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justice
Why DEI Was Doomed to Fail
DEI’s fundamental contradiction was this: It argued that race is a social invention—a system created to control people by reducing complexity—yet it never suggested replacing it with a more holistic vision of justice.
Mar 09, 2025
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, or DEI, is collapsing—not just as a corporate initiative, but as an ideological framework.
In what seemed like a flash, it became a dominant force in American institutional life, embedded in HR departments, university policies, and media discourse. And now, just as quickly, it finds itself in retreat, with entire DEI offices being gutted across corporate and academic America.
President Donald Trump’s administration has aggressively targeted DEI, issuing executive orders to dismantle these programs across federal agencies. This federal rollback has emboldened Republican-led states to eliminate DEI efforts within public institutions. Meanwhile, MSNBC’s recent firing of Joy Reid, a vocal defender of DEI who embodied many of its most aggressive tendencies, signals a broader cultural shift.
If we want to build a politics that actually addresses racial injustice, we need an approach that is dynamic rather than static—one that acknowledges history without being trapped by it.
The right celebrates this as a victory over “woke ideology.” The left frames it as yet another example of backlash and white fragility. But these explanations fail to account for why DEI has unraveled so quickly.
The reality is that DEI was doomed to fail—not because the principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion are unworthy, but because the framework built around them was structurally flawed.
DEI’s fundamental contradiction was this: It argued that race is a social invention—a system created to control people by reducing complexity—yet it never suggested replacing it.
Instead, it doubled down on racial categorization, reinforcing the very thing it claimed to challenge. This reification of race, rather than dismantling structures of oppression, helped sustain them, making DEI brittle and politically untenable.
For the left, the lesson here is crucial. If we don’t break out of the rigid, black-and-white thinking that DEI promoted, we will continue ceding ground to the right. The need to discuss race and identity remains vital, but it must be done in a way that opens space for complexity rather than reinforcing the very constructs that uphold division.
DEI’s fatal flaw is that it traps itself in a closed loop. It rightly argues that race is a historical construct—a tool of power designed to enforce hierarchy. Yet instead of pushing beyond this construct, it reinforces race as fixed and immutable. The result is an ideological contradiction: Race is framed as an arbitrary invention, yet treated as an unchanging, permanent reality.
James Baldwin exposed the hollowness of racial constructs decades ago. In “On Being ‘White’… and Other Lies,” he wrote: “The crisis of leadership in the white community is remarkable—and terrifying—because there is, in fact, no white community.”
Baldwin understood that whiteness, like all racial identities, was not a biological or cultural fact but a political invention—a shifting construct designed to serve power. Yet DEI never seriously engaged with this idea. It simply replaced one rigid racial hierarchy with another, treating whiteness as an unchanging position of privilege while treating other racial identities as fixed sites of oppression.
This rigidity meant that DEI operated as a closed system, reasserting racial categories rather than interrogating them. It failed to engage with race as a lived, historically contingent process—one shaped by history, class, and material conditions.
By doing this, DEI alienated people across the political spectrum. Many white people, even those who consider themselves progressive, felt that DEI erased any meaningful discussion of economic struggle or historical complexity within whiteness.
Meanwhile, many people of color found DEI’s racial framework superficial—offering corporate-friendly language about inclusion while doing little to address material inequalities. The framework functioned as a kind of racial accounting system, but it lacked a clear political vision for building solidarity.
Sheena Mason, a scholar of racial theory, has articulated the deeper flaw in this approach: “To undo racism, we have to undo our belief in race.”
This insight is crucial. If race itself is a construct designed to justify social stratification, then maintaining race as a primary framework for addressing inequality only reinforces the divisions we claim to want to overcome. Yet DEI never suggested dismantling the concept of race—it only sought to redistribute power within its existing framework.
This was a fatal mistake. Modern genetic science has definitively debunked the biological basis of race. There is more genetic diversity within so-called racial groups than between them. The racial categories that shape our politics and institutions are historical inventions, not natural facts.
Yet DEI, instead of leveraging this knowledge to transcend racial essentialism, entrenches race as the defining lens for justice. This approach not only deepens social division but also makes the left vulnerable to the right’s attacks.
