
You’re right, but one thing I’d like to point out about nature of voting in a democracy (and this isn’t about immigration itself): voter turnout is never 100% for anything, and winners are often decided by a handful (local elections) or couple of thousands of votes (state, federal).
Do you think that if leftists completely dropped any support for DEI and CRT that their opponents would suddenly support programs that aggressively attack wealth inequality?
No, but US wealth inequality is going to worsen now because of the US Dept. of Education being gutted, which is worse than DEI going away. I think education and welfare programs will make easier policies for majority of voters to vote for. More of the US population is poor than a minority of some kind. The danger I was alarmed by (admittedly a knee jerk reaction) is that increasing polarization is going to be used by authoritarians to win and install their own preferred systems. Poverty reducing efforts like in the Nordic model will be popular, but also something some types of politicians cannot favor because of their prior party stance.
You’re right, that’s why Title VII and VIII were written to address those aspects
I meant politicians will abuse the intention of these policies to gain favor from poor white voters, and that nation state actors will cause polarization by highlighting the growing discontent in various ways.
I think policies in the Nordic model are more along those lines, tbh.
I am not angry about anything, and I didn’t look them up now, tbh. The issue I find is that well-meaning and useful policies are painted as something they’re not, or used by others to create polarization. So, my pov is that leftists and progressives are better off focusing on poverty alleviation. If minorities face generational wealth issues (they do) then poverty alleviation policies that don’t single them out in particular will be harder to attack by political opponents.
Okay, so about immigration I’ll just make this point, from another thread:
So, let’s say a democratic country favors pro-choice policies, but then has an influx of immigrants who are anti-abortion, and now that population is greater. That’s a change of values because the population shifted to a majority opinion which favors a different view point. If a country has an idealized view of how it wants to be, then I think it’s fair to expect immigrants to integrate and assimilate. I don’t think that has anything to do with xenophobia or not excluding different cultures, as long as the core values of a country are maintained. For example, if a country wants to maintain a democratic socialist society, and a greater population of capitalists immigrate to it, then I think that socialist society would want to restrict immigration as well.
The above point is to demonstrate how democracies are fragile, and that not all immigration policies are necessarily xenophobic or racist.
Look, if I am wrong I want to know. I said I won’t respond to those posts because it’s not meant to be an argument.
I agree, the Chinese poster is on point about all their statements.
Can someone change my mind about CRT and DEI?
My pov is that CRT (critical race theory) and related policies, like DEI, put an undue emphasis on race instead of on poverty, and the resulting effect is that policies which are aimed at helping minorities seem like “favoritism” (and called as such by political opponents), which makes a growing population of poor whites (due to the adverse effects of wealth inequality) polarized against minorities.
Separately, the polarization is used by others who want to weaken a democratic nation. For democracies, a growing immigrant population of more poor people will cause further polarization because the growing poor white population believes that “they’re taking our jobs”. This happened during Brexit, this happened with Trump, and this is happening now in Germany and other western democracies.
I know that there are racist groups who have an agenda of their own, and what I am saying is that instead of focusing on what are painted as culture war issues, leftists are better off focusing on alleviating systemic poverty. Like, bringing the Nordic model to the U.S. should be their agenda.
So, maybe I am wrong about CRT and DEI and how it’s well-meaning intentions are being abused by people who have other goals, but I want to hear from others about why they think CRT and DEI help. I want to listen, so I am not going to respond at all.
— Added definitions —
CRT: an academic field used to understand how systems and processes favor white people despite anti-discrimination policies. Analysis coming out of CRT is often used to make public policy.
DEI: a framework for increasing diversity, equity and inclusion; DEI isn’t focused on race or gender only, but also includes disability and other factors (pregnancy for example) which affect a person.
— —
Okay , so end note: I appreciate the people who commented. I questioned the relevancy of CRT/DEI previously out of an alarmed perspective of how aspects that highlight group differences can be used by others to create divisions and increase polarization. But I get the point everyone is making about the historical significance of these tools.
Yes, but let’s stop pretending that all other countries are angelic heavens with leaders who have nothing but the best intentions for all people, everywhere. Every country has its issues, and it’s really easy to blame them on “imperialists”.
In fairness, all countries play the destabilization games against each other. That’s the core of realpolitiks.
The truth is that the U.S. contributes the most to foreign aid funds, and still gets zero to little political good will.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_development_aid_sovereign_state_donors
No, I am giving you a pithy example of how people will say there isn’t any systemic racism.
I never said that there aren’t racists, but when you have anti-discrimination policies in place, the public believes that there isn’t “systemic racism”. So then the problem becomes that putting policies into place which favor minorities makes it seem like “only minorities are being favored”. That creates divisions and polarization. That’s separate from the issue that nation state actors will use this polarization to create issues in democracies.
That’s why, the best way forward for leftists is to favor policies which target systemic issues for the poor.
This is one people should seriously protest to fucking stop. Education is the one thing that levels the playing field for people across different socioeconomic backgrounds. Get on the phone to your representatives, this is the main one they were working towards and wanted to distract from!
Maybe you’re right, and it’s too bad they did away with DEI before we got get any stats on its usefulness for the overall population. I remember that corporates starting removing DEI way before Trump started talking about it because they didn’t find that it did anything which contributed to their growth or leadership.
Edit this article shows why some people think removing DEI is racist. It’s true that anti-DEI is often favored by racist people as well.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-02-01/why-companies-are-scaling-back-dei-in-america
Don’t Believe Him
Look closely at the first two weeks of Donald Trump’s second term and you’ll see something very different than what he wants you to see.

https://archive.is/HlInJ
Trump criticizes diversity hiring after 67 dead in US air disaster
These people lose any credibility when they say nonsense like this. Overworked and overloaded personnel created this issue, but someone cutting budgets isn’t going to admit that. Might be the start of America’s brain drain if this kind of race-baiting politics continue.
https://archive.is/WyhBb
Meme gift (and note in thread)


I just want to say that I feel bad for creating an environment where people are maybe getting distracted from processing stuff that’s happening around them, and maybe to people they know. I can sometimes dig into the wrong thing at inappropriate times, that’s a me problem. Here’s a meme, and sorry if you’re going through something awful right now.
Is left-wing authoritarianism (LWA) closer to a myth or a reality? Twelve studies test the empirical existence and theoretical relevance of LWA. Study 1 reve...

> Recent evidence has revealed a need for balanced evaluations of potential symmetries and asymmetries related to political ideology (e.g., Duarte et al., 2015; Jussim et al., 2015, 2016; Crawford, 2017; Frimer et al., 2017; Proch et al., 2018; Ditto et al., 2019; Eadeh and Chang, 2019; Fiagbenu et al., 2019; Clark and Winegard, 2020; Honeycutt and Jussim, 2020). Using a multi-method approach spanning multiple content areas, validity types, statistical controls, and scale types, the present results consistently show that, just as right-wing persons are sometimes authoritarian, left-wing persons may also be similarly authoritarian. Taken together, this large array of evidence suggests that left-wing authoritarianism is more of a reality than a myth.
A funding freeze ordered by the Trump administration has sparked widespread confusion about its effects on government programs such as Medicaid.

Two peas in an authoritarian pod


Study here: https://news.emory.edu/stories/2021/09/esc_left_wing_authoritarians_psychology/campus.html