"I Love My Brack Brother"
- Wade
The quote above comes from Mr. Jason David McEwen, circa 1993. We were at a school-wide assembly back at AHS, and had just spent a half-hour watching a movie featuring African-American, Hispanic, and Indian kids around our age, playing around and acting cool. Being from Austin, this was the first time most of us had seen people like this. One of the Hispanic kids (with a noticeable lisp, 'cause that's OK too) had told everyone how he "loved his black brother" and Jason, true to form, felt obligated to loudly repeat that sentiment.
Little did I know that these annual forays into institutionalized acceptance wouldn't end when I graduated in '94. Each year that I've been in the workforce I am roped into similar sessions, based upon the same theme:
Embracing Diversity
Ahhhh.
All of the diversity training sessions I've been to have gone like this: 1) be told about the vast differences of people who aren't like me, then 2) treat them the exact same way I treat people who are like me. I don't get it either. If I am supposed to treat people the same regardless of gender, ethnicity, what have you, why do I need to spend three hours of my morning hearing about how great it is to be surrounded by people of different gender, ethnicity, and what have you?
My company goes a bit off the deep end in embracing diversity. (Ahhhh.) It's one of our Five Core Values, meaning it's (supposedly) just as important as, oh, customer service and integrity. We've got someone on the board of directors responsible for diversity. We make all employees spend three hours a year in diversity training. Which doesn't sound like much, but us I.S. bobos charge out at $102/hour, so add it up. (And, no, that's not how much I actually get paid.)
So how's it going? Well, recently a couple of Dain's diversity-inspired promotions have gone kaflooey, as they were let go for performance reasons. Funny, that.
I'm probably sounding a bit redneck here, and that's not how I want to come off. I believe competent people should be promoted regardless of if they are male or female, Scandanavian or Indian, walking or in a wheelchair. And isn't that the attitude I should have?
If yes, why do I need to spend my morning hearing about how much more exciting it is to be something other than a white male?
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feedback. Maybe we'll even run your letters in future Gambits. 'The Daily Gambit' is updated every weekday.