By insisting on the permanence of racial categories, DEI created an ideological framework that could be easily caricatured as divisive and exclusionary—giving conservatives an easy target while failing to deliver meaningful change.
Racial discourse often eclipses broader discussions of material conditions, making it harder to address economic inequality in a meaningful way.
Patricia Hill Collins, a foundational thinker in intersectional theory, has observed that, “Race operates as such an overriding feature of African-American experience in the United States that it not only overshadows economic class relations for Blacks but obscures the significance of economic class within the United States in general.”
DEI’s fixation on race, detached from material conditions, contributed to this very problem. By prioritizing racial categorization over economic struggle, it often obscured the broader systems of inequality that shape American life.
This not only made class politics more difficult to articulate but also allowed racial identity to become a stand-in for structural critique—reinforcing an identity-based framework that often benefited elites more than the working class.
With DEI collapsing, the question becomes: What comes next? The right hopes this marks the end of racial discourse altogether. That cannot happen. Structural racism, economic exclusion, and historical injustice are still deeply embedded in American life. Ignoring the function of racism and racial categories plays into the hands of those who want to maintain both racial and economic inequality.
But we cannot simply replace DEI with another rigid, prepackaged framework that reproduces the same mistakes. If we want to build a politics that actually addresses racial injustice, we need an approach that is dynamic rather than static—one that acknowledges history without being trapped by it.
This means recognizing that racial categories are not timeless truths but historical constructions that have been shaped by economic, political, and social forces. It means rejecting the idea that people are permanently locked into racial identities that define their entire experience. And it means moving beyond an approach that focuses primarily on representation and inclusion toward one that addresses material conditions to redistribute power.
DEI’s failure provides an opportunity for the left to rethink how it engages with race and identity. We need to stop seeing race as an unchanging structure and start understanding it as something that can be transformed. Morgan Freeman put it bluntly in an interview, stating, “I don’t want a Black History Month. Black history is American history.”
This is the kind of shift we need—one that integrates historical understanding rather than segregates it, one that moves past “race”—which we know doesn't exist—as a fixed identity category toward a broader, more holistic vision of justice.
The goal should not be to replace DEI with another top-down, bureaucratic approach, but to build a new paradigm that is open, flexible, and capable of fostering real solidarity.
If the left fails to do this, it will keep losing to the right. And if that happens, the backlash against DEI will not just be the end of a flawed initiative—it will be a major setback for the broader struggle for justice and equality.
How Would Gandhi Have Faced Down Trump?
Whatever injustices, cruelties, and evils you seek to end, Gandhi’s life and message are worth studying and emulating.
Feb 22, 2025
On Inauguration Day, I was flying home from India, where I had attended Gandhi 3.0, a retreat that brought together 40 people from around the world to explore how Gandhian principles can be meaningful in today's world. I returned to the U.S. just as my country was erupting in turmoil.
My emotions were all over the place. Having just experienced the most heart-expanding nine days of my life, where I witnessed the most extraordinary acts of generosity and heard some of the wisest of voices, I felt strangely grounded with a deep sense of love for, well, everyone. But I was also aghast, frightened for so many, and startled by those who were delighted by the sledgehammer upheavals, the head-spinning international proclamations, and the unconstitutional decrees.
I certainly understand the desire to upend “the system”—something I’ve been trying to do with multiple unjust, unsustainable, and inhumane systems my entire adult life—but what was unfolding was inchoate, cruel, and chaotic destruction rather than carefully considered interventions that would reduce waste and corruption.
What could Gandhi teach me and us?
Like Gandhi, ask yourself how you can tend your time carefully knowing that ineffective—and potentially destructive—efforts will waste your precious energy and could also backfire.
Studying Gandhi helps me put my country into perspective. Gandhi spent decades endeavoring to free his country from British rule using only nonviolent methods. He worked to end the evil of untouchability embedded in India’s caste system. He led a movement toward Indian self-reliance. And all along the way he made inner work—the cultivation of love and wisdom; inquiry, introspection, and integrity; and meditation—foundational to everything he did.
