#Richard Bilkszto

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Michele Seminara

Published: Jan 4, 2024

My first exposure to what I now call “griftivism,” a hybrid of grifting and Critical Social Justice activism, occurred in the arts. It was 2020 when—in my role as managing editor of literary journal Verity La—I became embroiled in a social media cancellation precipitated by backlash to the publication of a story some deemed racist and sexist. The ensuing moral outrage razed our “little magazine that could” into internet infamy, where it remains strung up, replete with apologies, hanging its masthead in shame.   

Verity means “truth,” and the journal’s motto was “Be Brave”—rendering its demise that little bit sorrier and sadder. The story that sank our publication depicted a disaffected Australian academic engaged in a sexual affair with a local woman while in the Philippines. The protagonist was uncomfortable with what the author described as the “patriarchal and colonial” power imbalance between his two characters, but not guilty enough to resist. He was an un-admirable and unreliable narrator, and in publishing the story, we sought to unveil an unsavory truth about how some men use women for casual sex. This truth was not well received.

What confounded me most about the backlash to the piece was not the mechanism of cancellation (if you’ve seen one online takedown, you’ve seen them all) but the beliefs and motivations of the cancellers, their supporters, and the silent mob of onlookers.

Upon examining this dynamic, I became aware of a new type of grifter who hitches their self-interest to activism and thrives in a culture hell-bent on “being kind”—or, at least, in appearing to be so. “Griftivists,” I call them. 

The instigator of my cancellation was a colleague on the advisory board of our journal. Her bio on Ko-fi, an online “tip jar” to make “income directly from fans” proclaimed that she liked to “spread joy on social media, & care for others a lot.” Her Twitter feed was both a consummate work of self-curation and self-contradiction; earnest retweets from fellow social justice activists and scathing criticisms of “white people” (“Do not get me started on white men. Do not, ‘not all white’ me. I’m spicy today”) bookended daily selfies showcasing designer shoes, handbags, and dresses. Fine dining, trips to the theatre, and a steady stream of purchases sat incongruously beside tweets thanking followers for ostensibly essential UberEATS vouchers and requests to “buy her a Ko-fi” so that she could replace her cracked Miele cooktop or purchase a dehumidifier for her “damp” Sydney harbor-side apartment. Unbelievably, there was even a request for donations to enable the purchase of an alcoholic drink at the airport before boarding an international flight to go on vacation. Yet few seemed to notice the grift.  

Someone that did was Sangeetha Thanapal, a Singaporean-Thamil writer and academic residing in Australia, who, in response to the plethora of praise showered on my colleague (“You are such a treasure. Such an advocate. Such a wonderful writer. We are lucky to have you in the world”), boldly tweeted, “It’s enraging to me that Singaporean Chinese people… who have access to every privilege and opportunity, can come here and play ‘person of colour.’ And y’all will fall for it cos you have zero understanding of the dynamics of race in Asia… This is why POC spaces in Australia will continue to shield privileged people like her while shutting out actually disadvantaged people like me.”  

This surprised me. While I had no doubt that since moving to Australia my colleague had experienced racism, I hadn’t thought to question whether she was disingenuous to present herself as marginalized. She had, after all, grown up in a wealthy country as part of the dominant race and spoke English as her main language. Could she be appropriating disadvantage to her advantage, engaging in a kind of cultural double-dip to reap social and financial gain? For a lifelong small-l liberal, even entertaining the idea felt verboten.

* * *

Leading the charge in cancelling someone can be a profitable affair; in the cash-strapped arts, it can pay handsomely in the type of cultural capital that translates into invitations to publish work, speak at writers’ festivals, judge and win literary prizes, and secure competitive grants. In the year following the demise of my journal, my colleague succeeded in repurposing her tweets into a paid full-length article in a literary magazine, saw her Twitter followers burgeon from several hundred to nearly ten thousand, was featured in the news multiple times for her writing and social justice activism, and went on to receive two lucrative arts grants totaling seventy-five thousand dollars. 

Of course, racism, disadvantage, and marginalization are real and must be challenged. Those dedicated to doing so have historically favored the left-wing of politics, a space heavily populated by my demographic: middle-class, educated white women (sometimes known as “bleeding hearts”). Having always been progressive, I was stunned by how swiftly and irrevocably I was recast during my cancellation as a “white supremacist.” A dreaded open letter signed by hundreds of my peers even demanded our funders withdraw their support for our “systemically racist” journal, despite the fact that we worked as volunteers and prioritized publishing and paying writers from marginalized demographics. Logically it made no sense; nonetheless, I was racked by guilt and shame.

However, after schooling myself in the recent trends in Western culture (a.k.a. scouring Twitter), my naiveté quickly resolved. I was both relieved and alarmed to discover that my case paled in comparison to more extreme pile-ons occurring around the world. Particularly in the arts, a space in which you might assume dissenting views could be aired and debated, there was a spate of ad hominem attacks being waged that seemed motivated by a mixture of moral certainty, self-advancement, and thinly veiled glee. As another Australian publisher confided to me when weathering their own public take-down, “One becomes a piñata.”

* * *

The moniker “Verity” in Verity La not only means “truth” but was inspired by the name of a once famous bookshop in Australia’s capital city, Canberra—which, in turn, was named after the inspirational woman who founded it. Verity Fitzhardinge brought literary culture to Canberra at a time when sheep still grazed on the paddocks of Old Parliament House and D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover was banned. From 1938-69, her bookshop was an oasis, a meeting place for thinkers, students and dissidents marooned in a cultural backwater. When Verity La was conceived in 2010, its founding editor happened to live on Verity Lane (rendered “Verity La.” on the street sign), and thus, the literary journal destined to live and die on the sword of its truth was born. Having no experience as an editor and no prescience, I enthusiastically took the helm in 2014 and would infamously go down with the ship just six years later.

After my cancellation, like the heterodox patrons gathered in Verity’s bookshop eighty years earlier, I sought comfort in knowing I was not alone. I discovered Counterweight, an organization established by author and academic Helen Pluckrose to help promote “reason and freedom by encouraging critical thinking” and support people like me who found themselves at odds with the new cultural climate. I devoured books, articles, and podcasts and realized that the verbal jabs thrown at me (“It’s not enough to be not racist, you have to be anti-racist!”) were not original but parroted from the rhetoric of far-left activism. As the 2020 global shitshow gathered steam, cultural commentators were warning that Critical Social Justice (CSJ)—a progeny of postmodernism and Critical Theory with roots in Marxism—had breached the walls of academia and was spreading its own divisive worldview.

CSJ was originally touted as a way to address “prejudice and discrimination on the grounds of characteristics like race, sex, sexuality, gender identity, disability and body size.” This certainly sounded rather positive to me. It appealed to my social conscience and to that of many others, as evidenced by the viral popularity of social media hashtags like #BlackLivesMatter and corporate advertising campaigns like Nike’s "For Once, Don’t Do It," urging Americans not to turn their backs on the issue of racism.   

Yet, as I discovered, the stated goal of ending bigotry was soon subverted—hijacked, if you will—by those wishing to bend the truth to their own advantage.

Perhaps this should come as no surprise since CSJ was born of the postmodern view that knowledge is not objective, but socially constructed to maintain power. Critical theorists scrutinize structures, language, and social interactions to identify and dismantle oppressive power systems and dominant “truths.” This makes for an enlightening thought experiment, but in the wilds beyond academia, it’s easy to see how things might go awry. For if there is no objective yardstick for ranking truths, how will we know what to believe, and what values will we allow to guide us?

