OPINION:
Last week, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson was confirmed as the next associate justice of the Supreme Court. For the establishment media, two things alone were relevant: Judge Jackson is Black and a woman.
It didn’t matter that Judge Jackson refused to define the word “woman” (in furtherance of gender ideology), said she had no opinion on whether individuals had natural rights and showed pronounced sympathy for those convicted of possessing child pornography.
All fell before the great god diversity — to which we all must do homage. From politics to culture to national security, diversity reigns supreme.
In California, the week before, a superior court judge struck down a law that would have mandated quotas on the boards of directors of publicly traded companies based in the state. At least one board member would have had to come from a racial or sexual “underrepresented community.” The diversity crowd’s latest cliche.
In another slap in the face to individual achievement, starting at the 96th annual Oscars in 2024, a movie will not be considered for Best Picture unless it meets two of four diversity criteria. Among them: At least one actor from a minority must be in a “significant role.”
A story must center on one of the underrepresented. And 30% of the cast must have a group identity. Another reason for Middle America to boycott both the box office and the Oscars.
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chair Gen. Mark Miley thinks diversity makes us stronger. John Kirby, spokesperson for Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, says it’s important for the military “to look like the country it serves.” While our enemies develop new weapons systems, we look to fill quotas.
If you’re wounded in battle, do you really care about the race or pronoun preference of the soldier who carries you to safety?
Diversity is a one-way street that only runs left. How often have you heard a university president say: “Our faculty should look like the nation we serve. Damn it, we need to start hiring conservatives and libertarians.”
Graduation speakers reflect academia’s commitment to conformity.
It’s hard to remember the last time an Ivy League institution had a conservative speaker. Speakers on the left are always in high demand. Transgender icon Dr. “Rachel” Levine is this year’s commencement speaker at Yale, while Dr. Anthony Fauci will deliver the commencement speech at Princeton. (I hope the graduates maintain proper social distancing.) Conservative speakers are relegated to a handful of independent and Christian colleges.
Academia is an echo chamber. According to the National Association of Scholars, on college faculties, Democrats have a 9 to 1 advantage over Republicans. Undergrads are as likely to encounter conservative ideas on the average campus as Iranians are to get objective critiques of Islam.
When I worked for the Boston Herald, an editor once bragged about the number of Black and Hispanic reporters the paper had hired. When I asked him how many conservatives there were in the newsroom, he stared at me like I had two heads. Don’t hold your breath waiting for diversity in the media.
The diversity drive is a fraud. It’s a way to get us to think about irrelevant characteristics (like race and gender) and ignore achievements and ideas. In the case of Judge Jackson, the establishment didn’t want us to look at her record and the ideology she represents and instead made being Black and a woman the exclusive focus.
Does it matter that Black athletes dominate professional sports or that Jews (who are 0.19% of the world population) are 20% of Nobel laureates, or that Asian Americans (5% of the U.S. population) were 22% of Harvard’s freshman class in 2017? Our focus should be on the absence of barriers, not racial bean-counting.
A free society values individual achievement. Cultural Marxism, which has our nation in a death grip, wants to reduce us to squabbling tribes fighting over spoils. If you call for help, do you tell the 911-operator, “Oh, and be sure the police officer you send to save my life is a member of an underrepresented community”?
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas does not add luster to the Supreme Court because he’s Black, male or Catholic, but because he’s brilliant and dedicated to the clear language of the Constitution — everything Judge Jackson is not.
Whenever you hear words like “underrepresented community” or a demand for something that “looks like America,” it means the dam broke, the diversity tango is playing and individual merit is about to drown in a sea of “woke” cliches.
• Don Feder is a former Boston Herald writer and syndicated columnist.
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