackness. When I was teaching my societal monsters seminars, my students and I explored how we use language and communication to label individuals as outcasts in order to justify our disgusting behavior toward them. We looked at how we push people out of the tribe by smearing them and then sacrificing them to the status quo gods. We came to terms with our own biases by reviewing our initial written responses to texts, group discussions, film, photography and music. And then we committed (at least for that semester) to challenge all of our beliefs and dismantle any ideas we had about people that were rooted in prejudice or bias. It was during this time, I really developed my ability to suss out shenanigans clothed as expertise.

Our relationships with different types of people give us a special window into how they view us as much as how we view them.

A few years ago, I was visiting with a blended family I was very close with—Bengali and Irish/Italian. I was their kids’ auntie and the legal guardian should anything happen to the parents. I only include this information so show the level of intimacy I had with this family. This particular day the Bengali partner began to tell me about how his parents had disowned him for being in a relationship with a white woman. As professional student (just ask my friends and family), this was not a surprise to me because parents in many countries/cultures teach their children that they should marry people within the culture to (i) sustain the culture and (ii) mitigate the risks that often come up in relationships. The basic premise for this rational is if you marry someone who shares your worldview then it limits the possibility for misalignment when it comes to larger decisions. In Christianity, we call that not being unequally yolked because how can two walk together (in the same direction with the same goals) when they disagree at core values. I began to ask a question but he begin to speak again. So I listened: “if you think that’s bad, they actually teach us that Black people are the worst possible match so as bad as I may be in their eyes, I’m still redeemable because I didn’t have kids with a Black woman.” I have a way about me; I won’t say it’s right and I won’t say it’s wrong but I will say it’s different. I smiled and asked him, so how are you reconciling what you’ve been taught with what you have come to know and how will you teach your children to engage difference? We’re teaching them that everyone is important and valuable no matter what.?

Some answers sound as good as the DEI mission statements on many company websites but people rarely practice what they preach.

That was a good enough answer for me so I didn’t pry more—I mean we all would like to think we’ve evolved from those ideologies with which we have been indoctrinated right? Who was I to sift him in his house and leave? I think that’s why a lot of the modern Anti-racist scholars are so adamant about not having folks that disagree with their existence as humans in their circles, even though they may have to work in an office with folks like that. But, I needed my Godkids to see me so those racist seeds would be much harder to plant. It’s hard to hate folks when they’re just like you or someone you might want to be one day. His transparency about what he had been taught reaffirmed my previously acquired data evidencing anti-Blackness in non-Black historically marginalized or excluded communities. Anti-Blackness is so rooted in the fabric of society that even within historically marginalized communities, there is a desperate need to remain distinct from Blackness. I think that’s why I am suspicious of non-Black individuals who hold themselves out as DEI professionals. You know, people are always on that let’s give them the benefit of the doubt rampage but let’s face it, oftentimes our doubts benefit us. I think that’s why I’m able to sift out anti-Blackness in conversations that are allegedly safe or LinkedIn posts that attempt to erase Blackness while simultaneously “informing” the world at large about how we are supposed to engage racism when we face it head on in our doctor’s offices, classrooms, offices, airports, libraries, malls, highways and, dare I say, religious institutions. It’s also why I believe all diversity offices should have a Black person with authority to implement the stated diversity missions of companies.?

It's scary when your doubts benefit you concerning DEI and folks holding themselves out as strategists and experts seem to be completely oblivious to their explicit and overt bias (trust me they know) while they inflict harm on folks that don't fit their particular narrative.