Enter the de-and-postcolonial theorists who argued for not only dismantling power systems such as white supremacy but inverting them. Drawing on their revolutionary vision, CSJ activists declared that those best placed to call out the oppressors’ false truths and design fairer alternatives are the ones who suffer oppression most: the marginalized. Perhaps because, in the absence of any method for judging the worth of one socially constructed thing against another, our safest bet is to run in the opposite direction of the powerful towards the powerless. But while it’s undeniably fair and wise to acknowledge, listen to, and learn from the experience of marginalized people, when groups who are viewed as oppressed are elevated to an unquestionable ethical status, problems predictably arise.

This has been evidenced in numerous social justice movements over the last decade (think #MeToo’s “Believe All Women” slogan), with activists claiming that lived experience trumps all other forms of knowledge and that the most marginalized person’s lived experience is the most valid. It follows that your right to engage in cultural and political dialogue is now dependent on your identity and positionality: the lower your position, the higher your status and the more weight your “truth” holds. Any skepticism is dismissed as racist, sexist, and so on. Even if you are a “marginalized” person whose dissenting views are inconvenient to the majority of activists within your group, you risk being diagnosed with “internalized” prejudice or dismissed as an “Uncle Tom.” Sadly, progressives have adopted this worldview with empathic gusto. I know I did. Many well-meaning people do. And so have corporations, universities, whole industries, and governments, effectively transforming the left—a formerly meager hunting ground for opportunists seeking power and reward—into a space fertile with possibilities for those on the grift.

The socially-enforced expectation that we not question the efficacy of progressive activist movements (or risk backlash and potential cancellation) has proved a godsend for the griftivist and has engendered what cultural commentators call a form of “new puritanism.” Whereas society used to judge morality according to religious and conservative values, now there is a shift to make the same judgments based on absolute acceptance of the tenets of CSJ. This has fostered a rigid leftist ideology equal to the far-right in both its pronouncements of acceptable truth and willingness to extinguish dissent. That may seem counterintuitive for a theory embedded in postmodern skepticism, but it’s perhaps not so surprising given human nature; as Lord Acton said, “Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” There is now power in being oppressed (or at least in appearing to be) and by establishing themselves as the marginalized or their allies and espousing the requisite leftist beliefs whilst denouncing those who fail to do so, the unscrupulous griftivist—like the Wolf dressed in Grandma’s clothing—succeeds in veiling their selfish intent under a cloak of harmlessness and virtue. And soft-hearted progressives, not hip to the ruse, are being eaten up.

* * *

A 2023 study published in the journal Current Psychology by Ann Krispenz and Alex Bertrams of the University of Bern entitled “Understanding left-wing authoritarianism: Relations to the dark personality traits, altruism, and social justice commitment” provides insight into the psyche of the griftivist. First, researchers characterized left-wing authoritarianism (LWA) as comprising three interconnected factors: anti-conventionalism, top-down censorship, and anti-hierarchical aggression. “Anti-conventionalism” is a dogmatic endorsement of radical moral values coupled with a desire to impose them on others. “Top-down censorship” is the use of authority to quash opposition and suppress “offensive and intolerant” speech. And “anti-hierarchical aggression” is the drive to overthrow and punish those with power. Together these paint a recognizable, if somewhat disturbing, portrait of left-wing CSJ activism, where the most virulent proponents possess traits mirroring those we’re accustomed to seeing on the authoritarian far-right.

To better understand left-wing authoritarianism, researchers designed two studies exploring its relationship with narcissism and psychopathy, as well as its correlation with traits they defined as prosocial, like altruism and social justice commitment. They found that left-wing activists who endorse aggressive actions to overthrow those in power are more likely to demonstrate “manipulative and exploitative behaviors… self-perceived entitlement, arrogance, reactive anger, distrust, lack of empathy, and thrill-seeking.” They also found that “neither dispositional altruism nor social justice commitment was related to left-wing anti-hierarchical aggression.” In fact, they concluded that “some political activists on the left side of the political spectrum do not actually strive for social justice and the support of underprivileged groups or persons, but rather endorse or express violence for the satisfaction of their own ego-focused needs.” Meaning that the most strident and morally outraged CSJ activists might not be driven by the desire for social justice at all. Quite the opposite.

As Krispenz and Bertrams explained to the science news website PsyPost, left-wing activism provides bad-faith players with “opportunities for positive self-presentation and displays of moral superiority to gain social status and dominate others.” Worse, those who “strive for influential positions that involve social visibility and outreach as well as access to financial and other resources” will likely misuse progressive movements for private purposes and cause “irreparable financial and reputational harm.” Indeed, it would seem a significant number of those marching under the banner of “doing good” while extolling others to “do better” and “be kind” are impelled by selfish, devious, or even harmful motives. And some are just on the grift.

So concerned were the authors that they advised minority groups should be made aware of these “narcissistic ‘enemies’ from within” who might hijack their causes and whose behavior could lead to dwindling public support.

Furthermore, they identified a phenomenon they dubbed “the dark-ego-vehicle principle” in which “individuals with dark personalities—such as high narcissistic and psychopathic traits—are attracted to certain ideologies and forms of political activism.” For example, someone might “participate in a pro-BLM protest pretending to fight against racism while actually using such protesting activities to meet their own aggressive motives and thrills” or because “this form of activism can provide them with opportunities for positive self-presentation (e.g., virtue signaling).”

The trajectory of the discredited Black Lives Matter Global Network certainly bears this out. In the wake of George Floyd’s death in 2020, corporations and individuals desperate to demonstrate their CSJ credentials poured hundreds of millions of dollars into the organization globally. Happy to profit off the empathy (or, more cynically, the virtue-signaling) of those willing to donate to BLM, one of its founders, Patrisse Cullors, controversially bought a house worth $1.4 million. Another BLM organizer, Xahra Saleem, was recently jailed for stealing donations intended for a British “anti-racist” group. And there are still several lawsuits involving alleged misuse of BLM funds by members ongoing; as UnHeard journalist Niall Gooch noted: “When a cause is hedged around with taboos... to the extent that obvious questions about governance, spending and oversight are simply not asked, that cause will attract grifters like moths to a flame.”

Of course, activism per se is not psychopathic; Krispenz and Bertrams’ study merely confirms that for a confluence of reasons, leftist CSJ movements are currently attracting dark personality types. There are still many political activists who get involved for positive reasons. That’s a relief on the one hand, but a concern on the other; it suggests that the volatile world of left-wing activism is currently a murky meeting point of malignant griftivists and socially conscious bleeding hearts being manipulated into rewarding them. It’s a worrying trend that—once recognized—you begin to see everywhere.   

Take, for example, my field: writing and publishing. The dirty secret behind the submissions wall is that many editors now read bios before even considering a writer’s work, and all know that the way to secure lucrative government funding is to tick as many diversity boxes on grant applications as possible. Of course, many (perhaps even the majority) of those working in publishing are motivated by good intentions and aim to nurture and platform underrepresented writers. However, it’s not a stretch to imagine that as publishers jostle to showcase the work of the marginalized, they might attract the attention of a canny griftivist.

One who twigged to these opportunities earlier than most was Norma Bagain Toliopoulos (otherwise known as Norma Khouri), who made a literary killing in the early 2000s with her “memoir” Forbidden Love. The book hinged on the false narrative of its author growing up in Jordan before fleeing on witnessing her best friend’s “honor killing.” Norma referred to herself as a “humanitarian” and claimed she wrote the memoir to give voice to the plight of oppressed Arab women, yet was not only found to have duped her worldwide readership, but was investigated by the FBI for having swindled lovers, friends, family, and even elderly and infirm strangers out of at least one million US dollars. Her ruse was uncovered after her publisher, Random House, received a twelve-page dossier from the Jordanian Women’s Commission outlining seventy-three factual errors and discrepancies they had noticed in the book. An eighteen-month investigation revealed that, far from being a Jordanian who fled her home, Khouri was an American passport holder who had lived in Chicago from the age of three. Rana Husseini, a Jordanian writer and human-rights activist who spent years actually exposing and working to eradicate her country’s honor killings, told journalists that by profiting off false narratives about Middle-Eastern women’s deaths and appropriating the work of activists, Khouri—like the opportunistic Dark Triad individuals Krispenz and Bertrams warn of—had effectively “ruined our cause.”

