5 ms·

DEI departments and projects have a fervor to them that is near religious: the core tenets are faith based and impossible to challenge scientifically. Challeng

DEI departments and projects have a fervor to them that is near religious: the core tenets are faith based and impossible to challenge scientifically. Challenge any DEI tenet and your are immediately met with threats of excommunication. Get in line or you're out. The thing is DEI efforts oftentimes mask comical understanding of history and blindingly gross racism. Personal anecdote: How do you deal with people who proudly wear "Antiracist" t-shirts, but will quickly tell you Asians are opportunity hoarders who must hate their kids because they focus too much on academics. Or how do you explain indentured servitude, wars and famine have been commonplace all through history.

tristor 4y ago
> Challenge any DEI tenet and your are immediately met with threats of excommunication. Get in line or you're out. The one that continually upsets me (as someone who grew up in a predominantly Hispanic community, is married to a Hispanic person, has Hispanic children, and speaks Spanish as a fluent second language and in the home) is the use of the term "LatinX" which has spread through the DEI community and now general HR. I, a white man, despite my involvement in Latin culture cannot push back against this offensive term, which is quite literally colonialistic with white people from other countries (mostly Americans) telling Latin PoC globally what the appropriate term is to self-identify with. I've attempted to do so, and it's gotten me in trouble, despite the truth and cultural basis of my arguments. DEI would be questionable but not objectionable if it only pushed actual factual truth, but because it's mostly subjective ideological zealotry, it's incredibly objectionable, and actually racist, more racist than those who are in opposition to it, but seems to have been granted a monopoly on determining what is and isn't racist or unacceptable by the Western elites.
- gowld 4y ago
  https://www.ketv.com/article/omaha-latinx-organizations-share-hopes-for-futuro-latino-fund/42720767 https://www.ketv.com/article/omaha-latinx-organizations-shar... > "Latinx organizations share hopes for Futuro Latino Fund" > The grant is meant for nonprofits and organizations that help support Latinx communities. > Garcia said Latinx people understanding their history is important for community development. > "As Chicanos, as we grew up understanding that America, the United States of America, era nuestra casa, we became interested and connected to American history," he said. > A lot of Latinos would love to be baseball,
- poszlem 4y ago
  That's because the idea there is not to "be inclusive". The idea is to create a complicated set of rules that can be used to promote people you like and demote people you don't like. This is what happened in many colleges. 1. Certain job listings mandate adherence to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) principles. 2. Candidates with the strongest understanding of DEI typically come from privileged backgrounds, such as private K-12 schools and Ivy League universities, and tend to be white. 3. These applicants are able to "out-perform" other applicants in terms of DEI understanding. 4. As a result, the faculty continues to be predominantly white and wealthy. 5. Profit.
- brodouevencode 4y ago
  Tell them you identify as Latino?
  - tristor 4y ago
    I don't, though. And I see no point in any such gamesmanship. I'm a white man with Turkish and Scottish heritages, born in middle US, and am not Latino or Hispanic by birth, only by association in later life. While I participate in the culture, I am not of the culture, and would never claim to be. I have my own culture, which I also participate in and claim. This, in fact, is one of the major difficulties with DEI. My identity has no bearing on the truth or falsity of my words, my observations, or my statements. It is simply the truth that "LatinX" does not work in the Spanish language, it's effectively unpronounceable, and it is directly targeting a language feature from the perspective of English speakers as applied to a another language, which means that in so many ways it is insulting, offensive, and colonialistic. It should not require one to identify as Hispanic or Latino to say this (or to be aware of it). It feels intentionally racist, because anyone who purports to be representing the ideal of helping this community should surely be aware of such basic things about Hispanic culture and the Spanish language.
    - dorchadas 4y ago
      It's worse in minority languages, where the whole movement has been co-opted by well-meaning learners, who happen to share the nationality of the group who speaks the language natively and has kept it alive, calling native speakers bigots for stating their language doesn't work like English and to quit trying to translate English into it directly. Not to mention all the other classism issues that said natives face at the hands of non-native learners/speakers, including accent discrimination when the others literally only use English phonemes. And I'm not part of that language's native speaker group, I just recognise they should probably be included in stuff said about it, and try to respect what native speakers say, even if it's not how English works.
- taylodl 4y ago
  It's sad how many Americans don't realize how many white people live in Latin America - they've lived all their lives in Latin America and their families have been in Latin America for centuries. We definitely have a stereotype for those living in Latin America. That and not everybody in Latin America speaks Spanish, either. But hey, I'm a white guy! What do I know about other people and cultures?!
  - testfoobar 4y ago