Black people, especially Black women are the most negatively impacted individuals in every industry. Often experiencing a range of aggression in the workplace, very conscious bias and in some instances plain old racism, the Black person must navigate the negative emotions and behaviors of their colleagues, managers and direct reports while also doing the job that they’ve been hired to do. Then they are tasked with being the face, often plastered over websites to show commitment to diversity, but often afraid to speak up in the same spaces that they have been told are safe for fear of retaliation. When you are in a world that is so determined to misunderstand you and mismanage everything that concerns you, why would you want a DEI professional who has grown up learning about your inferiority to speak on your behalf? How could you trust white-adjacent (but marginalized, nonetheless) to advocate for you and your needs when they have demonstrated time and time again that they lack the capacity to do so. Listen, before you start disagreeing just look around you; search the company websites. Most of the organizations have a white or white-adjacent individual at the helm of DEI and in some cases the entire team is white or white-adjacent. If there is a Black person on the team they are in a position of support rather than leadership and if they have the leadership role, it comes without basic authority to achieve a company’s supposed diversity goals. It’s why so many Black folks leave companies shortly after being hired. It’s why so many Black people are launching their own businesses rather than being complicit to a career riddled with abusive experiences. And frankly, it’s why I’m bothering at all to write about this.

About a month ago, I was scanning my LI feed to see when I got whiplash from a DEI strategist who identifies as an asian, queer, trans, nonbinary person. This person is incredibly popular with 100s of thousands of followers, a published book and I’m certain a lot of contracts to support their consulting business. I say all of this to intimate that they have exponentially more influence than the average DEI professional and thus have the ability to inflict harm at a much wider scale than the Chief Diversity Officer at one company might have. I normally get wind of their posts because we are connected to a lot of the same people on LinkedIn and IRL but I have never met them and I am not connected to them directly. I do not know this person, and generally have been at least somewhat in agreement with their discussions about workplace diversity but this post was different. This person is not an anti-racist, hasn’t held themselves out as anti-racist and likely hasn’t considered Black people in their discourse of racism (at least based on this isolated post) but on that particular day in October, they decided to make some proclamations about how we ought to be dealing with racism. They suggested that we have to let go of our need to label people as racist or antiracist in their opening line so I paused to read because admittedly I was intrigued. Where could they possibly be going with this? They proceeded to list why this was a problem, which I will transpose here:

?? Extreme avoidance and disengagement from racially advantaged groups… (i.e. white or white-adjacent folks become uncomfortable talking about these things because they don’t want to be labeled)

?? Heavy intra-community policing among self-proclaimed antiracists to prove moral purity + a standard… (i.e. Black folks are holding people accountable and raising the standard by which people engage them)

?? Backlash and radicalization of racially advantaged groups (i.e. By labeling people they are more likely to become racists)

?? High anxiety and need to display in-group behaviors among “antiracists… (i.e. People behave better because they don’t want to be considered racist)

?? The “self-helpication” of antiracism practice into something sold primarily… (i.e. Although everybody can make money from their lived experiences, Black folks shouldn't we should continue to be martyrs, begging for bread while every other cause stands on our already dislocated shoulders)

And then it continues with the usual pandering that some marginalized folks do to gain favor in white society. I won’t continue adding direct quotes because you have enough to find their post if you care. Listen, I am all for having open dialogue about racism/antiracism and everything in between, but I am not for the erasure of the Black experience on one side of your mouth while on the other side touting your commitment to diversity. This is why I tell people I will take the radicalized racist any day — dem folks are open and honest about what they are and you are put on notice the first time so you can adjust accordingly. When someone calls themselves a DEI guru or some variation, you have to hold them at a really high standard because they are now impacting the lives of every historically marginalized archetype and can sabotage DEI efforts if they remain unchecked. I won’t give you their name because I can’t be directly responsible for giving them more eyeballs. In fact, for a really long time I wouldn’t even bother commenting on people’s posts when I disagreed with what they had to say. You know the saying….I scrolled on by. BUT something made me stop dead in my tracks. Tons of our mutual connections that I had previously believed to be “safe” based on discussions with them, the word on the street about them, their books, their posts, were reacting and even LAUDING the post. So I thought to myself, GURR you probably misread the post, go back and read it again. And after my fifth read I decided against my rule about about scrolling by to say the following:?

“Nope. This is yet another a semantics limbo about how we should approach racism. We can’t separate concepts in society from the people in society who are impacted or those who do harm. Whether you choose to label yourself as racist or anti-racist, is less about being nuanced and taking a true stand either way. We don’t dismantle racism in society by hiding behind nuance and theory and we don’t by perpetuating the lie that people are unaware of their racism/racist behavior. It’s not a guilt trip it’s a reality check. We have had enough of the nuances of racist systems that have decimated Black people’s progress. Antiracism or racism as concepts force individuals to the reflect about their behavior and such behaviors impact on a specific individual as well as larger groups of people, only when the individuals do the deep work. We tried dealing with racism and racist policies by “finding common ground” turns out Black people have been hung out to dry every single time. Even the people we stand in solidarity leave us exposed time and time again often siding with those who harm us. I wonder what the scholars who have been committed to antiracist work for years upon years have to say.”

