Next read: On Diversity by Russell Jacoby.

My next book blogging project will be On Diversity: The Eclipse of the Individual in a Global Era by UCLA historian Russell Jacoby. I'd read a few things since the previous project, including the controversial American Dirt (enjoyed it a lot, I guess I'm evil) and Rushdie's Satanic Verses (never really grabbed me, but I was stubborn enough to finish it). Now I'm starting another 180 page popular book on the problems with diversity politics.  I guess I'm a sucker.

Only a few pages in, but I appreciate some insights.  For instance, on page 6 he notes that despite the talk of difference, people mostly want inclusion and assimilation.  Calls for diverse hiring, diverse casting in the arts, etc. are calls for inclusion in the mainstream.  He contrasts with some ethnically distinct groups who maintain pretty substantial social and even linguistic separation from the mainstream, while adhering to decidedly unique cultural and ethical perspectives:  The Amish and Hasidic Jews.  There are no activists demanding that corporations hire Amish people.  (Well, there's probably one, because in a big weird world there's always one, but there certainly aren't a lot.) They genuinely want to be different, so they don't demand to be included in the diverse rainbow of people all doing the same things in the mainstream.

None of this is to say that if it's OK to not hire Amish software engineers then it's OK to not hire whoever else. Jacoby makes that clear.  But just as we shouldn't discriminate on the basis of identity, we don't necessarily need to go around insisting on the value of diversity in order to insist on treating people ethically. A rainbow of skin hues may not actually improve the outcome of whatever group effort, but that's no reason to not give everyone a fair shake regardless of skin hue. People should be given fair treatment because they are people with basic human dignity, not because a melanin balance allegedly benefits everyone else via cultural enrichment (that will happen on its own, with or without initiatives, as evidenced by the great interplay of artistic styles in our world) or because Studies Have Shown that diverse groups allegedly boost the corporate bottom line. A person could be a mediocre worker and still deserve decent treatment and basic human dignity (while hopefully finding a better niche in the job market, eventually).

Jacoby also acknowledges how fraught it is to critique diversity politics in an era where our head of state refers to Nazis and Klansmen as "very fine people." However, he says (page 8):

My object, in any event, is not to criticize the jargon of diversity for something worse, but for something better. To understand what renders diversity ideological is to understand what devitalizes it, an endeavor to realize, not junk it.

I look forward to seeing how he does that.