A no less scandalous case is that of Egyptian-Australian activist Eman Sharobeem, who grifted on a fake narrative of being forced to marry her first cousin as a child bride before escaping to Australia. She was a finalist in the 2015 Australian of the Year Awards and founded two publicly funded not-for-profit community organizations to assist immigrant women before being found guilty of fraud in 2017 for misappropriating upwards of $800,000 in public funds for personal use. Like Khouri, Sharobeem styled herself as a women’s rights activist while stealing from the marginalized communities she claimed to support. She wasn’t investigated until a group of determined migrant women working for one of her organizations repeatedly filed complaints about her financial misappropriation and bullying of staff. Only then was it discovered the prominent activist’s entire backstory was fabricated, including her claim to have two PhDs. When asked how such fragrant lies could pass unchecked, the Immigrant Women's Health Service board chairman Audrey Lai testified, “We trusted Eman. We thought she had such a good reputation and high profile in the community, we didn't check. It's not very wise in hindsight but unfortunately we were very gullible because we believed in her.”

* * *

Establishing belief in an oppressed identity, a common enemy, or a worthy cause, is central to the griftivists’ game. And it’s disturbingly easy because few of the precariously privileged who have the power to call out their lies are prepared to risk questioning the veracity of a social justice activist’s claims; their reputations and often livelihoods depend upon asserting the emperor is indeed clothed.

Instead, the dirty business of calling out the truth is often left to the people who can afford it least but who it affects the most: people from the marginalized communities that the griftivists leech off.

Take, for example, the case of Rachel Dolezal, a white woman whose career, memoir, and Netflix documentary were based on her identification as a black American. While some white commentators were quick to reach for explanations such as mental instability and childhood trauma to explain Dolezal’s bizarre behavior, many black critics accused her of exploiting the history of black suffering in order to opt into victimhood and co-opt lucrative leadership positions in the black community. One of the most intriguing aspects of Dolezal’s case is that she continues to uphold her black identity despite admitting to being biologically Caucasian, claiming that race is just a “social construct”—another example of how the postmodern elasticization of “truth” is artfully manipulated by griftivists.

Another sphere where griftivists opting into an oppressed identity to secure advantage has succeeded is in the gender versus sex debate, with some biological men exploiting society’s support for transgender people to enter previously sex-segregated spaces, often with disastrous results. After violent criminal Stephen Wood (who adopted the name Karen White) expediently claimed to be trans while awaiting trial for multiple sexual crimes and then reoffended while housed in a women’s prison, there was outrage from both the gender critical and trans communities. Many feminists claimed such outcomes were the inevitable result of the recent legal and social sanctioning of gender self-identification and used the case to demonstrate the incompatibility of all trans women in all women’s spaces. However, trans activists, such as Steph Richards, denied that Wood was transgender at all and argued that by claiming to be so with nefarious intent, he had created a public and media backlash that harmed the trans rights movement. Indeed, in 2023, the British Ministry of Justice tightened its rules in an effort to curtail people of bad faith exploiting policies designed to keep inmates of all genders safe. As Richards pointed out, “Wood was very aware that the Prison Service procedures at that time (they have subsequently changed) meant that he could self-identify as a trans woman and easily get transferred to the female estate. This offered Wood two significant advantages... Firstly he himself would be in a safer environment... Secondly, he would be close to vulnerable cisgendered females and trans women—potentially more victims.” Yet another case where a malevolent griftivist exploited the empathy and damaged the reputation of the social justice movement that harboured him.

Griftivists and their cons come in many shapes and sizes—from hate crime hoaxes, to identity appropriation, to outrageously priced diversity dinners—but what they share is a canny eye for the opportunities created by Critical Social Justice ideology and a willingness to trade on progressive guilt in order to advance their own ends, often while destroying their competitors with allegations of bigotry. It’s beyond dispiriting.

In his essay ‘The Curse of the Man Who Could See the Little Fish at the Bottom of the Ocean,” sinologist Pierre Ryckmans pondered belief, truth and lies after the ruthlessness of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was confirmed in the wake of the Tiananmen Square massacre. For twenty years prior to the massacre, Ryckmans (who wrote for security reasons under the pen name Simon Leys) was a rare dissenting voice in the West. His warnings about the Chinese regime were drowned out by leftist media, academics, and film stars who were convinced that the Maoist Revolution was a net good. When asked how the world could have failed to recognize the reality of the CCP for so long, Ryckmans chose to ponder a much more profound question: “How and why do we usually endeavor to protect ourselves against the truth?” For, as he noted, the truth can be disturbing, inconvenient, and dangerous to acknowledge. Perhaps this explains why, in a culture captured by Critical Social Justice, we’re committed to not seeing certain obvious but unpopular “truths,” or to bending the truth so far out of shape with clever theories that it essentially becomes meaningless.

With a nuance atypical by today’s standards, Ryckmans’ article outlines the varied reasons people might choose to believe lies, even in the face of evidence to the contrary: “What people believe is essentially what they wish to believe. They cultivate illusions out of idealism—and also out of cynicism. They follow their own visions because doing so satisfies their religious cravings, and also because it is expedient. They seek beliefs that can exalt their souls, and that can fill their bellies. They believe out of generosity, and also because it serves their interests. They believe because they are stupid, and also because they are clever. Simply, they believe in order to survive. And because they need to survive, sometimes they could gladly kill whoever has the insensitivity, cruelty, and inhumanity to deny them their life-supporting lies.”

The lies peddled by CSJ activism and exploited by griftivists are not ones we are supposed to question, and yet, everyone does—in their minds, in their hearts, and in private rooms and messages, away from the censorious and punitive eyes and ears of ideologues.

We question privately because to do so publicly risks joining the ranks of the cancelled, becoming one of the shunned. Calling out griftivists can extract a heavy personal and professional price.   

One of the more tragic examples in recent years is that of Canadian school principal Richard Bilkszto who took his own life after being publicly shamed for questioning Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion trainer Kike Ojo-Thompson during a Zoom presentation in which she claimed that Canada was a bastion of “white supremacy and colonialism.” The Toronto District School Board has finally announced an investigation into Bilkszto’s tragic case, but not before two years of bullying, disbelief, and social media pile-ons fatally took their toll. While his family must continue without him, Bilkszto’s peers who smeared him as racist for merely questioning Ojo-Thompson’s “truth” have prevailed.

Human rights activist Ginetta Sagan wrote that “silence in the face of injustice is complicity with the oppressor.” The questions we might ask in cases like Bilkszto’s are: where was the injustice and who was the oppressor? Or perhaps it’s time to drop the often-weaponized framework of oppressor and oppressed entirely for something that has the potential to unite us.

I imagine only a handful who took part in my cancellation did so out of self-interest or spite. Most believed the “truth” my detractors spun, and those who didn’t played along or stayed silent for fear of joining the ranks of the cancelled. Their fears were well-founded; the power of the scarlet letter is frighteningly real. To disarm the griftivists and limit the harm they cause their victims and the justice movements they claim to champion, more of us must fight for what Verity La tried to: truth and the bravery to face it. By doing so, and by speaking up, we can strip the Wolf of Grandma’s clothing and unveil bad-faith players.