Honestly this is why I hate that sound bite that has been making its rounds for a while "surround yourself with people who will talk about you in rooms you aren't in" -- How do I know those people have my best interests at heart when they are speaking? How do I know the folks listening have enough sense to ask for receipts when anything is said about me? -- NO, this is why we need to be in the rooms.

I get it. Racism is one of the grossest topics. Not even Black people want to talk about. In fact, we wish racism was dead. We wished it so much that when Barack Obama became our first Black president we convinced ourselves for a bit there that racism was in fact, dead. When Obama became president, the media, the internet and society by and large repeatedly attacked Michelle Obama often comparing her face to monkeys and gorillas and her body to men (I mean they’re still doing that). The words tickled our ears but we knew the truth. The Williams’ sisters, Naomi Osaka and now Coco Gauff having to defend their humanity repeatedly on the tennis court because they don’t fit what tennis champions should look like but they were the problem for speaking up. It’s like when people were getting killed on their way home in the Jim Crow south and people had the nerve to send letters to MLK calling him disruptive for speaking out about it. Strewps, Amadou Diallo being pumped with 40 bullets by white NYC cops and they complained about Rev Sharpton showing up to advocate calling him a pariah while desperately trying to excuse that behavior. It’s like Gov. Parsons refusing to pardon Marcellus even though it was clear the man committed no crime. It’s like how the Asian cop was complicit in George Floyd’s traumatizing murder. It’s how Sonya Massey got shot in the face after SHE called the cops. Starts with words like this post and ends with innocent people dead every day.

How can we hold systems accountable and not people? If survivors have to deal with the feelings they have as a result of the harm they endure trauma for existing while Black why shouldn't racists experience discomfort that comes with recognizing they are racist because they target individuals not based on systems and concepts, but based on their commitment to maintaining their stereotypical + caricatured viewpoints of Black people despite overwhelming evidence of how these behaviors harm us? We cannot dismantle systems if we refuse to label the people for what they are (i.e. stating a fact based on their behavior, which in that case would be a fair assessment (if judgment is uncomfortable)) and hold each individual accountable. The failure to call out perpetrators of racially motivated bad behavior empowers them to perpetuate unbridled harm. Only racist people engage in racist behavior -- whether they believe it or not. It is the continued attempt to disassociate people from their racist behavior that is causing Black folks loss of money, loss of promotions, loss of time, and exponential gains in trauma 159 years since we were free to pursue life, liberty and happiness. So excuse us if we are not interested in being salve to folks who repeatedly poor salt the wounds they reopen every time they encounter us. Le sigh.

You can’t tackle racism (or any ism for that matter) without naming and defining the thing, the folks we engage or refuse to engage in such thing and the standards and ways to implement such standards of such thing. We just can’t.

If you ask me, we are still dealing with a lot of the isms of society that we would prefer to kill dead because we have been pussyfooting around these topics, toeing the line to find favor in a society that will never favor the oppressed, and completely avoiding opportunities to complete dismantle deep-rooted issues in our microcosm as well as society at large because we think we are keeping the peace. Now we can lie to ourselves about where we are in this stage of our existence and we can continue to avoid the truth about what really is and how we truly effect the changes we include in our diversity mission statements. OR we could get really honest with ourselves. We can get honest about our personal relationship with race and our behavior based on another person’s own relationship to race. Then we can seek out the real experts on race—if you ask me it’s Black people (because we get the worst end of the stick every time) and White people (because we get the platinum diamond plated version of the stick every time)*. Most groups in between are just trying to avoid or gain proximity to each end of this spectrum of race. What we can’t do is pretend we can talk in circles about the impact of race on the lives of people and make meaningful impact in the diversity, equity and inclusion space.