One of the crowning achievements of the 2nd Trump Administration has been the systematic dismantling of government and academic DEI programs and policies, in favor of merit-based criteria. Government funds to universities are withheld from schools that continue to support discriminatory approaches to operations, DEI chief among them.
By contrast, the Biden Administration wasted no time in championing DEI efforts in any manner that it could. Biden’s puppet masters sought to undermine and vanquish the “1776 Project,” which was designed by the 1st Trump Administration to offer a balanced perspective on American history. Instead, Biden and company supported the misdirected and now discredited “1619 Project,” which was intended to fan the flames of racial dissonance and lend credibility to the notion that DEI programs are crucial because of what occurred 400 years ago.
Racial Dissonance Vs Anthropology
Such wrangling over pseudo-history has got to end. One aspect of interracial understanding and relations, to this day, however, has been perpetually overlooked.
The night before I was scheduled to give a speech, I was watching TV in a Washington, D.C. hotel room. A news item on a local animal shelter indicated the preferences among dog adopters. Light-colored and multi-colored dogs were popular. The darker the dog, the longer it stayed in the shelter. Black dogs were the least popular and had the hardest time attracting an owner.
All of the sociological, anthropological, and human behavior books and articles I had ever encountered leapt forward in my mind. In selecting a pet, if black fur is the least desirable, what is the implication for dark-skinned people in this world? Are they born to a life of inherent bias, even when legions of others resolutely seek to avoid being prejudiced?
Blinded by the Night
Is human nature hardwired to be attracted to light and be repelled by dark? Light, white, and mild colors are traditionally equated with positive attributes, while dark colors frequently are not. Such pairings are primarily subconscious, likely persisting in the human psyche for eons.
If life is ever discovered on distant planets, the variation in human appearances on our planet will more than likely be mirrored by a wide variation in whatever species populate those celestial bodies. Diversity is the fate of species everywhere, not simply on Earth. It's our ongoing challenge to rise above physiological differences and even the resulting psycho-physiological variations in perspective and disposition. Individually and collectively, we have the ability. It is within our grasp.
As we acknowledge our long-term, ingrained bias toward light and away from dark, we need to constantly be aware that discrimination should not arise as a result of race or skin color.
All Behavior Matters
A fundamental issue that is rarely explored in the fakestream media is the impact of one person's behavior on that of another person. Martin Luther King Jr. said it best, "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character."
Author Shelby Steele has written such insightful books as The Content of Our Character: A New Vision of Race in America; White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era; and A Dream Deferred: The Second Betrayal of Black Freedom in America. He emphasizes that those who claim that they're being discriminated against because of skin color often maintain little or no responsibility for their behavior.
Black or white or any other color, if you attended public schools through grade 12 and learned very little, primarily because you didn't pay attention in class, didn't see the value in conjugating a verb, felt that science was boring, thought it was cool to goof off, or disdained learning in general, why blame others?
As an adult, if you feel left out of the economic mainstream and cannot attain the type of job that you want, at a decent salary, exactly who is to blame? A vanishing cadre of 'discriminatory' employers who won't hire you because of skin color? Or, discerning employers who won't hire you due to your academic underachievement, which renders you as under-qualified?
Humans Discriminate Based on Behavior
Discrimination based on skin color is morally corrupt — a grave offense. Discrimination based on behavior is rational: something that all human beings have done since the beginning of time and which will continue far into the future.
It behooves each of us to do our best each day, to relegate skin color as a non-issue and recognize that behavior, along with aptitude, performance, and on-the-job results are the measures that count most to employers.
As much as anything else, behavior matters.