#Michele Seminara #griftivism #grifting #social justice activism #critical social justice #machiavellianism #Richard Bilkszto #diversity equity and inclusion #diversity training #equity #inclusion #diversity #hate crime hoax #religion is a mental illness

[allthecanadianpolitics]

A former principal who sued the Toronto District School Board after he said he suffered workplace harassment during an anti-racism training session has died by suicide.

Richard Bilkszto, 60, worked for the TDSB for 24 years, primarily in adult education. He retired in 2019, but continued to serve as a fill-in principal on contract, most recently at Burnhamthorpe Collegiate Institute in Etobicoke.

Earlier this year, Bilkszto sued the school board, alleging that his reputation was “systematically demolished” during two anti-Black racism training sessions in the spring of 2021 when, after he challenged some of the speaker’s comments, he was singled out and accused of supporting white supremacy.

Bilkszto allegedly suffered “severe emotional distress” and had to take a stress leave as a result. He filed a “mental stress injury” claim to the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, which allowed the claim and provided compensation for two months of lost earnings. [...]

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada, @vague-humanoid Original post.

#cdnpoli #Toronto #education #racism #white supremacy tw #suicide tw

[89845aaa]

[earthpages]

[tuntematon-marsalkka]

Канада не делает ракеты, но по идиотизму впереди планеты всей

Bully DEI trainer paid $7,500 an hour is heard LAUGHING as she taunts beloved gay school principal driven to suicide for questioning her woke diktats – as crony who held no-whites school meetings is also identified Richard Bilkszto, 60, came out of retirement to work as principal of Burnhamthorpe Collegiate Institute in Toronto In April 2021, Kike Ojo-Thompson, a diversity trainer in Toronto,…

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[news247planet]

#'anti-racism' #indoctrination #NFL How 'anti-racism' indoctrination led to the loss of life of Toronto educator Richard Bilkszto https://news247planet.com/?p=465015

[hartkern14]

How Racism Is Weaponized Against White People

Two weeks ago, former Toronto District School Board (TDSB) principal Richard Bilkszto, an esteemed educator with 24 years’ experience, took his own life. http://dlvr.it/Ssyt3G

[andronetalks]

Ex-principal who sued board over bullying during anti-racism training dies by suicide

New York Post By Ronny ReyesJuly 24, 2023 2:21pm  Updated  A former Toronto principal has died by suicide after facing harassment for calling out an anti-racism instructor who allegedly claimed that Canada was more racist than the US. Richard Bilkszto, 60, had served as a fill-in principal for the Toronto District School Board until his reputation was “systematically demolished” after he was…

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[ultramaga]

The struggle session claims a life.

#leftism

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Rupa Subramanya and Ari Blaff

Published: Aug 3, 2023

Kike Ojo-Thompson, a diversity trainer in Toronto, was explaining to her class of 200 or so public school administrators that Canada is a much more racist country than the United States. 

“Canada is a bastion of white supremacy and colonialism,” Thompson said to a sea of nodding heads squeezed into Zoom. “The racism we experience is far worse here than there.” 

It was April 26, 2021, and Thompson was leading attendees through a session on systemic inequity. 

Thompson acknowledged that this might be hard for Canadians to accept, explaining that Americans “have a fighting posture against, at least, the monarchy. Here we celebrate the monarchy, the very heart and soul and origins of the colonial structure.” 

It was at that point that Richard Bilkszto, the principal of Burnhamthorpe Collegiate Institute and Adult Learning Centre, put his hand up. (Burnhamthorpe is a high school that caters mostly to students in their twenties who previously dropped out.) Bilkszto had trained in the United States, he was a devout progressive, and he was mystified by Thompson’s comments.

“I just wanted to make a comment about the Canada–U.S. thing, a little bit of a challenge to it,” Bilkszto offered. 

Citing Canada’s public schools, tax regime, and socialized healthcare system, and no doubt drawing on his own experience teaching in a predominantly black high school in Buffalo, New York, he said: “We’re a far more just society.”

There was a momentary silence. None of the other attendees waded in. 

Then Thompson, who is black, laced into Bilkszto, who is white.

“What I’m finding interesting is that, in the middle of this Covid disaster, where the inequities in this fair and equal healthcare system have been properly shown to all of us. . . you and your whiteness think that you can tell me what’s really going on with black people—like, is that what you’re doing, ’cause I think that’s what you’re doing, but I’m not sure, so I’m going to leave you space to tell me what you’re doing right now,” she said.

Bilkszto shut up.

That seemed like the end of that. 

In fact, it was just the beginning of Bilkszto’s harrowing, two-year descent into an ordeal of public shaming and isolation that ended only when he took his life last month.

“He was distraught,” Michael Teper, a Toronto accountant and friend of Bilkszto, told The Free Press.

“It was not only his job that was taken away from him, but his reputation, because those very people were assassinating his character. They claimed he was a white supremacist, that he was a racist. They knew nothing about him. They knew nothing about what he stood for or what he believed. All they know about is what they believe.”

As the lawsuit that Richard Bilkszto filed against the Toronto District School Board, or TDSB, later noted, he was a 24-year veteran of Toronto public schools. He had been a teacher, a vice principal, and a principal. He was respected by his colleagues.

“Richard Bilkszto is an experienced, effective, and highly accomplished educational leader,” the Toronto District School Board’s supervisory officer, Karen Falconer, said in a 2015 appraisal of his work. 

When Bilkszto announced his retirement in January 2019, Falconer said: “You have proven your excellence in equity, instruction, entrepreneurship, student engagement.” She called Bilkszto a “leader amongst leaders.”

Curtis Ennis, who was then a regional manager in the Ministry of Education, praised Bilkszto’s “brilliant service.”

Robert McManus, 60, a retired teacher who had been friends with Bilkszto since they’d met at Boy Scouts camp at age 11, said of Bilkszto: “He really listened. He really cared. If you had a problem, he was going to do his very best to help you. Obviously, these qualities went on to make him an amazing educator.”

After retiring, Bilkszto stayed on as a substitute principal, but he was eager to start thinking about the next phase of his life. He wanted to travel. 

Then, in late August 2020, Superintendent Leila Girdhar-Hill reached out to Bilkszto. The district desperately needed a principal to run Burnhamthorpe.

Bilkszto said he’d love to do it, but he was tied up until late September. 

“Later that evening,” according to the lawsuit, “Girdhar-Hill called Bilkszto to inform him that she had spoken with Executive Superintendent Uton Robinson. . . and they had both agreed Bilkszto was the right candidate for this position, given his unique qualifications [and] extensive experience in the Adult Education field.”

On September 21, Bilkszto started at Burnhamthorpe.

For the first several months everything went well, despite the pandemic and the lockdowns. 

On April 25, 2021, Falconer, now interim Director of Education, said to Bilkszto, “How long are you saving us at Burnhamthorpe? It is such a relief to know you are there.”

Two days later, on April 27, 2021, Leila Girdhar-Hill, the superintendent, informed Bilkszto that Dan MacLean, the TDSB trustee for Burnhamthorpe, was “very impressed” with Bilkzsto, according to the lawsuit, and asked if he could return for the next school year.

Bilkszto agreed.

[ Richard with his mother, Alice, who is still alive at 94. When she heard about her son’s death, “it looked like someone had ripped her heart out,” a relative told The Free Press. (Photo courtesy of Jason Bilkszto) ]

As it turned out, on April 26, 2021, the day before Dan MacLean offered to extend Bilkszto’s contract by a year, Bilkszto had his confrontation on Zoom with Kike Ojo-Thompson, the founder and CEO of the KOJO Institute.

