{"id":76634,"date":"2025-02-04T14:41:32","date_gmt":"2025-02-04T19:41:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thestoryexchange.org\/?p=76634"},"modified":"2025-08-11T10:14:55","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T14:14:55","slug":"dei-is-not-to-blame-for-what-ails-us-dumb-arrogant-men-are","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thestoryexchange.org\/dei-is-not-to-blame-for-what-ails-us-dumb-arrogant-men-are\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018DEI\u2019 is Not to Blame for What Ails Us \u2013 Dumb, Arrogant Men Are"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Elon Musk, President Donald Trump and their cronies are at the heart of what ails us, says Candice Helfand-Rogers. (Credit: Department Of Government Efficiency X account<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Over the weekend, a report from Wired<\/a> revealed that the team leading Elon Musk\u2019s takeover of our government \u2013 and of our sensitive personal data \u2013 is just six members strong. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

None of the men \u2013 boys, really \u2013 who make up the so-called Department of Government Efficiency Task Force are old enough to rent cars. Several are too young to even drink alcohol<\/a>. But all the same, they now have control of the Office of Personnel Management, the General Services Administration, and the Treasury Department\u2019s payment system.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s shady, careless, power-grabbing work on the part of incompetent individuals, Musk chief among them, who are moving without accountability, and with only their own best interests in mind. \u201cWhat we’re seeing is unprecedented in that you have these actors who are not really public officials gaining access to the most sensitive data in government,\u201d Don Moynihan, a public policy professor at the University of Michigan, told Wired. \u201cWe really have very little eyes on what’s going on. Congress has no ability to really intervene and monitor what’s happening, because these aren’t really accountable public officials.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He continued: \u201cThis feels like a hostile takeover of the machinery of governments by the richest man in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The lawsuits blocking said takeover have already been filed<\/a>, but \u2026 President Donald Trump<\/a>\u2019s long-ago promise to hire the \u201cbest people<\/a>\u201d continues to function solely as a mirthless joke. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This news comes as we continue to reel in the wake of several horrific aviation accidents \u2013 the biggest<\/a> among them involving a collision between a commercial airline flight and an Army Black Hawk helicopter over Washington, D.C. airspace.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Related<\/h4>\n <\/div>\n \n
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\n \n \"\"\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n
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\n \n Somehow, Women and \u2018DEI\u2019 Are to Blame for the Trump Rally Shooting\n <\/a>\n <\/h3>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n\n

Now, experts have cautioned<\/a> against making logical leaps about causes, even including the potential relationship between these recent accidents and Trump\u2019s gutting of the Federal Aviation Administration, or his hiring freeze on air traffic controllers. Jim Cardoso, senior director of the University of South Florida\u2019s Global and National Security Institute, told PBS that \u201cthe actions by President Trump would not have led to such an immediate impact.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This call for patience and reticence hasn\u2019t stopped Trump and his supporters from formulating noxious theories of their own, however.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even before the identities of the pilots were released, conservatives were blaming \u201cDEI\u201d efforts \u2013 short for diversity, equity and inclusion programs \u2013 for the crash. We\u2019re not just talking about random internet bums or conservative sycophants in Congress, either \u2013 Trump himself was touting this theory in a press conference the day after the crash, seemingly blaming DEI hiring practices<\/a> for the tragedy. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And when it was revealed that one of the Black Hawk pilots was a woman, Rebecca Lobach<\/a>, the swamp that is the online manosphere exploded, crowing about how<\/a> \u201cfeminism is the original DEI, and it destroyed this country.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to gutting and shuttering DEI programs <\/a>throughout federal government \u2013 one of the new administration\u2019s first acts \u2013 a ripple effect has been created. The still-majority-white-male owners of our biggest companies are now rolling back their own efforts<\/a>, ones that had created pipelines for marginalized individuals routinely excluded from higher tiers of corporate life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But here\u2019s the thing: Studies show that companies who did implement such measures benefited from them. Higher profits<\/a>, increased innovation<\/a>, boosts in employee morale<\/a>. In particular, having more women in charge<\/a> yields better results for the companies that don\u2019t exclude them.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Try telling that to the DOGE Task Force, though.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No really \u2013 tell them. Tell everyone, in fact. Part of dissenting amid a hostile takeover involves naming things for what they are, and not ceding ground on objective truths. The Earth is not flat<\/a>, to name one example. Trump is a convicted felon<\/a> and rapist<\/a>, to name another. And diversity has been proven to make us better, and stronger, while these unqualified-yet-power-hungry men are making us worse. Weaker. Significantly more vulnerable, in all the worst ways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump, Musk and their ilk have already taken control of so much, including sensitive parts of our official identities \u2013 we cannot let them take control of the narrative, too. ◼️<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Women and minorities didn\u2019t start the fires that burn around us, metaphorically or literally. No, those were lit by the ones who have always been in charge, Candice Helfand-Rogers writes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":76636,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"autoblue_enabled":true,"autoblue_custom_message":"Elon Musk, President Donald Trump and their cronies are at the heart of what ails us, says this op-ed.","autoblue_shares":[{"did":"did:plc:l2n6ydtigm3gtra4vb4rfl7f","date":"2025-02-04T19:41:40+00:00","uri":"at:\/\/did:plc:l2n6ydtigm3gtra4vb4rfl7f\/app.bsky.feed.post\/3lheste7ivh2e","response":"{\"uri\":\"at:\/\/did:plc:l2n6ydtigm3gtra4vb4rfl7f\/app.bsky.feed.post\/3lheste7ivh2e\",\"cid\":\"bafyreibrpttn5gkymkk6nikb55lkzi3onqhlxwyytjdrrn3t5ctbkxntqi\",\"commit\":{\"cid\":\"bafyreigbq7nqvwao6not4is6viuurrmguxcuitmdekonhkll3cirvhbgdy\",\"rev\":\"3lheste7pq72e\"},\"validationStatus\":\"valid\"}"}],"autoblue_post_url":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19648],"tags":[20633,20194,21351,19645],"class_list":["post-76634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-corporate-governance","tag-diversity-and-inclusion","tag-government-accountability","tag-opinion"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAn Op-Ed About Sexism and Incompetence in Powerful Men<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Women and minorities didn\u2019t start the fires that burn around us. 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