Need To Know with Dr. Nsenga Burton-Understanding the Attack on DEI

BEP Narrator: 00:00:02

A Black Executive Perspective now presents Need to Know

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with the award winning hyphenated Dr.

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Nsenga Burton.

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Dr.

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Burton.

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What do we need to know?

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Dr. Nsenga Burton: Hi, this

is Nsenga Burton bringing you

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your need to know moment today.

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And today we're going to be talking

about the wonderful DEI, diversity,

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equity, and inclusion, which is under

attack by many, many different factions.

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Of our society, um, DEI which is really

about inclusion and belonging and making

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sure that people who are usually qualified

and overly qualified, um, have access to

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the same, um, types of jobs, education,

you know, various institutions as.

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Those who have been part of the, um,

ruling class is what we would say

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in academic setting, but those who

have been historically empowered.

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So, you know, diversity, equity and

inclusion is really about historically

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disenfranchised populations and

how to bring them into the fold in

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a way that is equitable as we try

to create a more fairer society.

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Fair and just, or some would

say egalitarian society.

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So it's been really interesting, um, as

of late that DEI, um, has become sort

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of a Republican dog whistle, um, and has

been presented as something other than

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the desire to create a more equitable

and just society, but it has become,

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uh, a term that is now, um, aligned

with being less than, uh, with being,

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um, Unqualified with being, uh, part

of a movement and this is not true.

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Right?

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These are just what people are saying and

doing in order to take away opportunities

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from historically disenfranchised

populations and these options that they

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otherwise would not have because we do

know when these Members of a historically

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disenfranchised populations met all the

criteria, met all of the qualifications

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exceeded those qualifications.

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They still were not given the nod.

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They still were not admitted to schools.

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They still were not given jobs or

awarded jobs that they had applied for.

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Some weren't even allowed

to have interviews.

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Right?

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And so all of these things, um.

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Are tied up in diversity, equity and

inclusion and why, you know, diversity,

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equity and inclusion is important.

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So, an example of what I'm talking

about when we talk about a dog whistle

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is when you change the meaning of

something so that it becomes, um,

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it becomes a, A negative, right?

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It becomes, uh, something other

than what is an original intent is.

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So example, uh, you all have been watching

the unfolding of, or the aftermath

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of the collapse of the Francis Scott

Key Bridge in Baltimore last month,

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you know, it's in Maryland and, um.

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You know, it was purely an accident.

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It's still under investigation,

but for all intents and purposes,

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it was an accident that happened.

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In fact, the people who warned, uh,

the police, uh, who subsequently

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died in the accident, the only

people to have died in the accident,

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uh, were, uh, immigrants, right?

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So, um, and Latinx immigrants,

um, who were working.

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Um, on the bridge at the

time of the collapse.

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So had they not been employed, we don't

know what would have happened or might

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have happened, but we do know that

they did warn the police, um, and the

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police were able to keep people from

going onto the bridge, which would

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have led to a greater catastrophe.

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I say all of those things to say,

this is an accident that happened.

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The mayor of Baltimore is

Brandon Scott, a young man.

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He's 39 years old, native Baltimorean.

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And the governor of Maryland

is Wes Moore again, native

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Baltimorean, um, African American.

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Um, and the port commissioner

is a black woman named Corinthia

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Barber, again, native Baltimorean.

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I lived in Baltimore for 10 years.

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So, I am familiar with Baltimore,

its politics and all of the, the

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things, um, um, that, uh, are

surrounding this particular case.

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I've driven across the Francis

Scott Key Bridge many, many times.

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Um, so when this happened, what

happened, uh, or some of the things

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that you might have seen is, um, people

on Twitter saying, oh, the DEI Mayor.

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Um, this is why this accident

happened because they have an

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unqualified DEI Mayor in place.

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This is why this accident happened

because they have an unqualified

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DEI port commissioner in place.

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This is why this accident happened

because we have the DEI governor

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unqualified governor in place.

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Right?

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So, this idea that anything that is

diverse, particularly black, right?

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It's rooted in anti black racism, but

anything that is diverse anything that is

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black has to be less than an unqualified.

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Right?

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Even when the facts state the

opposite, it was an accident.

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Accidents do happen.

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It was awful that this happened.

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Um, and there was no attention paid to

the quick response, um, by the governor

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who looked very presidential to me.

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Um, by Mr.

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Scott, you know, Brandon, um, who

looked like a leader of a city

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and a, uh, uh, county and a state.

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You know, that was under

great duress because of this.

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Um, and so you have like, Phil

Lyman, who's a GOP Republican

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gubernatorial candidate out of Utah.

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Who's saying, you know, calling

them the DEIs right versus.

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Calling them by their names and so

what this does is 1st of all, it

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makes people have, um, an incorrect

understanding of what is right.

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And my lines and miss labels.

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This is the 2nd part lines and this

labels people and what they're doing.

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Third, it dehumanizes whole human

beings like Wes Moore and Brandon

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Scott and Corinthia ba uh, barber,

uh, it dehumanizes them so that you

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feel okay about calling them less

than or underqualified, um, because

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you know, you value them less, right?

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All of those things happen when you

use these dog whistle tactics, right?

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You, you use these tactics.

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To bring out the conservatives, to

bring out the people, to criticize,

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um, who have no real information.

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Um, and the same thing would have

happened had you had Republicans

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in office at that time, right?

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This was an accident was that was

unavoidable, um, to a large extent.

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Um, and then the challenges that were

happening, um, have nothing to do with

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those individuals or their qualifications.

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So why would you do that?

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Um, Other than to mislead people,

so I'm gonna wrap this up, but I

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just wanted to be clear that DEI

which is actually a positive thing.

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It's about diversity, equity, inclusion

and belonging, creating a sense of

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belonging so that people can be a part

of whatever institution business church.

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Educational institution, whatever

institution, um, they can be a part of it.

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If they are qualified, if they

want to, and then if they do gain

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admittance that they are treated

fairly and equitably once they are

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there, that is what diversity equity

and inclusion is about is not about.

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You know, given handouts to people, it's

not about putting people in places who

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are unqualified, even though we've seen

a lot of that happening, particularly

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under this previous administration,

national administration, which is

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why the mail system is in a complete

disarray and horribly run currently.

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But, you know, we don't

talk about that person.

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We don't say, oh, they put

another white man in there.

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So it's gonna be terrible.

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Because it's ridiculous.

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That sounds ridiculous, right?

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Yeah.

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Okay.

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And I know it's not equally yoked.

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What I am saying is, and it's not an equal

argument because of the power dynamics.

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But what I'm saying to you

is DEI is a good thing.

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DEI is about giving people who

are qualified and who have paid

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their dues and who have done

what they needed to do a shot.

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In a place, often a workplace, often

an educational institution that they

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normally would not get the nod for

just because they're actually black

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or they're actually Latinx or they're

Asian or they're whatever, right?

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They wouldn't get the nod necessarily.

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So that's what it is about.

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It's about inclusion, right?

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Not about unqualified people

getting jobs they don't deserve and

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running the country into the ground.

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So I just wanted to make that clear.

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And that is your need to

know note from Nsenga.

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BEP Narrator: A black.

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Executive perspective.