The Toronto District School Board had hired the KOJO Institute to provide four two-hour diversity, equity, and inclusion training sessions to its administrators—for nearly $61,000.

Thompson launched the KOJO Institute, a Toronto-based diversity, equity, and inclusion consulting shop, in 1998, and her clients include H&M, United Way, the Centers for Disease Control, and the University of Toronto, according to the firm’s website. 

KOJO is part of a rapidly ballooning, global DEI marketplace—with companies big and small increasingly worried they’ll be accused of systemic racism, and a slew of diversity consultants eager to charge handsome fees to teach these companies’ employees how to avoid being racist. In 2020, companies spent $7.5 billion on DEI-related efforts. By 2026, that figure is expected to rise to $15.4 billion—despite growing concerns about the efficacy of such efforts. 

KOJO’s first session with the TDSB took place April 19, 2021. Bilkszto attended that meeting, which was uneventful. (It’s unclear what attendees discussed at the first session.)

It was at the second session the following Monday, April 26, 2021, that Bilkszto suggested that maybe Canada was not “the bastion of white supremacy” Thompson had made it out to be—noting, for example, that public schools serving Canada’s poorest students are generally better funded than their equivalents in the United States.

“As white people, there’s a whole bunch going on that isn’t your personal experience,” Thompson said at the second session. “It will never be. You will never know it to be so. You will never know it to be so. So your job in this work, as white people, is to believe.”

No one in the Zoom meeting challenged any assumptions or thought to ask questions like: Who counts as white? Or black? Who should be believed? Who shouldn’t be? What about the many white and black people who don’t fit snugly into Thompson’s ideological compartments?

As she wrapped up the discussion, Thompson said: “I just want to thank everybody for a proper, thorough session today. We got into the weeds and got the weed whacker out apparently. It was hot today. It was good. It was really good.”

That day, Sheryl Robinson Petrazzini, the executive superintendent of education—who is black—took to Twitter to show her support for Thompson. “When faced with resistance to addressing Anti-Black racism, we can’t remain silent as it reinforces harm to Black students and families,” Petrazzini wrote. “Thank you @KOJOInstitute for modeling the discomfort administrators may need to experience in order to disrupt ABR,” or anti-black racism. (She has since deleted the tweet.) 

The Petrazzini tweet “had a horrible effect on Richard,” according to Robert McManus, his longtime friend. It sent a message to the entire community of teachers and administrators, McManus said, that the school board approved of Bilkszto’s treatment—that he was guilty. (Petrazzini has since been promoted to director of education at another school district.)

It was at the third session on May 3, 2021—one week after Thompson’s public tongue-lashing of Bilkszto—that she decided to turn his “resistance” into a “teachable moment.”

“One of the ways that white supremacy is upheld, protected, reproduced, upkept, defended is through resistance,” Thompson explained—before laughing and going on to say: “I’m so lucky that we got perfect evidence, a wonderful example of resistance that you all got to bear witness to, so we’re going to talk about it, because, I mean, it doesn’t get better than this.” (Bilkszto’s attorney, Lisa Bildy, permitted The Free Press to listen to segments of the audio recordings of the training sessions.) 

Other attendees joined the pile on.

One woman, who Thompson calls “Lisa” on the recording, talked about white “discomfort” with open-ended discussions about race. 

Another woman, whose name is hard to make out on the recording, defended Thompson to the class while referring to Bilkszto as “the whiteness.” 

She said to Thompson: “I believe I heard you say—I’m a black woman, I’m telling you this—yet the whiteness said, ‘No, this is what I’m telling you,’ and that’s often the posture.’ They don’t want to hear what you’re saying. . . ”

No one came to Bilkszto’s defense.

“I think there was some back-channel texting while it was going on, where they acknowledged this was wrong,” Anthony Furey told me, alluding to other people in the DEI training session. Furey met Bilkszto while Furey ran in the recent Toronto mayoral race. “But the problem is nobody had the balls or leadership to stand up and say this is wrong.”

On May 4, 2021, the day after the third session, Bilkszto filed for sick leave. He missed the fourth and final session, the next Monday, and filed a complaint with school officials saying that he’d been harassed.

Ontario’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board looked into the matter. In August 2021, the board released its findings, stating that Thompson’s behavior was “abusive” and amounted to “workplace harassment.” Bilkszto was awarded seven weeks of lost pay.

But by then, Bilkszto was tainted goods.

Mike Ramsay, a friend of Bilkszto, told us: “His contracts were freezing up—and not a word from his former supervisors and colleagues. While he said some people were nice to him, for many others, he was not politically popular to be seen or be around.”

Richard Bilkszto was, above all, an educator, his friends and colleagues said. He didn’t have a partner or children. But he cared deeply about his students, and he was worried about the impact of the new identity-focused politics on the classroom, even though he was gay and, in an interview with The Free Press a few months before his death, voiced concern about transgender students being bullied.

“To me, being gay is a part of me,” Bilkszto said in the interview. “It’s not my identity. It’s not something I choose to put out there all the time. As a matter of fact, if people were having a conversation about, you know, ‘I don’t think there should be gay marriage,’ I’m not even offended by that if people are making rational arguments—as long as they’re not being homophobic.”

He added: “It’s about the whole cancelling and not allowing for free speech, free debate, and all those types of things. I’m a big free speech proponent.” Bilkszto said he thought Chris Rufo, the conservative activist who built his online following by spotlighting the excesses of wokeness, was spot on.

In his interview with The Free Press, Bilkszto sounded exasperated with the Toronto District School Board, saying that if he had kids he wouldn’t send them to the public schools. “It’s nothing about competence anymore,” he said. “It’s about your allegiance to the ideology.”

In April, Bilkszto sued the Toronto District School Board, citing Thompson’s “defamatory statements” and the unwillingness of administrators and other higher-ups at the TDSB to stand up for him—even though they had previously showered him with praise.

“Bilkszto has suffered and will continue to suffer damage to his character and reputation both personally and professionally,” the lawsuit states. “As well, Bilkszto has been subjected to embarrassment, scandal, ridicule, contempt, and severe emotional distress.” 

The lawsuit offered the hope of redemption. But it apparently wasn’t enough.

On July 13, Bilkszto jumped from his 16th-floor apartment in Toronto, ending his life. He apparently left a note, but loved ones did not want to share its contents. He was 60. 

[ Richard with his nephews Jason and Cody and niece Kate when they were children. “I miss my uncle. I don’t have him to ask for advice or guidance anymore. I feel like that’s been stolen from me,” Jason told The Free Press. (Photo courtesy of Jason Bilkszto) ]

“How can you not be allowed to slightly disagree with something without them tearing you apart for it?” Jason Bilkszto, Richard’s nephew, said in an interview with The Free Press. He was having trouble holding back his tears. 

“I miss my uncle. I don’t have him to ask for advice or guidance anymore. I wasn’t done getting advice from him. I feel like that’s been stolen from me.”

The last time Jason saw his uncle was June 19. It was Richard’s birthday and Father’s Day weekend, and the whole family gathered at Richard’s 94-year-old mother’s house. Richard made lasagna and salad.

“He seemed okay,” Jason, a chef who runs his own catering business, said. “He didn’t seem too stressed out or anxious. I can’t really say we noticed anything in particular that raised any alarms or anything.”

Robert McManus last spoke to Bilkszto July 12—the day before he committed suicide. “It was absolutely clear he was not sleeping well as a result of all the stress,” McManus said. “He was a very optimistic person, so the vast majority of the time, when people would be speaking to him, he would be seen as doing well, but his friends knew that he struggled—he struggled with what had happened to him.”

