Are YOU a Good Candidate?
By Stanley K. Ridgley in American Greatness
April 25, 2023
Demand for Diversity Officers may have peaked and may even be on the wane. The Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion hustle is running its course and may soon be out of steam, but it’s not too late to collect your share of the loot. This means you shouldn’t delay applying for one of the lucrative positions carrying the generic title of “DEI Officer.”
While the typical DEI position requires no expertise of any sort, it does require a collection of attitudes toward your fellow men and women, an ability to utter shameless platitudes and clichés, and embrace a clearly identifiable and primitive Manichean worldview grounded in paranoia. All of this is discussed in detail in Brutal Minds.
If you aim to become a promising candidate for a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) position, either in the corporate world or in academia, you can easily discover if you have the necessary self-conscious virtue by taking this five-minute employment aptitude survey.
Answer “Yes” to the following statements if you agree, and add or subtract the points assigned for each question based on your Yes answer. Then score yourself by comparing your results with those in the chart at the end. Good luck!
1) I am not appreciated for my many talents. +3
2) I am inherently suspicious of others. +3
3) I believe that America is the land of opportunity. -3
4) I believe that I have access to truths denied to others. +5
5) I believe that I must work hard for my reward. -3
6) I believe in a world that is divided into oppressors and oppressed, exploiters and exploited and that these groups are easily identified by the color of their skin. +5
7) I believe that I can work to give in-groups preferential treatment while simultaneously saying that there are no racial or gender preferences at our institution. +3
8) I believe that I should bring my “authentic self” to work, irrespective of any other considerations. +5
9) I believe, like Frederick Douglass, that in America, one can pull oneself up “by the bootstraps” to succeed. -7
10) If I fail in my job, I immediately search for the reason in causes external to me, such as the “system” or the “unearned advantages” available to other people. +7
11) If people question me and ask for evidence for what I say, I immediately attack them for their “resistance” to the truth that I offer in my story. +5
12) I believe that “indigenous” forms of knowledge such as the “medicine wheel” and the “talking stick” should be incorporated into our scientific discourse. +7
13) I always list my pronouns in my email signature and social media profiles. +3
14) I recognize that today’s “Diversity” office resembles the Soviet Union’s old Political Commissariat, where political ideologues occupied positions to report on the political reliability of those who actually worked to accomplish the mission. -10 BONUS POINTS: If you know this but believe it’s a good thing. +15
15) Anyone who disagrees with the lofty goals of “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” is guilty of “diversity resistance.” +5
16) I believe that a doctorate in education, sociology, or gender studies is every bit as important and impressive as a doctorate in physics. +3
17) When people respond to my charges of “racism” in a particular company or university, with bothersome requests for evidence, examples, or proof, I complain of being attacked, invalidated, and dehumanized rather than taking the opportunity to prove my point. +5
18) I believe that “stories” and “narratives” are just as important and as convincing as knowledge grounded in logic, reason, and the scientific method. +7
19) As women are 50 percent more likely to earn bachelor’s degrees than men, this shows we need to do everything we can to support women in higher education. +3
20) I am familiar with the racialist statement “skinfolk aren’t always kinfolk,” and I look with suspicion at persons with whom I share the superficial characteristic of race but who disagree with me. +7
21) I routinely drop the word “systemic” into conversations. +3
22) I use the terms “white supremacy” and “white privilege” comfortably and un-ironically, without awareness that they are equivalent to scapegoat devil terms such as the bourgeoisie, or Kulaks, or International Jewry, or infidels to explain all the bad that happens. +5
23) I believe that the best method for advancing our knowledge and understanding of the physical world is logic, reason, and the type of inquiry we call the scientific method. -10
24) I believe that people like Ijeomo Oluo, Paulo Freire, Ibram Kendi, and Derald Wing Sue have important things to say about our society that get to the inner truth. +5
24) I don’t pay much attention to the fantasies, “stories,” and pseudoscience of Ijeomo Oluo, Paulo Freire, Ibram Kendi, and Derald Wing Sue. -7
25) I believe in something called “diversity science,” which substantiates the basic beneficial tenets of the diversity agenda. +5
26) I believe that “diversity science” is pseudo-scientific twaddle fabricated by off campus nonprofits and imported into universities and the corporate world. -10
27) The Brazilian educationist Paulo Freire and his Pedagogy of the Oppressed inspires me to work for social justice, emancipation, and against oppression in all its forms. +5
28) I know that Paulo Freire was a crypto-Maoist who borrowed almost all of his education theory from Mao Zedong’s murderous Cultural Revolution, which Freire greatly admired. -5 BONUS POINTS: If you know this but believe it’s a good thing. +15 .
29) I believe any disagreement with my worldview can be overcome with more “education.” +3
30) I divide society into “oppressors” and “oppressed,” “exploiters” and “exploited,” and I know that this is a primitive Manichean way of looking at society that resembles a medievalist world divided into “infidels” and “believers.” +5 BONUS POINTS: If you do this and believe it’s a good thing. +5
31) I believe in “inclusion and belonging” as fervently as any member of Reverend Moon’s Unification Church believes in “peace and unity.” +3
32) I believe that I have attained “critical consciousness” and that those who disagree with my ideology are afflicted with “false consciousness” and must be taught to embrace a new belief system. +5
33) I believe that “critical consciousness” and “false consciousness” constitute a tautological contrivance that updates Karl Marx’s notion of “class consciousness” for race and gender sensibilities. -5 BONUS POINTS: I recognize that critical consciousness is the latest play on Plato’s cave allegory from his Republic of the 4th century B.C. -5 DOUBLE-BONUS POINTS: If you know the foregoing and believe they are good things. +15 TRIPLE-BONUS POINTS: I don’t know who Plato is. +10
34) I believe that the poetry of Audre Lorde is profound, particularly her “master’s tools” line. +2
35) I recognize that Audre Lorde’s “master’s tools” line is pedestrian. -7
36) “Inclusion and belonging” sounds too close to a cult slogan for me to feel comfortable with it. -7
37) I believe that I should be called “Doctor” just like Jill Biden because I wrote a 120-page “dissertation” for my Ed.D. that explores my feelings about the education program I just completed, and which required zero research. +7
38) I am thrilled—thrilled—that “I finally get to use my master’s degree” in educational leadership to bring people to critical consciousness. +3
Good candidate? You make the call!
+40 and above: Welcome aboard, commissar! Get ready to Do the Work!
+39-30: Not the perfect package but you’re ready to share authentic stories, struggle against “supremacy,” and do some dismantling!
+29-20: A few more weeks of amplifying “marginalized voices” should bolster your score
+19-10: You’re not committed enough—time for a “difficult dialogue” and a “courageous conversation,” capped off with a “Brave Space”
+9-0: Hands behind your back—your struggle session is through that door.
-1 and below: Racist!