    I have an Argentinian friend. Brilliant guy with a lovely family. He has a senior level big tech job. Vacations around the world with his family. Drives fancy cars. Currently building a beautiful new home. He is also fair skinned, blonde and blue eyed - as is his family. He objectively looks "white". Why does it matter? Because in the current DEI world, he and his children can mark "Hispanic" or "Latino" on all forms (I may be wrong here on whether it is both). His children will therefore benefit from many advantages granted by DEI benefactors. Lost in this crazy DEI calculus is that this is a wealthy family.
    - filoleg 4y ago
      Everyone who doesn't align with the "stereotypes" assigned to each group by the DEI bible gets affected disproportionally in really weird ways. Your friend is one of those cases. I am not blaming him or his kids for utilizing the current situation to their advantage, and I don't feel particularly bad about someone getting a lucky hand and playing it well either. Good for him and his kids. But on the flipside, imagine being an asian-american kid coming from a poor family. Not only you get disadvantaged by the financial situation in your household, you then get screwed over by the DEI initiatives on top of that. Too bad, kid, shoulda aligned with the "stereotypes" assigned to your group by DEI better and had well-earning and educated parents. And given how DEI policy supporters often use the "it is for the greater good as a society" argument, it feels doubly dirty and insulting to those individuals. Even the factual outcomes and effects of such policies aside, officially assigning those "economic stereotypes" to various ethnic groups and treating individual people in those groups based on those "stereotypes" (derived from the aggregate data for that group) just feels icky.
- davelpz 4y ago
  As a Hispanic PoC person, I agree 100% with you about LatinX. It's the result of white people with a high school understanding of Spanish trying to fix a language they really don't understand. The Spanish language is not broken and does not need to be fixed.
  - gowld 4y ago
    High School Spanish teaches gender quite clearly. It's a major aspect of education, since it's the biggest difference from English. > The Spanish language is not broken and does not need to be fixed. Latinx is an English word. English words are not necesarily gendered, and English linguistic culture has evolved away from gendered nouns. "Latine" is better for English, though. https://theconversation.com/stop-using-latinx-if-you-really-want-to-be-inclusive-189358 https://theconversation.com/stop-using-latinx-if-you-really-...
  - readthenotes1 4y ago
    Not broken? La mano??? Seriously, I would be surprised if there is not a broken spoken language. English is completely messed up. I don't know how anyone learns it.
    - stemlord 4y ago
      I was going to say. Americans should be focused on fixing English first. Lol.
      - readthenotes1 4y ago
        Even if the English were to fix English, Americans would still reject the changes.
        stemlord 4y ago
        Lol, probably.
  - nunez 4y ago
- gamblor956 4y ago
  I don't know any Latinos who actually use the term "Latinx." Spanish is an inherently gendered language; using the term "Latinx" is perceived by most as an attack on their culture. If LGBTQ+ people want to use the term Latinx to refer to themselves, that's fine. But they don't get to make that decision for the 98% who are fine with "Latino" or "Latina."
  - tristor 4y ago
    The objection I've heard from friends and family is less about any desire to protect the gendered expression of words in Spanish, and more about the fact that LatinX is explicitly and obtusely violating language rules and is effectively unpronounceable. It uses English-specific visual and pronunciation expectations and applies them to another language. There is already an established way to make this term non-gendered, either drop the gender suffix entirely Latin, or make it explicit by using Latine. Both are which are existing words in Spanish with an established meaning. Rather than use this, activists in the US decided to demand 640 million people change their language to appease those who don't even understand their language.
  - carlosbaraza 4y ago
    There is still quite a bit of controversy around the inclusive non-gendered form, because it is non-standard and not approved by the Real Academia Española (rae.es). In Spain, where I come from, the most common non-gendered form is to use the suffix -e, instead of -a or -o. However, in practice, this is mostly use by the LGBTQ+ community and not the general public. It will take a while (if ever) to spread around society. IMO, genders on objects without a sex are just non sensical and a legacy product of Roman Latin evolution. A simple -e suffix could potentially fix this, but it's incredibly hard to change without a generational change, cause language and habits are sticky. However if you are triggered by a table being female gendered or a car being male gendered, maybe you are overthinking it. When it comes to human related words, another potential approach is to always use the female form, because you refer to the word person (la persona) and not the particular gender of the individual in question. This applies to groups too, the rule in Spanish is that if a group has females and males, you should use the "male" plural form. Why not just use the female form and everyone is happy? Just remark that this is a hot topic and conservative and older people usually oppose this aggressively and openly. New generations understand the arbitrary split of society in two based on the presence of a penis more intrinsically though.
ding_dang 4y ago
You fire them?
- tristor 4y ago
  Unfortunately the people who can make these decisions (HR) are fully members of the DEI cult, and would never fire their allies.
brodouevencode 4y ago
> How do you deal with people who proudly wear "Antiracist" t-shirts, but will quickly tell you Asians are opportunity hoarders who must hate their kids because they focus too much on academics. That sounds pretty bigoted, so make a complaint to HR. Putting on a 49ers jersey doesn't make me a true fan.