McManus added: “Our last conversation ended with me inviting him over to my place for a dinner party on Saturday, and he said, ‘See you Saturday.’ ”

Jason Bilkszto recalled that, when his grandmother—Richard’s mother—heard about her son’s death, “it looked like someone had ripped her heart out.”

Jason said he thinks his uncle was worried about the stain on the family name. “Our last name is very unique and not common at all,” he said, “and everyone’s on social media these days. I do think that maybe he was worried about our name and it affecting the rest of the family, because it is so uncommon. That was probably weighing on him.”

The Free Press reached out to Kike Ojo-Thompson and several of her colleagues at the KOJO Institute. No one agreed to talk. When we visited the KOJO Institute’s office—in a sleek, two-story brick building—no one appeared to be there.

On July 27, Thompson released a statement on the KOJO Institute’s site saying: “This incident is being weaponized to discredit and suppress the work of everyone committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion.” She added that “[W]e will not be deterred from our work in building a better society for everyone.”

In the wake of Bilkszto’s death, Ari Goldkind, a Toronto attorney, said the DEI consultants—and all the businesses, nonprofits, and school districts that hire them—are now “on notice” that these training sessions “can have horrendous, real-world consequences.”

“There’s a real possibility here that, moving forward, the DEI training session becomes much more litigious, with attendees who feel put upon or hurt or maligned, dangerously maligned—meaning they’re ostracized or rendered unemployable—striking back in court,” Goldkind said. “That’s the lesson of this tragedy, that people are sick and tired of being isolated and cast out from polite society because they have the gall to ask a question or challenge the orthodoxy.”

It’s been two weeks since Bilkszto’s death, and his friends can’t believe he’s gone. Once upon a time, Robert McManus said, Bilkszto was the centrifugal force around which everyone in their circle revolved. He was the energetic one, the one who was always the most enthusiastic about whatever anyone else was up to.

And then he seemed lost, Michael Teper said. He’d gone to Mexico earlier this year to get away from the madness, but when he came back, Teper said, the madness was waiting for him.

McManus said: “It’s hard to imagine my life without him. I’m saddened that, in his moment of need, no one defended Richard.” Had it been someone else, McManus added, “he would never have sat silently by.”

==

Like any authoritarian regime, wokeness has a body count.

"There’s a real possibility here that, moving forward, the DEI training session becomes much more litigious"

Good. These fundamentalist cultists have been given undeserved, unearned, self-appointed free reign over society for far too long. If the DIE organizations themselves can't be sued into oblivion, then hopefully businesses can be financially discouraged from engaging these hate preachers in the first place, to subject their employees to this harassment, bullying, ideological domination and thought control.

In China, this exact kind of intimidation and coercion was a form of Mao-era torture called a struggle session.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Struggle_session

Struggle sessions or denunciation rallies were violent public spectacles in Maoist China where people accused of being "class enemies" were publicly humiliated, accused, beaten and tortured by people with whom they were close. Usually conducted at the workplace, classrooms and auditoriums, "students were pitted against their teachers, friends and spouses were pressured to betray one another, [and] children were manipulated into exposing their parents". Staging, scripts and agitators were prearranged by the Maoists to incite crowd support. The aim was to instill a crusading spirit among the crowd to promote the Maoist thought reform. These rallies were most popular in the mass campaigns immediately before and after the establishment of the People's Republic of China and during the Cultural Revolution. The denunciation of prominent class enemies was often conducted in public squares and marked by large crowds of people who surrounded the kneeling victim, raised their fists, and shouted accusations of misdeeds.

The fantasists and fanatics can never be satisfied.

#Richard Bilkszto #victims of woke #struggle session #neoracism #antiracism as religion #antiracism #woke authoritarianism #woke totalitarianism #cult of woke #woke #wokeism #wokeness as religion #reeducation #Kike Ojo Thompson #KOJO Institute #diversity equity and inclusion #diversity #equity #inclusion #critical race theory #abuse #religion is a mental illness

[allthecanadianpolitics]

Black community leaders rallied at Queen's Park on Wednesday to fight against what they see as threats to anti-racism, diversity, and equity training in Ontario schools.

Advocates feel that work is under attack after the death by suicide of a former Toronto District School Board principal last month.

Richard Bilkszto, who worked on contract with the TDSB after his retirement in 2019, filed a lawsuit against the board in April, claiming that an anti-racism training session in 2021 and its aftermath destroyed his reputation. 

Bilkszto claimed supervisors did not intervene and later retaliated against him when trainer Kike Ojo-Thompson allegedly implied he was racist and humiliated him in front of colleagues after he disagreed that Canada was more racist than the U.S.

A lawyer for Bilkszto said her client died by suicide in July.

"It is clear to us, that his death has been used as a rallying point for right-wing opponents to dismantle the necessary and imperative anti-racism work," community leader Idris Orughu said outside the legislature [...]

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada, @vague-humanoid

#cdnpoli #racism #anti blackness #systemic racism #white fragility #suicide tw #education #Toronto #Ontario

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: David Millard Haskell

Published: Feb 15, 2024

Almost two months ago, Tesla CEO and Twitter (now X) owner Elon Musk, made critical statements on X about the field of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). In a post that’s now been viewed nearly 36 million times, Musk stated “DEI must DIE. The point was to end discrimination, not replace it with different discrimination.”

Recently, Musk showed he was willing to do his part to hasten DEI’s demise. In its official filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Tesla did a clean sweep of DEI language and references to DEI initiatives. The world’s largest electric vehicle manufacturer is now DEI-free.

Musk’s comment and related actions reflect a growing consensus that DEI ideology and instruction—educational materials steeped in critical social justice and offered as mandatory training by most corporations, educational systems and government agencies—does not work.

That is, it fails to deliver on its promise to reduce prejudice and produce greater harmony among groups. Ironically, as Musk observes, it appears to promote the divisive concept popularized by self-proclaimed “anti-racism” scholar and DEI guru, Ibram X. Kendi, that “the only solution to past discrimination is present discrimination.”

In the US, several high-profile controversies have further solidified the connection between questionable concepts (like Kendi’s) promoted in DEI training and reverse discrimination against Caucasians as well as academically successful Asians, and Israel-supporting Jews.

There have been similar DEI-influenced controversies in Canada. The suicide of Toronto public school principal Richard Bilkszto awakened many to the destructive nature of this caustic curriculum. When announcing his death, Bilkszto’s lawyer traced his deteriorating mental health and ultimate demise to a series of diversity, equity and inclusion workshops he had attended. (The allegations have not yet been proven in court.)

Recordings show that Bilkszto was subjected to repeat harassment and humiliation based on his skin colour after he politely questioned the DEI trainer about one of her claims.

Shortly after Bilkszto’s death in July of 2023, the trainer in question, Kiki Ojo-Thompson, released a statement on the website of her consulting company, the KOJO Institute. It said: “This incident is being weaponized to discredit and suppress the work of everyone committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion” which is “building a better society for everyone.”

But is it true that the concepts and training of DEI builds “a better society for everyone?”

This was a question that the Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy asked me to answer. To do that I examined the findings of the most significant DEI studies from recent decades published in top social scientific journals like the Annual Review of Psychology, Anthropology Now, Journal of Experimental Psychology, Psychological Science, and Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. Authors of the reviewed literature are from various universities including Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Michigan, Syracuse, Aberdeen and others.

What the research shows is surprising—for some. For example, claims that “DEI works!” are not supported; multiple meta-analyses of hundreds of studies could not discern any clear evidence that DEI instruction changes people’s attitudes for the better.

In one particularly damning analysis, the researchers concluded “Implementation of DT [Diversity Training] has clearly outpaced the available evidence that such programs are effective in achieving their goals.”

