DEI is a good idea that has led to a catastrophic backlash.

Imagine a world where us intellectual types hadn’t given the right this kind of talking point on a silver platter. Election might have gone differently.

Should one be required to submit a statement proving their past support of DEI as part of the hiring process in academia? What should people who disagree with such efforts put in this statement?

That is quite literally what this thread is about.

>“DEI exists” isn’t an argument.

But it is. DEI indicates ideological capture. Whether it's good or bad doesn't matter, it's not germane to the purported goals of "advancing science/health/military readiness/etc". At best it's tangential.

If we were a robust and wealthy country, then perhaps we could engage in these sorts of boutique social experiments. But we are not. We've got serious problems on multiple fronts. Fixing it before it all goes blooey means serious disruption, and we're now well into 30 years of positive reinforcement on the ideological capture. You're not going to get the results you need from the people who benefitted from the previous mismanagement. Trump learned that lesson quite directly the last time he was in office.

Look, there are multiple lawsuits against universities regarding their hiring practices going on right now.

Outside of academia you have things like the FAA hiring scandal coming to light: https://substack.com/home/post/p-156166190

The list goes on and on.