This is absolutely not a myth. I have been personally directed by recruiters to discriminate on the he basis of race and gender. And two of the three companies

This is absolutely not a myth. I have been personally directed by recruiters to discriminate on the he basis of race and gender. And two of the three companies I've worked at set explicit quotas on the basis of gender. While there are companies where DEI isn't a dog whistle for racial and gender discrimination, they're the minority in my experience.