On the other hand, the research provides clear proof: DEI instruction can activate and even increase bigotry among participants.

You’d think that such a conclusion would cause our corporate, academic, and political leaders to immediately withdraw the millions they’re spending on DEI programs and DEI staff. But old habits die hard, especially when those enforcing the habits have to admit that they’ve been hoodwinked.

The practice of blood-letting lasted more than one thousand years and only began to fall out of fashion in the mid-1800s when a Parisian physician, Pierre Louis, finally decided to measure patient outcomes. To his surprise, the application of leeches to a person’s back or the cutting and draining of the vein at their elbow didn’t do anything positive and could make matters worse.

We now can say the same about DEI.

History is riddled with instances of scholarship exposed as snake oil. Let’s learn our lesson: In the absence of evidence, you need to throw out the leeches.

David Millard Haskell is the author of “What DEI research concludes about diversity training: It is divisive, counter-productive, and unnecessary.” He is a professor and researcher at Wilfrid Laurier University and a Senior Fellow with the Aristotle Foundation for Public Policy. 

--

By: David Millard Haskell

Published: Feb 12, 2024

Introduction

In July 2023, public school principal Richard Bilkszto killed himself. When announcing his death, Bilkszto’s lawyer traced his deteriorating mental health and ultimate demise to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) workshops his school board required him to attend.1 Recordings show that he was harassed and humiliated by the DEI trainer for questioning one of her claims.2

A growing number of high-profile cases suggest that diversity workshops and their supporting materials regularly promote questionable claims—particularly about the overarching, malicious character of the majority population.3 Similarly, hostility toward those who challenge DEI claims is part of the pattern.4 In Canada, students who challenge claims have been punished or expelled5; employees have been suspended.6 One whistleblower who leaked DEI training session material maligning the majority population lost his employment.7

While the hostility Bilszto was subjected to during his DEI training is not unusual, his extreme response to it is an outlier. But it also sounds an alarm. It draws our attention to the potentially negative nature of this instruction that is now ubiquitously conducted— usually as a mandatory exercise—in most corporations, educational systems, and government agencies.

The DEI training that Bilkszto attended focused heavily on race; this is typical. While DEI instruction can be as varied as it is pervasive, so-called “anti-racism education” tends to get the most attention during workshops.

Supporters justify DEI training—in particular, the “anti-racist” variety—with the argument that Canada, and Western nations generally, are systemically racist. The logic is this: the medicine must be applied everywhere because the disease is everywhere.

Specifically, DEI advocates assert that discrimination against minorities, while not explicit, is embedded in society’s institutions, and therefore leads to disparities. They hold up any difference in outcomes between the country’s majority and minority populations— at least when they skew negatively for the minority—as obvious proof of systemic racism.8

However, a rudimentary understanding of statistical analysis leads to the conclusion that it is in fact not “obvious” that differences in outcomes between racial and ethnic cohorts are evidence of racism; correlation does not equal causation. In fact, in his recent Reality Check on systemic racism claims in Canada, the Aristotle Foundation’s Matthew Lau evaluates the empirical data and comes to this conclusion:

If the typical anti-racism activist in Canada today is looking for widespread institutional or systemic racism… they will not find it. …Moreover, the data on disparities in income, educational attainment, occupational outcomes, and public school test scores show that, on average, Asians are doing better than the white population.9

Operating under the assumption that society is overrun with intolerance, the expressed goal in DEI workshops is to generate harmony amongst diverse populations. To that end, independent consultants or in-house DEI staff lead participants through a curriculum focusing on such concepts as implicit bias, white privilege, and micro-aggressions.

With reference to the existing scholarship, this Reality Check investigates whether diversity, equity, and inclusion instruction actually leads to greater harmony and tolerance—or to the opposite. As we will see, the national and international research10 shows there is often a disconnect between the evidence and the claims of DEI advocates. (See the appendix table for a short summary of the literature on DEI instruction.)

Diversity training in practice: Aggressive, and justified by circular “proofs”

To “prove” the effectiveness of DEI instruction, proponents often point to surveys conducted before and after workshops that show, following training, participants are much more likely to articulate answers that align with the pro-DEI ideas. That is to say, someone who takes the training can, afterwards, recite what they were told. In these testimonials it is seldom mentioned that for many participants job security and career advancement is contingent on giving the “right” answers.11

This type of methodology has drawn criticism and has proven to be unreliable. In a 2022 article, after reviewing the scholarly literature on DEI instruction, psychological researchers Patricia Devine and Tory Ash concluded that scholars of diversity training “too often use proxy measures for success that are far removed from the types of consequential outcomes that reflect the purported goals of such trainings.”12

A disconnect between DEI claims and DEI outcomes: A look at the literature

Despite criticism of their methods, proponents of DEI instruction continue to assert that it is effective. “Effective,” for them, means more than just reciting talking points from a workshop, they claim that their programs actually change behaviour. Websites and public documents from independent DEI consultants and in-house DEI office staff promise that because of their instruction, workplace harmony, productivity, and collaboration across groups will increase, discrimination will be reduced, and bias and bigotry will be lessened.13

However, the research does not support claims of behavioural change. For example, in their 2018 article “Why Doesn’t Diversity Training Work?” published in Anthropology Now, Harvard Sociologist Frank Dobbin and colleague Alexandra Kalev observed:

Nearly all Fortune 500 companies do training, and two thirds of colleges and universities have training for faculty according to our 2016 survey of 670 schools. Most also put freshmen through some sort of diversity session as part of orientation. Yet hundreds of studies dating back to the 1930s suggest that antibias training does not reduce bias, alter behaviour or change the workplace.14 Supporting Dobbin and Kalev’s observation, numerous systematic reviews and meta-analyses—an advanced research method that combines the data of multiple studies to identify overall trends—have determined that the ability of DEI training to elevate harmony and/or decrease prejudice (in any lasting way) is undetectable or negligible.15 Those systematic reviews and meta-analyses are cited in this paper’s endnotes; however, for the purpose of illustration, the key findings of some of the most significant and representative works are discussed below.

In a review of all available research between 2003 and 2008 focusing on the impact of DEI programs, Elizabeth Paluck, then at Harvard and now at Princeton, and Donald Green at Yale generated a sample of 985 studies. After aggregate, statistical assessment they concluded:

… the causal effects of many widespread prejudice-reduction interventions, such as workplace diversity training and media campaigns, remain unknown… Due to weaknesses in the internal and external validity of existing research, the literature does not reveal whether, when, and why interventions reduce prejudice in the world.16

Updating her research in 2021 with a second meta-analysis of over 400 current studies, Paluck and colleagues again found little evidence that instruction in diversity, equity, and inclusion works to decrease prejudice. They begin by stating: “Although these studies report optimistic conclusions, we identify troubling indications of publication bias that may exaggerate effects.”17

They then clarify what they mean by “exaggerate effects.” When examined through the lens of their rigorous methodology, Paluck and team found that the effect size of diversity-type training is near zero. This is of consequence because effect size measures the difference between those who participated in the training and those who did not. DEI proponents say their training makes a difference; the research disagrees. Importantly, the effect size (minimal as it was) decreased as the academic rigour of the study increased (e.g., as the sample size became larger).18

In their 2022 meta-analysis, Divine and Ash uphold the findings of Paluck and others writing:

Our primary conclusion following our review of the recent literature echoes that of scholars who conducted reviews of the DT [Diversity Training] literature in the past. Despite multidisciplinary endorsement of the practice of DT, we are far from being able to derive clear and decisive conclusions about what fosters inclusivity and promotes diversity within organizations. Implementation of DT has clearly outpaced the available evidence that such programs are effective in achieving their goals.19

Contributing to the muted outcomes of DEI programs, the meta-analyses repeatedly observe that even when diversity-type training seems to produce a measurable, positive effect, that effect tends not be enduring. Negative stereotypes and prejudices that appear to decrease immediately following a DEI workshop typically re-emerge when evaluated a few weeks or months later.20

DEI does have an impact… but it’s not positive

While the “good” of DEI training remains elusive, the harms associated with such instruction are less equivocal.