tristor 4y ago

> Challenge any DEI tenet and your are immediately met with threats of excommunication. Get in line or you're out. The one that continually upsets me (as someone who grew up in a predominantly Hispanic community, is married to a Hispanic person, has Hispanic children, and speaks Spanish as a fluent second language and in the home) is the use of the term "LatinX" which has spread through the DEI community and now general HR. I, a white man, despite my involvement in Latin culture cannot push back against this offensive term, which is quite literally colonialistic with white people from other countries (mostly Americans) telling Latin PoC globally what the appropriate term is to self-identify with. I've attempted to do so, and it's gotten me in trouble, despite the truth and cultural basis of my arguments. DEI would be questionable but not objectionable if it only pushed actual factual truth, but because it's mostly subjective ideological zealotry, it's incredibly objectionable, and actually racist, more racist than those who are in opposition to it, but seems to have been granted a monopoly on determining what is and isn't racist or unacceptable by the Western elites.

gowld 4y ago
https://www.ketv.com/article/omaha-latinx-organizations-share-hopes-for-futuro-latino-fund/42720767 https://www.ketv.com/article/omaha-latinx-organizations-shar... > "Latinx organizations share hopes for Futuro Latino Fund" > The grant is meant for nonprofits and organizations that help support Latinx communities. > Garcia said Latinx people understanding their history is important for community development. > "As Chicanos, as we grew up understanding that America, the United States of America, era nuestra casa, we became interested and connected to American history," he said. > A lot of Latinos would love to be baseball,
poszlem 4y ago
That's because the idea there is not to "be inclusive". The idea is to create a complicated set of rules that can be used to promote people you like and demote people you don't like. This is what happened in many colleges. 1. Certain job listings mandate adherence to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) principles. 2. Candidates with the strongest understanding of DEI typically come from privileged backgrounds, such as private K-12 schools and Ivy League universities, and tend to be white. 3. These applicants are able to "out-perform" other applicants in terms of DEI understanding. 4. As a result, the faculty continues to be predominantly white and wealthy. 5. Profit.
brodouevencode 4y ago
Tell them you identify as Latino?
- tristor 4y ago
  I don't, though. And I see no point in any such gamesmanship. I'm a white man with Turkish and Scottish heritages, born in middle US, and am not Latino or Hispanic by birth, only by association in later life. While I participate in the culture, I am not of the culture, and would never claim to be. I have my own culture, which I also participate in and claim. This, in fact, is one of the major difficulties with DEI. My identity has no bearing on the truth or falsity of my words, my observations, or my statements. It is simply the truth that "LatinX" does not work in the Spanish language, it's effectively unpronounceable, and it is directly targeting a language feature from the perspective of English speakers as applied to a another language, which means that in so many ways it is insulting, offensive, and colonialistic. It should not require one to identify as Hispanic or Latino to say this (or to be aware of it). It feels intentionally racist, because anyone who purports to be representing the ideal of helping this community should surely be aware of such basic things about Hispanic culture and the Spanish language.
  - dorchadas 4y ago
    It's worse in minority languages, where the whole movement has been co-opted by well-meaning learners, who happen to share the nationality of the group who speaks the language natively and has kept it alive, calling native speakers bigots for stating their language doesn't work like English and to quit trying to translate English into it directly. Not to mention all the other classism issues that said natives face at the hands of non-native learners/speakers, including accent discrimination when the others literally only use English phonemes. And I'm not part of that language's native speaker group, I just recognise they should probably be included in stuff said about it, and try to respect what native speakers say, even if it's not how English works.
taylodl 4y ago
It's sad how many Americans don't realize how many white people live in Latin America - they've lived all their lives in Latin America and their families have been in Latin America for centuries. We definitely have a stereotype for those living in Latin America. That and not everybody in Latin America speaks Spanish, either. But hey, I'm a white guy! What do I know about other people and cultures?!
- testfoobar 4y ago
  I have an Argentinian friend. Brilliant guy with a lovely family. He has a senior level big tech job. Vacations around the world with his family. Drives fancy cars. Currently building a beautiful new home. He is also fair skinned, blonde and blue eyed - as is his family. He objectively looks "white". Why does it matter? Because in the current DEI world, he and his children can mark "Hispanic" or "Latino" on all forms (I may be wrong here on whether it is both). His children will therefore benefit from many advantages granted by DEI benefactors. Lost in this crazy DEI calculus is that this is a wealthy family.
