The IA dog caught the DEI car...now what?
Iowa lawmakers just overnight eviscerated DEI on our campuses.
Did you hear the news? Were you up until 2AM to hear Iowa lawmakers debate and ultimately pass budget bills? One of which null and voids all DEI work as we know it on our public campuses? Or were you like me and slept through the night with the aid of new prescription sleeping pills? Ones that were prescribed because you have been waking up in the middle of the night in cold sweats, the anxiety too much for your subconscious to abate? I mean…how can one sleep when there are apparitions who howl in the night on things they do not know? But they howl nonetheless, shaping and molding or state until it is a grotesque wasteland deprived of empathy and compassion. Buckle in dear readers. We will not go gently into the day while the ramifications of our Iowa Legislatures overnight bender lay squelching at our feet.
Let’s not bury the lede anymore. Here is the eye ball popping section from this dammed thing (if you’re following along it’s on page 35 of the bill):
DIVISION IX13
DIVERSITY, EQUITY, AND INCLUSION14
Sec. 31. NEW SECTION. 261J.1 Definitions.15
As used in this chapter:
16 1. “Diversity, equity, and inclusion” includes all of the following
a. Any effort to manipulate or otherwise influence the composition of the faculty or student body with reference to race, sex, color, or ethnicity, apart from ensuring colorblind and sex-neutral admissions and hiring in accordance with state and federal antidiscrimination laws.
b. Any effort to promote differential treatment of or provide special benefits to individuals on the basis of race, color, or ethnicity.
c. Any effort to promote or promulgate policies and procedures designed or implemented with reference to race, color, or ethnicity.
d. Any effort to promote or promulgate trainings, programming, or activities designed or implemented with reference to race, color, ethnicity, gender identity, or sexual
orientation.
e. Any effort to promote, as the official position of the public institution of higher education, a particular, widely contested opinion referencing unconscious or implicit
bias,cultural appropriation, allyship, transgender ideology, microaggressions, group marginalization, antiracism, systemic oppression, social justice, intersectionality, neo-pronouns, heteronormativity, disparate impact, gender theory, racial privilege, sexual privilege, or any related formulation of these concepts.
261J.2 Diversity, equity, and 3 inclusion office prohibited.
A public institution of higher education shall not, except as otherwise provided by federal or state law or accreditation standards, do any of the following:
1. Establish or maintain a diversity, equity, and inclusion office.
2. Hire or assign an employee of the public institution of higher education, or contract with a third party, to perform duties of a diversity, equity, or inclusion office.
3. Compel, require, induce, or solicit any person to provide a diversity, equity, and inclusion statement, or give preferential consideration to any person based on the provisions of a diversity, equity, and inclusion statement.
Y’all. I do not say this lightly. This is a megaton bomb on SO MUCH good work in our state. This is razing everything to the ground and looking around confused when the soil is scorched earth with no one around to till it. That they did it so sneaky-like in the middle of the night is such a move of cowardice to boot. I guess my mom was right when she told me nothing good comes during the devil’s hour.
And don’t get me wrong…this is unprecedented and scary as hell. What passed last night was what I’ve been warning about since the first Make it Make Sense. It’s what me and people like me have been ringing the alarm on. We saw that the powers that be were flirting with this racist, transphobic, and just plain idiotic discourse and we started turning the crank of the siren. But it was all for not. As this bill, in effect, actively dismantles DEI offices at their core. It is even more frightening that the local media landscape seems so quiet in the rebuke of this. Now I know that the ink is still wet on this dogshit of a bill but here I am skipping lunch to furiously type this thing out and I just hope to see some others do the same. Because I wish I could say this was their endgame. I really do. I mean, there are definitely some asshats out there partying and celebrating that tHey kIlLed tHaT wOKe ShIt in those liberal bastions. But you know this is only the next step in our states downward slide. I remember when I first wrote the description of my first ‘Make it Make Sense’ column. I was a little hesitant to include this line….“…the coordinated efforts to regress our state to an oblivion only the GOP could stomach.” I thought am I being to dramatic? Is it fair to directly call out the GOP like this? But in retrospect I was right on the money. It is the IA GOP that has so in-eloquently hamfisted so many DEI buzzwords in their bill. It is the IA GOP that passed this bill that plainly forbids a public university to have a DEI office. Straight up banned. It would be funny how bizarre and reactionary this bill was if it didn’t directly mess with the livelihoods of so many good people that I know, myself included. Because I’ll be honest, even though I left months ago. Even though I saw the inevitably for what it was. I still had a little sliver of hope that it wouldn’t come to this. That maybe somehow, someway, things wouldn’t have gone down like this. And when I got the call from a colleague asking if I heard the news I was still stunned at the gall. It manifested in the pit of my stomach. A physical reaction to an underlying notion that I can’t reconcile for myself. When it comes to these people and the way that they are manipulating these systems for political clout…sometimes you can’t make sense of it. Sometimes you just have to mourn the place that used to be. Now the question is how long before they realize the blunder…that this will effect everything from job growth, retention, student admissions, innovation in research, tourism…the list goes on and on. But will it even matter by then? Will these legislators be our version of the Music Man? They do this song and dance and catch the next train out in the dead of the night. I, for one, can’t wait for the time when the day shines on our state again. Let’s hope it’s in our lifetime.
-C
More than fifty years of work to make our campuses welcoming and safe for all, gutted by a bunch of creepy, scared white men. This has to be unconstitutional at both the state and federal level. And it has to be the last gasp of the dying empire, please the gods of all that is good.
This and so many other horrors have just overwhelmed our ability to give each new act its proper attention. You are not alone in your pain. It is truly incomprehensible.