Pining for the Patriarchy

A scorched-earth campaign to keep it intact

Credit: Getty Images

Of all the complaints, grievances, and gripes coming from the White House, the great majority have been directed at an aspect of 21st century America that Donald Trump just can’t seem to handle: diversity, equity, and inclusion. These three words tie him in knots. DEI raises his IRE.

Several of the executive orders he’s signed since taking office are aimed at eliminating DEI programs within the federal government, in education, and in the private sector.

Trump has weaponized DEI in the ever-worsening culture wars. It has become the go-to for killing any program that enables a diverse workforce or student body, studies underserved communities, or tackles institutional bias. He also uses it to absolve himself. Midair collision? Blame DEI.

For Trump, rooting out any and all DEI is fulfilling a campaign promise to end “wokeness” and “leftist indoctrination” in education. Some might call it a blanket excuse to blow up programs he doesn’t like. Just tag it DEI and be done with it.

This White House wants everything to be “merit based.” Trump has convinced his supporters that DEI stands for “didn’t earn it.”

This is hypocrisy, especially when you consider some of his Cabinet appointments. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth pretty much kills their argument for merit-based hiring.

Let’s take a step back for what’s known in television as the wide shot. Here’s what this is really all about: white men whining.

You can’t call it a dog whistle, because that would suggest Trump is trying to hide his derision for DEI. He is not. His executive orders are announcing that it is open season to be brazenly, unapologetically racist, sexist, homophobic, ageist, xenophobic, ableist — pick your bigotry.

The MAGA backlash to DEI is an outgrowth of the identity politics that have taken a greater hold in the United States over the past 10 years. The reaction has been building for a while but has recently grown deeper and stronger.

The 2015 Supreme Court decision legalizing gay marriage could be seen as the start. The #MeToo movement, which was partly a response to revelations about Harvey Weinstein’s sexual misconduct, took hold in 2017. The police killing of George Floyd spurred the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020.

White males have had a disproportionate share of power in the United States since its founding. But the country’s demographics are changing, with the U.S. becoming less white. In the year 2000, 69% of the population was white; just 20 years later, that percentage was down to 58%. The group making the biggest population gain is Latinos. Is it any wonder Trump still wants to build that wall on the Mexican border?

And recent trends will continue. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, white people may still be a plurality but no longer a majority in America by 2045. Trump is desperately trying to stop the clock, and even reverse it, with his executive orders.

So far the orders have:

• Put all government DEI employees on administrative leave and ordered each federal agency to eliminate their positions.

• Ended all diversity programs in the U.S. military and federal agencies.

• Rescinded a 1965 executive order prohibiting racial discrimination in federal contracts.

• Directed his Cabinet secretaries to “prepare up to nine civil investigation targets” along with “other strategies to encourage the private sector to end illegal DEI discrimination and preferences.”

• Required all federal contractors to eliminate DEI programs, which includes all grant recipients.

Cumulative far-right outrage over programs seen as helping and promoting people of color, women, the LGBTQ+ community, and immigrants, combined with the fear of straight white men losing status and power, has brought us to this crossroads.

During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump recognized all of this as an umbrella wedge issue, and it helped win him the White House. One of his most repeated lies was that Kamala Harris and Democrats wanted to force gender-affirming surgery on schoolchildren without their parents’ knowledge. As ludicrous as that sounds, he wouldn’t have kept saying it if it hadn’t hit a nerve.

And now his anti-DEI rhetoric is coming to fruition with potentially devastating consequences.

As mentioned above, Trump intends to eliminate anything and everything with even a whiff of DEI and that includes grants given by the National Institutes of Health. NIH is the largest public funder of medical research in the world. Because of NIH grants, the United States is the world leader in cancer and infectious disease research. The speed with which drug companies were able to create a Covid vaccine, which helped end the pandemic, was a direct result of NIH grants.

Most NIH grant money goes to research universities. Those schools now “must certify” that they do not “operate any programs promoting” DEI. Because of Trump’s DEI purge, any university, medical school, or other institution engaging in research that could be deemed DEI is in jeopardy of having its funding stripped. Retribution for perceived “wokeness” of institutions of higher learning? And this pertains not just to future funding but to money already awarded.

In 2023, $35 billion worth of competitive NIH grants were awarded for medical research as well as studies on health care equity and urban literacy rates. And it is not just areas of study that are being targeted, but the grantees as well. Historically Black colleges and universities receive a lot of NIH money, which may now be pulled.

The White House has released a list of words NIH grant seekers may no longer use, including women, trauma, disability, biased, systemic, inclusive.

It seems the writer of this list does not realize that some words have more than one meaning. How would a trauma surgeon apply for a grant? Apparently researchers can no longer study the effects of a drug on a certain sex, though doctors know that many drugs affect men and women differently. The word “bias” has several meanings, and it’s especially important in science and statistical analysis. But grant writers, beware: “Bias” is not allowed.

You will never convince Trump, his operation, or his most avid followers that DEI is not the devil. But it is still important to keep pointing out that what is happening is bound to have many unintended consequences. Besides the moral and ethical implications of eliminating NIH grants, there is a considerable economic impact. NIH funding supports more than 400,000 jobs in the United States. According to United for Medical Research, every NIH dollar spent generates $2.50 in additional economic activity. Or it did.

Trump’s anti-DEI bent is more than a bigoted policy. It is anti-science, anti-education, and anti-American. The country cannot afford to have this covered over or forgotten.

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Stay Steady,
Dan