Dr. Sherita Hill Golden, chief diversity officer for the Johns Hopkins Medical School, defined privilege as “a set of unearned benefits given to people who are in a specific social group” that operates on “personal, interpersonal, cultural and institutional levels.”
She provided a list of privileged social groups, which included white people, able-bodied people, heterosexuals, cisgender people, males, Christians, middle- or owning-class people, middle-aged people and English-speaking people.
When I drive around town, I see lots of homeless people. They're almost all white, and mostly male English speakers. Many are "middle-aged."
Because DEI intentionally ignores class in favor of identity, it has no concern for these individuals. (Yeah, she talks about "middle- or owning-class people" as if those two groups were at all similar. What unearned privilege do middle class people have? How is a trucker, or other worker, who "owns" a home the same as Musk or Oprah?)
DEI is deeply flawed, both morally and practically.
Why does DEI ignore class, or get it wrong? Because it is intensionally divisive, and because most of its funding comes from foundations established by wealthy individuals who prefer to keep us ordinary folks at each others' throats, instead of theirs.
The original Civil Rights movement had none of these flaws: it accomplished much and promoted unity. It focussed on equal opportunity and fairness, which are deeply rooted and shared American values. It aimed at making the country live up to its beliefs and ideals. It aimed at helping people who needed help, rather than attacking those who were getting by.
The Civil Rights movement focussed on ending discrimination -- which remains a worthy goal. It did not demonize people by labelling them with the harmful and dubious epithet "privileged." The only meaningful definition of "privilege" is "not discriminated against." That's not some unearned and undeserved characteristic of certain groups (except for the extremely wealthy -- for which it is indeed appropriate): it's a societal ideal that all of us should enjoy. The word "privilege" is a tool designed to divide, not to aid.
DEI, as it exists today, is nothing like the Civil Rights movement. It has no end goal. Since people (thankfully) differ in skin colors, DEI asserts that racism will endure forever. DEI is an intentionally harmful agenda, designed not to eliminate or ameliorate a harmful power hierarchy, but to invert it, while leaving those at the very top in place.
Socialists, of which I am not one, understood all of this very early. They saw CRT, DEI, "woke" as means to keep us divided.
DEI must go.