DEI instruction has been shown to increase prejudice and activate bigotry among participants by bringing existing stereotypes to the top of their minds or by implanting new biases they had not previously held. Reviewing the related findings of past research, Dobbin and Kalev state: “Field and laboratory studies find that asking people to suppress stereotypes tends to reinforce them—making them more cognitively accessible to people.”21

For example, in a laboratory setting, a University of Toronto research team led by Lisa Legault (now at Clarkson University) determined that race-focused DEI campaigns that exert strong pressure on people to be non-prejudiced backfired, yielding heightened levels of bigotry.22

Similarly, for their landmark paper “Out of mind but back in sight: Stereotypes on the rebound,” the University of Aberdeen’s Neil Macrae and colleagues conducted experiments measuring the outcomes of DEI-type training that, like Legault et al., asked participants to reject prejudicial stereotypes. They confirmed that in trying to suppress bigotry, DEI-type training can activate it:

Indeed, this work suggests that when people attempt to suppress unwanted thoughts, these thoughts are likely to subsequently reappear with even greater insistence than if they had never been suppressed (i.e., a “rebound” effect). … The results provide strong support for the existence of this effect… stereotype suppressors [those told to suppress their bias] responded more pejoratively to a stereotyped target on a range of dependent measures.23

Simply put, numerous studies show that when DEI-type workshop leaders instruct participants to suppress their biases—be they existing or newly implanted—many will cling to them more tightly and mentally generate additional justifications for their presence.24

The language and practice of division: DEI’s inequitable treatment and impact

While DEI-type instruction can activate prejudice in individuals of any race, in its ability to produce feelings of isolation and demoralization, it has a singular effect on the majority population.25 In his article “Diversity-related training: What is it good for?” Columbia University sociologist and research fellow Musa al-Gharbi summarizes the findings on that phenomenon:

Diversity-related training programs often depict people from historically marginalized and disenfranchised groups as important and worthwhile, celebrating their heritage and culture, while criticizing the dominant culture as fundamentally depraved (racist, sexist, sadistic, etc.) … In short, there is a clear double-standard in many of these programs… The result is that many members from the dominant group walk away from the training believing that themselves, their culture, their perspectives and interests are not valued at the institution—certainly not as much as those of minority team members—reducing their morale and productivity. … The training also leads many to believe that they have to “walk on eggshells” when engaging with members of minority populations…. As a result, members of the dominant group become less likely to try to build relationships or collaborate with people from minority populations.26

Illustrating al-Gharbi’s point that DEI instruction can lead participants to perceive the majority population less sympathetically, researcher Erin Cooley at New York’s Colgate University and her team found that teaching students about white privilege, a core component of the DEI curriculum, does not make them feel more compassion toward poor people of colour but can “reduce sympathy [and] increase blame… for White people struggling with poverty.”27

To al-Gharbi’s point that such instruction hinders unity, a 2022 study from the University of Michigan analyzed online discussions and found that mention of white privilege made even previously “supportive whites” less supportive of racially progressive policies, less engaged in group discussions, and “led to less constructive responses from whites and non-whites.”28

While the Caucasian majority is typically the focus of contempt in DEI instruction, leaving them feeling isolated and demoralized, increasingly participants of Asian ethnicity are also being targeted. In achieving, on average, greater salary and educational outcomes than the majority population (as Matthew “DEI instruction has been shown to increase prejudice and activate bigotry among participants by bringing existing stereotypes to the top of their minds or by implanting new biases they had not previously held.” What DEI research concludes about diversity training Lau showed in his Reality Check),29 this community presents a problem to the major claim of DEI instruction that skin colour or ethnicity matters most for success.

The solution that some DEI advocates have adopted is to deny that Asians qualify as visible minorities. They claim that having outcomes similar to the majority population puts one in the majority population and excludes one from being a “person of colour.”30 Borrowing ideas from academic race studies,31 some DEI proponents have begun to refer to Asians as “white adjacent” (or near white) and have accused them of perpetuating “white supremacy.”32 On the extreme end, certain school boards in the United States have gone so far as to remove the category “Asian” from student profiles, lumping anyone of Asian ancestry into the “White” category.33

Beyond denying minority status to those of Asian ancestry, the current trend among DEI consultants and departments is to weight the scales against them (a move reminiscent of the institutional racism they faced in some Western countries during the 19th and early 20th century34). Nowhere has this been more obvious than in college admissions in the US. Striking evidence shows that, for the benefit of diversity and inclusion, Asian students are being excluded from some of America’s most elite universities.35

Specifically, submissions before the US Supreme Court disclosed that when applying to Harvard, the University of North Carolina, and other universities, students of Asian descent are required to hold entrance exam scores “450 points higher than black [students]… to have the same chance of admission.”36 Thus, out of a possible score of 1600 for combined math and verbal skills on the SAT, Asian students need to be nearly perfect.37

Such universities justify their unequal standards for admission by citing their commitment to a core notion of DEI instruction: “Diversity is our strength.” They note that without intervention, the proportion of Asian students would skyrocket leaving less room for other visible minorities. That is, there would be “diversity” but not the right type of diversity. Therefore, to achieve the right outcomes, criteria other than academic merit need to be implemented.38

In the US, these unequal standards have been successfully challenged. In summer of 2023, citing violations of America’s Fourteenth Amendment and federal civil rights law, the Supreme Court ruled that universities cannot discriminate by race when making admission decisions.39

Canada has no such legislation; in fact, our Charter of Rights and Freedoms40 and our human rights laws41 allow for discrimination against the majority population. This constitutional allowance has now resulted in employment postings that, in the name of DEI, explicitly promote reverse or “recycled racism.”42

Conclusion

While job candidates not categorized as a minority are increasingly prevented from applying for certain employment openings, the research shows that a reputation for promoting DEI can more generally affect job applications to an organization. Specifically, findings reveal that some Caucasian candidates perceive organizations that heavily promote messages of diversity and inclusion as potentially discriminatory work environments.43

DEI’s negative perception extends beyond potential job candidates. Two-thirds of human resource specialists—those in charge of overseeing DEI initiatives—report that diversity training does not have positive effects.44 Interestingly, both the research into DEI and the majority of those involved in such training have arrived at the same conclusion: when it comes to harmony and tolerance, DEI does not make things better, but it can make things worse.

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It's time to start talking about DEI the same way we talk about homeopathy. It's fake, it's unscientific, it's not based on evidence, and not only doesn't work, it makes things worse.

In the case of DEI, this is not a bug, it's a feature.

Marx was frustrated that he could not get the proletariat to rise up against the bourgeoisie, because they were comfortable, especially with the free market producing inexpensive items of comfort.

DEI's objective isn't to unify, it's explicitly to divide, to agitate for "liberation," a violent revolution in which liberal secular society is torn down. Those designated "oppressed" are supposed to come out feeling paranoid and persecuted, and those designated "oppressors" are supposed to come out feeling guilty and shamed. Because then the expectation is they'll both work together to destroy society and replace it with a Maoist, Leninist "utopia." The kind that killed millions.

#David Millard Haskell #diversity equity and inclusion #diversity #equity #inclusion #DEI bureaucracy #DEI apparatchiks #antiracism #antiracism as religion #neoracism #pseudoscience #cultural homeopathy #religion is a mental illness

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