Does anyone else cringe at the word "diversity"?

[SunniDelite]

I had this email from someone on Crowdfunder...
"I am raising funds for the Lenny Henry Centre for Media Diversity at Birmingham City University.
In the last year, the centre has revealed the racism and prejudice actors face when they go auditions and, for the first time, exposed the lack of gender diversity of sound recordists. We're now building programmes to address this problem. So far, our research has highlighted specific problems for disabled people working in the industry and created more job opportunities for Black people behind the camera. Additionally, we are working with major broadcasters to change how they report on race, gender and disability."
I have no problem with the race and disability part, but what on earth does "lack of gender diversity of sound recordists" mean? That there aren't enough women? or that there aren't enough blue-hairs who can't decide what they are? or there aren't enough transwomen?
It's come to a point where I'm suspicious that any organisation that mentions diversity is a TRA, even if they're talking about hedgehog populations! :)

I always thought intersectionality was about the intersection of discrimination of black women. Does it now mean intersection of any protected characteristic?

Yes, race, and to a lesser extent class, poverty was the original meaning (as I understand it). Now when people talk about 'intersectional' feminism they almost always mean feminism that includes males.

cis women

Who are these "cis women"? What about the ones who are neither trans nor "cis"?

And it's a preoccupation with women's rights, actually, not "trans rights", considering this is the feminism board. Not sure what you expected to find on a feminism board?

My eyes also roll when I hear diversity as it just seems to mean T and Q. I actually got asked to join the EDI group after 8 made some complaint at work. I did join to be someone on the inside and where I can speak up for women I do.

Yes.

Absolute shit show. The whole DEI concept is.

It makes me cringe. It’s a real shame because I think it’s an incredibly important area and I do think most people are willing to help and change and learn more. But it’s such a turn off when it’s oversold, lopsided, something every week at work, clearly not a priority etc.

D&I is such a fragile ecosystem because as soon as you help one group you unintentionally upset another or you have the others wanting similar attention.

My workplace is obsessed with diversity and what they mean is 'we need more token Black and Asian people working here'. What frustrates me is that we already have a diverse work force in terms of age, class, background, levels of education and previous employment experience and they don't appreciate, celebrate or make use of this diversity in any way. The nature of the profession (public sector, non-profit, relatively low paid but still very competitive) means that most of the senior management team are women but they are without exception white, highly educated and middle class.

I have been mispronouncing it as Divicity so have decided forthwith to stick with Divicity and Exclusion.

At a meeting recently a female colleague from an ethnic minority was berated by a white male about his perception of the organisation's lack of diversity.

A big problem with identity politics is it rarely takes class into account.

“JellySaurus

'Diversity' is one of those words which have a clear meaning, but have been misappropriated to mean whatever the loudest shouters want them to mean.

Other words misappropriated this way include

^Intersectional
Kind
Harmless
-phobia^

and, of course,

Woman.“

And appeal court judges in Scotland have just decided that sex can mean gender ( which can mean trans gender) on the 2022 Census

I cringe at
Diversity
LGBTQ+ especially ‘an LGBTQ+ person’
and ‘the LGBTQ+ community’
Intersectionality
Phobe - used to make someone feel guilty and be quiet
Hate which is now losing meaning

My heart sinks when I see it these days too, because I know a wad of unmitigated shit is about to drop.

The problems being, one, that the diversity champion types seem to have a very narrow view of what counts as diversity and in some cases don't even seem to be aware of what kinds of diversity are missing. In an organization. I can go into a company or organization and they will be full of race or gender or sexual diversity, but they all have the same politics, the same religion, the same class background, all grew up in urban environments.

But what's worse is that they only seem to recognize one very narrow type of thinking about diversity initiatives, all based around identity. And somehow the only diverse voices they bring forward are the ones with the "correct" politics.

I read the D&I stuff from the very large form that someone I know works at. It was all about gender and stonewall points.

Similarly, a "cameraman" is someone with skill and judgement who uses his/her/their experience and artistic ability to add to the effect of the production. A "Camera operator" is a skivvy.

