America Doesn’t Need Diversity Training; She Needs Home Training
Name a corporation almost any corporation: Google, Facebook, Starbucks, or Amazon, and you will find a company grappling with the same issue. Pick a university practically any university: Yale, Syracuse, Cornell, or American University, and you will see a university that shares an unresolved problem.
The issue, the problem – America’s never-ending struggle to live up to her precepts and promises. More specifically, the inability of the Nation’s wealthiest companies and leading educational institution to do their part to make sure that America’s “the self-evident truths” are manifest in the lives of all people.
HUMAN RIGHTS
Speaking of all people, if there were a Court of Humanity, America would be found wanting. Because whenever America has been asked to prove by word and deed that we believe that all men (people) are created equal and that all of us are endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable Rights (among these are Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness) we demonstrate almost universally that we are a nation of mostly hypocrites.
Almost daily, a university, corporation or individual is an offending party to an incident that shows America as a nation of not only hypocrites but of broken promises. And like clockwork when the transgression occurs, the university, corporation, or individual pulls out the go-to “National Get-Out-Of-Trouble” trump card.
In nearly every case where faulty Americans contradict our creed, be it the corporate leadership, educational administrators or an individual citizen, each offending party immediately asserts as a defense of their behavior an undying belief in… Wait for it… Diversity.
Yes, in America, it appears that the way to correct depriving others of the self-evident truths is not to make sure the self-evident truths are manifest in the lives of everyone. Instead, the way to redress a wrong in America is to assign diversity and inclusion training for the entire organization or hire an institutional diversity officer.
UTTER NONSENSE
Most CEOs, University Presidents, and individual offenders alike appear to believe that proclaiming a belief in diversity is the right and natural thing to do. Such declarations are utter nonsense.
Proclamations of a commitment to diversity are just the easy, tried and untrue American thing to do. In fact, it could be suggested that asserting a commitment to diversity after an incident of bigotry is as American as hot dogs and apple pie.
Diversity statements and training are far from a panacea for what ails America. Rather than continuing our national pastime of shadowboxing with our domestic adversaries: racism, sexism, homophobia, etc., what we need to do instead of writing more diversity statements and closing stores for training is roll up our sleeves and start fighting to be who are founding documents indicate we are. As an alternative to dancing around the ring pretending to fight for diversity, it might be time to get in the ring and fight for everyone’s humanity.
HOME TRAINING
When I was a child, there were not many more important aspects to growing up than home training. Home training meant that your parents and your village had taken the time and made an effort to teach you manners and social etiquette. Children with home training were the children who were prepared to respect authority; who esteemed adults particularly those who clothed, housed and fed them; who thought themselves no more or no less significant than anyone else; and who treasured their responsibility to be great citizens – to leave the planet better for others than it was when they arrived.
Home training was so vital in my day that before I could attempt to visit another child’s home, my parents would ask “who are their folks?” And the query of who are their folks was unambiguous. My parents wanted to know if my friends had parents/family/villagers who not only believed in but practiced home training.
Parents like mine wanted to know if the people I wanted to spend time with where being raised by good (honest, open-minded, inclusive, fair) people. In my old neighborhood, moms and dads were unwilling to take the chance that their child might go off course and not become the best version of themselves possible. Back then when it came to childhood friendships, the primary objective for the parents in my neighborhood was to make sure children associated with people who were more likely to influence you to be a better not worse citizen.
SIMPLY LAUGHABLE
When I see companies like Starbucks close for a half day of racial bias training, and I watch, as one university president after another proclaim that the behavior of students is incongruous to what the university stands for I laugh out loud. I sometimes giggle uncontrollably by the lack of genuine understanding about the cause of the problem. I also cringe at the ungodly sums of money thrown away at ineffective diversity programs and failed inclusion and equity training.
CEOs, University Presidents, and Boards of Trustees alike fail to comprehend the central reason their organization is in the news for all the wrong reasons. Regrettably, unlike the parents back in my day, neither corporations or universities make any meaningful inquiries about employees or students home training.
Neither HR administrators nor admission officers bother to query, “who are your folks?” Neither corporations nor universities know much if anything about the upbringing of the people they choose to lead, those they employ or the students they admit. Generally speaking, we have no idea and worse we don’t seem to care if our leaders, employees or students received home training.
WHO ARE YOUR CHILDREN’S FOLKS?
If you are a parent, who is as exhausted as I am with the snail in quicksand pace that America takes when it comes to making manifest the “self-evident truths” for all her citizens, I have couple ideas that could expedite our progress. What if you and I decided to stop waiting for on the job diversity training or classroom diversity instruction to teach our children to work towards making this Nation’s “self-evident truths” manifest in all lives.
What if instead of waiting for companies like Starbucks to close its doors for company-wide diversity training or for universities like Syracuse to suspend a fraternity from campus, we, the parents of future college administrators, public officials, and corporate leaders, considered taking a refresher course or get trained for the first time in the lost art of Home Training.
What if you and I first wholeheartedly embraced our responsibility to model for our children from birth to death a diverse, inclusive and equitable America – an America that made manifest the “self-evident truths” for everyone? What if you and I accepted our duty to raise children with home training?
Perhaps, instead of living in a community with the one non-homogenous obligatory family, we could intentionally move into neighborhoods that mirrored America. Maybe, rather than enrolling our children in the schools with families exclusively from our income bracket, we joined forces to make sure all children regardless of socioeconomic standing were able to attend a school that looks identical to America and where all children could receive an education that truly prepares them for the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
How about we stop fainting shock and surprise when a governmental leader, a corporate executive or a university administrator behaves in a discriminatory, prejudiced or unlawful manner? How about the next time a woman is abused, a student is harassed, or a child shoots another child at school (or during a police stop), we allow no excuse and immediately investigate the offenders upbringing?
What if the authorities along with the wrongdoer also brought the parents in for questioning? What if the first question, anyone including the media asked about the accused was “who are your folks”? What if starting today there was a national mandate for every American to get home training?
PLEASE share, if you agree that this Nation can and should do better!