Gandhi once said:
I hold myself incapable of hating any being on Earth. By a long course of prayerful discipline, I have ceased for over 40 years to hate anybody. I know this is a big claim. Nevertheless, I make it in all humility. But I can and do hate evil wherever it exists. I hate the systems of government that the British people have set up in India. I hate the ruthless exploitation of India even as I hate from the bottom of my heart the hideous system of untouchability for which millions of Hindus have made themselves responsible. But I do not hate the domineering Englishmen as I refuse to hate the domineering Hindus. I seek to reform them in all the loving ways that are open to me. My noncooperation has its roots not in hatred, but in love.
I posted this quote shortly after my return to the U.S., and a friend commented: “Waiting for your solution? Do we just be still without any action to what is happening in this country?”
Gandhi would hardly want us to keep still. After all, he worked tirelessly. He also worked strategically, wisely, and forcefully, with force embedded in his guiding principle of satyagraha, often translated as “nonviolent resistance.” But satyagraha means so much more than this. The word combines satya, meaning truth, and agraha, meaning insistence, firmness, and adherence. In other words, Gandhi’s force for change was an unshakeable commitment to opposing injustice with truth. And truth for Gandhi meant never doing evil to combat evil; never using violence to oppose violence; and never succumbing to hate to resist hate. It meant no less than living, acting, and teaching with an abiding core of love.
Gandhi is famous for responding to a reporter’s question about his message by jotting down, “My life is my message.” Those five words aren’t just one man’s story. They represent a universal truth. Each of our lives is our message. The question thus becomes: Am I modeling the message I most want to convey?
None of us is or will be Gandhi. Nor will we have the megaphone to the world that he came to have through the power of his character, his resolve, and his at the time unique nonviolent approach to resistance. If you or I declared, as Gandhi did on several occasions, that we were fasting until and unless violence among our citizenry ended, we would surely die of starvation, and that violence would persist after we were gone. But that doesn’t mean that Gandhian principles have nothing to teach us today. They absolutely do.
Here are Gandhian teachings I am taking to heart right now:
- Avoid rash acts and angry outbursts; these will not bring about any positive change.
- Learn from the changemakers who have brought about greater peace and justice and built more compassionate, sustainable systems against all odds.
- Embrace satyagraha, recognizing that this requires cultivating the inner resolve to continually pursue justice through nonviolent, loving means.
- Work toward systemic change, understanding that this takes profound dedication, deep thinking, careful strategizing, and patience.
- Do the inner work as tirelessly as the outer work to achieve all of the above.
If you were hoping for more specific strategies to address your current concerns, this may be a disappointing list, but let’s not forget that most people across the political spectrum care about others and want a future where their fellow citizens can thrive. Rather than consider those with different political views one’s enemies, we can perceive them as fellow participants and even potential friends with whom we can communicate, and maybe collaborate, as we identify better ways forward upon which we can agree.
Gandhi devoted years to readying himself and his followers for nonviolent resistance. He spent nearly two decades in preparation for the Salt March that led to India’s independence. Just ponder that as you consider the role you will play in achieving your vision for a sustainable, peaceful, just world.
Please don’t interpret this as meaning that we should only cultivate inner strength and love, or that we should do nothing now other than plan and strategize for an indefinite future. Rather, like Gandhi, ask yourself how you can tend your time carefully knowing that ineffective—and potentially destructive—efforts will waste your precious energy and could also backfire.
Whatever injustices, cruelties, and evils you seek to end, Gandhi’s life and message are worth studying and emulating. He demonstrated that satyagraha is not only a profound strategy; it is fueled by the most powerful of human capacities: love. Given that Gandhi was perhaps the greatest changemaker in history, it’s worth deeply considering his approach as a model for today’s world. And lest we think we somehow need to dispense with our anger to follow in Gandhi’s footsteps, he also said this:
“I have learnt through bitter experience the one supreme lesson to conserve my anger, and as heat conserved is transmuted into energy, even so our anger controlled can be transmuted into a power which can move the world.”
We the People Face the Abandonment of America's Foundational Principles
Are we ready to defend our ideals, or have we lost interest in distinguishing virtue from vice and public good from private greed?