What a complete load of bollocks.

@FrecklesMalone

I imagine you are white, straight and not disabled. For me diversity means a lot more than the single issue. In most places of work it is relevant still because 99% of my managers have been white and not disabled.

I'm disabled. Diversity rarely means anything to improve the lives or the representation of disabled people. I really do cringe at the word.

Diversity seems to mean how many of a specific group there are. So a highly diverse school would be one with 99% of students from India, and a highly diverse civil servant department would be one with a lot of transwomen. And a group of people with neurodiversity means they are all autistic. The last thing it actually seems to mean is diversity!

I cringe at...
*LGBTQ+ especially ‘an LGBTQ+ person’
*and ‘the LGBTQ+ community’

I wonder how many Lesbian women feel that they are part of the Trans community?

And BAME/BIPOC - especially a BAME person.

I'm a woman from a Minority Ethnic group, but I am not Black and I am not Asian. The challenges we face and the racism we experience are totally different.

It is lazy language. And really undiverse to lump groups of people together this way purely because they experience some form of vaguely related discrimination. Not sure how you would word it differently, though, without making every statement into a long, convoluted word-salad. Maybe not try to reduce everything into a pithy soundbite.

@JellySaurus

I cringe at... *LGBTQ+ especially ‘an LGBTQ+ person’ *and ‘the LGBTQ+ community’

I wonder how many Lesbian women feel that they are part of the Trans community?

And BAME/BIPOC - especially a BAME person.

I'm a woman from a Minority Ethnic group, but I am not Black and I am not Asian. The challenges we face and the racism we experience are totally different.

It is lazy language. And really undiverse to lump groups of people together this way purely because they experience some form of vaguely related discrimination. Not sure how you would word it differently, though, without making every statement into a long, convoluted word-salad. Maybe not try to reduce everything into a pithy soundbite.

I think you would have to just talk about the problems and needs of specific groups within a specific context. Which is generally a good idea anyway because otherwise there is a significant tendency to resort to meaningless generalizations with no actionable elements.

There was an interesting thing a few weeks ago (or maybe longer) by Andrew Sullivan touching on this, on the desire to group disparate people together with the term "black and brown" people. He suggested it's in part related to the fact that in the US the demographic realities are so changed that there are various groups whose interests are not all the same. Which makes trying to talk about policy initiatives a lot more complicated if you are trying to push a certain perspective as good for minorities. Hence trying to get people used to thinking about all these different groups as somehow part of one thing.

I'm not big on conspiracy theories but it does seem like there is an effort to simplify the narrative to better suit certain people.

It's richly ironic how certain forms of disadvantage are privileged over other, less fashionable disadvantages.

@louderthan

My workplace is obsessed with diversity and what they mean is 'we need more token Black and Asian people working here'. What frustrates me is that we already have a diverse work force in terms of age, class, background, levels of education and previous employment experience and they don't appreciate, celebrate or make use of this diversity in any way. The nature of the profession (public sector, non-profit, relatively low paid but still very competitive) means that most of the senior management team are women but they are without exception white, highly educated and middle class.

DFOD with your token. BAME people are always accused of taking over or token representation. Maybe, they are just best for the job

One of the very unforunate things about some diversity schemes is that even when members of their targets groups are hired are absolutely the best people for the job, others are not sure. Sometimes the person hired is not sure.

Whenever I read the word “inclusive” (like I just did in the What’s On Stage Awards’ statement regarding changing the title of their awards to “performer in a male/female identifying role”) there is a little voice inside my head that just says oh, fuck off…

I'm not big on conspiracy theories but it does seem like there is an effort to simplify the narrative to better suit certain people.

And not necessarily the people the narrative is claimed to suit.

@AngeloMysterioso

Whenever I read the word “inclusive” (like I just did in the What’s On Stage Awards’ statement regarding changing the title of their awards to “performer in a male/female identifying role”) there is a little voice inside my head that just says oh, fuck off…

Are you me?