  - filoleg 4y ago
    Everyone who doesn't align with the "stereotypes" assigned to each group by the DEI bible gets affected disproportionally in really weird ways. Your friend is one of those cases. I am not blaming him or his kids for utilizing the current situation to their advantage, and I don't feel particularly bad about someone getting a lucky hand and playing it well either. Good for him and his kids. But on the flipside, imagine being an asian-american kid coming from a poor family. Not only you get disadvantaged by the financial situation in your household, you then get screwed over by the DEI initiatives on top of that. Too bad, kid, shoulda aligned with the "stereotypes" assigned to your group by DEI better and had well-earning and educated parents. And given how DEI policy supporters often use the "it is for the greater good as a society" argument, it feels doubly dirty and insulting to those individuals. Even the factual outcomes and effects of such policies aside, officially assigning those "economic stereotypes" to various ethnic groups and treating individual people in those groups based on those "stereotypes" (derived from the aggregate data for that group) just feels icky.
davelpz 4y ago
As a Hispanic PoC person, I agree 100% with you about LatinX. It's the result of white people with a high school understanding of Spanish trying to fix a language they really don't understand. The Spanish language is not broken and does not need to be fixed.
- gowld 4y ago
  High School Spanish teaches gender quite clearly. It's a major aspect of education, since it's the biggest difference from English. > The Spanish language is not broken and does not need to be fixed. Latinx is an English word. English words are not necesarily gendered, and English linguistic culture has evolved away from gendered nouns. "Latine" is better for English, though. https://theconversation.com/stop-using-latinx-if-you-really-want-to-be-inclusive-189358 https://theconversation.com/stop-using-latinx-if-you-really-...
- readthenotes1 4y ago
  Not broken? La mano??? Seriously, I would be surprised if there is not a broken spoken language. English is completely messed up. I don't know how anyone learns it.
  - stemlord 4y ago
    I was going to say. Americans should be focused on fixing English first. Lol.
    - readthenotes1 4y ago
      Even if the English were to fix English, Americans would still reject the changes.
      - stemlord 4y ago
        Lol, probably.
- nunez 4y ago
gamblor956 4y ago
I don't know any Latinos who actually use the term "Latinx." Spanish is an inherently gendered language; using the term "Latinx" is perceived by most as an attack on their culture. If LGBTQ+ people want to use the term Latinx to refer to themselves, that's fine. But they don't get to make that decision for the 98% who are fine with "Latino" or "Latina."
- tristor 4y ago
  The objection I've heard from friends and family is less about any desire to protect the gendered expression of words in Spanish, and more about the fact that LatinX is explicitly and obtusely violating language rules and is effectively unpronounceable. It uses English-specific visual and pronunciation expectations and applies them to another language. There is already an established way to make this term non-gendered, either drop the gender suffix entirely Latin, or make it explicit by using Latine. Both are which are existing words in Spanish with an established meaning. Rather than use this, activists in the US decided to demand 640 million people change their language to appease those who don't even understand their language.
- carlosbaraza 4y ago
  There is still quite a bit of controversy around the inclusive non-gendered form, because it is non-standard and not approved by the Real Academia Española (rae.es). In Spain, where I come from, the most common non-gendered form is to use the suffix -e, instead of -a or -o. However, in practice, this is mostly use by the LGBTQ+ community and not the general public. It will take a while (if ever) to spread around society. IMO, genders on objects without a sex are just non sensical and a legacy product of Roman Latin evolution. A simple -e suffix could potentially fix this, but it's incredibly hard to change without a generational change, cause language and habits are sticky. However if you are triggered by a table being female gendered or a car being male gendered, maybe you are overthinking it. When it comes to human related words, another potential approach is to always use the female form, because you refer to the word person (la persona) and not the particular gender of the individual in question. This applies to groups too, the rule in Spanish is that if a group has females and males, you should use the "male" plural form. Why not just use the female form and everyone is happy? Just remark that this is a hot topic and conservative and older people usually oppose this aggressively and openly. New generations understand the arbitrary split of society in two based on the presence of a penis more intrinsically though.

ding_dang 4y ago

You fire them?

tristor 4y ago
Unfortunately the people who can make these decisions (HR) are fully members of the DEI cult, and would never fire their allies.

brodouevencode 4y ago

> How do you deal with people who proudly wear "Antiracist" t-shirts, but will quickly tell you Asians are opportunity hoarders who must hate their kids because they focus too much on academics. That sounds pretty bigoted, so make a complaint to HR. Putting on a 49ers jersey doesn't make me a true fan.