Feb 05, 2025
Misattributed quotes and next-level gaslighting aside, we find ourselves yet again at a crossroads in time—a moment demanding serious reflection on the foundational principles that shaped our republic. This is not hyperbole.
For far too many years, most of what we have been willing to believe contradicts the ideals of the figures said to be revered by those we have entrusted with our government.
As to misattributed quotes, we could jump right in with Thomas Jefferson's actual words regarding our shared principles, but let's first reflect on the insights of his revolutionary compatriot turned bitter political rival, John Adams. In a letter dated April 16, 1776—less than three months before the signing of the Declaration of Independence—Adams shared this wisdom:
Public Virtue cannot exist in a Nation without private, and public Virtue is the only Foundation of Republics.
Now, recognizing that those working to recreate our nation—in their own oh-so-very perfect image—may not favor the Federalist Adams, our indispensable second president, let us fast forward some 140 years to Theodore Roosevelt. "Teddy" Roosevelt, a man well-versed in the ideas of our Founding Fathers and our foundational principles, had this to say in a letter dated January 1917:
Americanism means the virtues of courage, honor, justice, truth, sincerity, and hardihood—the virtues that made America. The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety first instead of duty first, the love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of life.
The focus on virtue as the foundation of national character contrasts sharply with the narrative we have been fed by those who, in reality, promote "the things that will destroy America." God only knows why we, the people, have been so accepting of their manipulative tactics instead of insisting upon promoting "the virtues that made America." Regardless, we have once again set ourselves up to watch as policies that overwhelmingly benefit a growing cadre of super-rich are implemented.
Yes, they will fuel their economic fire sufficiently so that some of us will enjoy a few crumbs. But regardless of their justifications, the harsh realities facing the shrinking middle class and the most vulnerable will be disregarded. They'll tell us that our best way forward is to be dragged down some technological path by today's Monied Interests, feeding us an amped-up version of the same greed-driven trickle-down bullshit that we've willfully consumed for nearly half a century. And for good measure, they will, this time, destroy as many ballasts of good governance as they possibly can. Then, their blaze will exhaust itself—leaving behind a stunning path of destruction. Never mind the damage done.
We the People should by now recognize their ways.
Let's now acknowledge that many of our antagonists today would prefer that we conclude this essay with the Anti-Federalist Jefferson's 1801 Inaugural Address, wherein he listed his governing principles and said, "These principles form the bright constellation, which has gone before us and guided our steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages, and blood of our heroes have been devoted to their attainment..." However, it seems anything but likely that those currently at the helm of government are willing to acknowledge this in context.
For example, we are far removed from Jefferson's agrarian society, our need for a standing army is without question, and the Monied Interests have evolved beyond anything Jefferson could have imagined. So, we'll conclude, in a moment, with another example of Jeffersonian wisdom. Nonetheless, here's an abbreviated look at Thomas Jefferson's "bright constellation":
- "Equal and exact justice to all…
- Peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations…
- The support of the state governments in all their rights…
- The preservation of the General government in its whole constitutional vigor…
- Absolute acquiescence in the decisions of the majority…
- A well-disciplined militia…
- The supremacy of the civil over the military authority…
- Economy in the public expence…
- The honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith…
- Encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid…
- The diffusion of information, and arraignment of all abuses…
- Freedom of religion; freedom of the press; and freedom of person…
- and trial by juries impartially selected."
To close, let's turn to the wisdom of an aging Jefferson, as he penned in an 1819 letter:
Of Liberty then I would say that, in the whole plenitude of its extent, it is unobstructed action according to our will: but rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will, within the limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add "within the limits of the law"; because law is often but the tyrant's will, and always so when it violates the right of an individual.
We may not yet fully realize it, but we are literally in the process of deliberating (for lack of a better term) our foundational principles, and the chaos to come is going to test our commitment to Jefferson's Rightful Liberty—our foremost foundational principle of liberty and justice for all. We will soon know if we, as a nation, will continue our pursuit of a more perfect union.
The good news is that we, individually and collectively, get to decide which path we will pursue. The choice is ours.
Are we ready to defend our ideals, or have we lost interest in distinguishing virtue from vice and public good from private greed? Are we really to be remembered as the ones who abandoned America's Foundational Principles?
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