DEI can be weaponized to enforce rather than repair exclusion

Evidence

In this context, DEI efforts become complicit in anti-Palestinian racism when they are strategically used to cover up how university administrations uphold compulsory Zionism by oppressively disciplining faculty and students who are against the genocide. Punishing student and faculty activists accomplishes the opposite of DEI; instead of inclusion, it aggressively excludes. Given that it is effectively recoding and reversing social justice issues, it is ironic that DEI emerged in response to a backlash against affirmative action and to maintain a commitment to repairing a history of inequality through creating diverse, inclusive, and equitable campuses. … Today, DEI normalizes the Zionist ideology responsible for genocide. — Evelyn Alsultany, Antisemitism and Islamophobia The…, 38

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to critiques of DEI co-optation by organizational power structures generally, and to censorship of Palestine activism on US campuses. — connects to: Crime can be redefined as tort requiring repair rather than retribution; Subtler punishment masked sovereign power rather than making it more humane
• QUESTION: What evidence does the author marshal for calling DEI ‘gaslighting’ and for claiming DEI normalizes Zionism? Worth verifying the strength of the causal claim.

Broader Connections

• Crime can be redefined as tort requiring repair rather than retribution #responds-to (0.75)
• Subtler punishment masked sovereign power rather than making it more humane #complicates (0.65)