Re-Segregation is The Point
Yeah, more politics. What can I say? It’s been a minute since a tech person has done something dumber or eviler than the Administration. I have faith in them, though. It’s coming.
The Musk administration (again, Trump is a delusional, decrepit old man who is no more in charge of the administration than I am the starting goalie for the Chicago Blackhawks (welcome Spencer Knight!)) has begun a program of what appears to be resegregation. Their attacks on DEI, or DEIA as they call it, since the idea that disabled people should be full members of society apparently runs counter to their eugenics tastes, is nothing more than an attempt to drive anyone who is not a white, straight, man out of public life. This drive has a lot of flashy, symbolic moves but they are hiding the more important substantial retreat from anti-discrimination principles.
Among other items, the Musk administration has removed all references to the first woman to complete Ranger school. It did that as a part of an effort to remove all references to “respect” and “racism” in DOD materials. In addition to just being an asshole move, of course, it also is meant to keep women in their “place”. Before, it was easy to find information to counter people who said that women could not handle combat roles. Now, of course, they have hidden that information and in doing so, have told women that they aren’t welcome.
They fired three members of senior military command, including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, all of whom were minorities. Trump replaced the fired Chairman with a retired white man, who was not a four-star general and who did not meet the legal requirements to be Chairman (trump used a loophole ot force the unqualified white man into position). Clearly, the message being sent is that no minority is qualified, that whatever their paper accomplishments are those are not real and cannot compare to the lessor achievements of white men.
They required various national guard units to pull out of a parade honoring Frederick Douglas (I guess people aren’t recognizing him more and more?) because the parade allegedly ran counter to commands to not honor someone because of their race. Douglas was a brilliant writer, an incredible organizer, and a leader in the fight to end slavery. The idea that you are honoring a man of his accomplishments because of his race is sending a very clear message that the achievements of African Americans are by definition fake. And therefore, you can feel free to discard those accomplishments when looking to hire or promote people.
A similar logic applies to the military ceasing to recruit at a Black Engineering awards events. The recruiting was done to find the most talented people and use those talents for the benefit of the military. By refusing to recruit at an awards event, the message, again, is that minority achievements are not real. The award-winning work must not be good because it comes from Black engineers. No need to recruit them — we know that their achievements are fake.
Minorities need not apply to Musk’s military.
But minorities need not apply anywhere in Musk’s America.
The Administration reversed an executive order from the Johnson administration meant to prevent the government from discriminating in hiring. It abolished the department in the Social Security Administration that fights discrimination. These are rule and organizations that are dedicated to ensuring that all people are treated equally. In Musk’s world, though, ensuring that discrimination does not happen is bad.
I could go through and discuss all the ways in which these actions reflect the discriminatory ideas that Musk and other tech leadership marinates in. But I have already done that, and more importantly, these actions speak for themselves. Musk and Trump have systematically taken step after step premised on the paired ideas that minorities by definition cannot have real achievements and that, as a result, there can be no such thing as discrimination. If they cannot achieve anything, then how can they be discriminated against?
These moves are plainly and purely about shoving minorities out of the public sphere except in the lowest paid, least prestigious roles. They are a direct attack on the plain wording of the Declaration of Independance that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights”. Instead, the Musk administration seems to be ruled by the sentiments of the Southern declarations of succession, perhaps most succinctly put by the Texans: “beneficent and patriarchal system of African slavery, proclaiming the debasing doctrine of equality of all men, irrespective of race or color—a doctrine at war with nature, in opposition to the experience of mankind, and in violation of the plainest revelations of the Divine Law.”
Somewhere, Jim Crow is smiling.