This is a challenging subject, but there’s a lot of valid criticism of DEI efforts of many large companies. For one, these programs tend to be led by teams tha

This is a challenging subject, but there’s a lot of valid criticism of DEI efforts of many large companies. For one, these programs tend to be led by teams that are, ironically, not very diverse. They tend to focus too much on box checking while ignoring broad swaths of underrepresented populations. “Asia” is a big complex region of the world with those from this region often very underrepresented in the US and subjected to discrimination. However many DEI programs fail to recognize those from this region as underrepresented and the whole lumping everyone under the generic label of “Asian” is itself painting with a very broad brush that’s insensitive to all the nuanced cultures in this region. They also tend to push messaging that is not broadly accepted, even by the communities they claim to be helping. For example DEI had a big push on saying the word “Latino” was offensive and insisted people must say “Latinx.” Many Lantinos in companies were outraged and pointed out that in fact this concept of “Latinx” can in fact be extremely offensive to those it’s attempting to describe. For one, it’s suggesting that a gendered language is somehow inferior and must be corrected. As the OP indicates, putting people up in a pedestal when someone that checks a desired box is hired also diminishes that person. It sends the message that they’re hired and celebrated in part to check the box vs the skills they bring to the team. The above is all complicated that people are terrified to discuss these matters because of their sensitive nature. Rather that creating an inclusive environment to discuss these issues DEI programs more frequently establish a culture of indoctrination into the thinking of a few (such as the Latinx example above). In short, DEI programs have a lot of self-reflection to do and need to be more aware that many of the efforts so far have caused more harm than good.