The fight for equality has morphed into equity, and with it a quest to empower minorities over all considerations–including merit. In other words, increasingly people are being hired and promoted on the basis of the colour of their skin and not the content of their character to turn Martin Luther King’s famous expression around.
A federal government agency – Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada has just offered the latest proof with “The 50 – 30 Challenge: Your Diversity Advantage.” The program’s stated goal is “to challenge Canadian organizations to increase the representation and inclusion of diverse groups within their workplace, while highlighting the benefits of giving all Canadians a seat at the table.”
Further, the challenge is “an initiative between the Government of Canada, Canadian businesses, and diversity organizations,” the challenge’s website explains, thereby admitting a cross-sector collusion.
“Diverse” is a euphemism for “everyone but straight, white, able-bodied males.” This more stark, but true admission, would make apparent how inherently racist, ableist, and agist the new program really is.
The banner of its website includes illustrations of people from diverse profiles–not one of them is a white working-age, able-bodied male. A wheelchair-bound white man, a black man, a blind man, and an old white man are outnumbered by five women.
The 50-30 challenge wants organizations to have “gender parity,” which it defines as 50% women and non-binary people on Canadian boards and/or in senior management positions. Given that most boards are composed of odd numbers so that they don’t have tie votes in their decision making, the only way this goal could be reached is if the women and “non-binary” people actually outnumbered men (just like the 5-4 count in the illustration above).
The second goal is “Significant representation (30%) on Canadian boards and/or senior management of members of other equity-deserving groups.”
Equity carries the idea of ensuring every class of person is represented evenly or better than straight, able-bodied white males. Unlike Martin Luther King, who wanted people judged by their merits and not their skin colour, equity proponents say minorities deserve better as a group.
Enforcing group entitlement means ensuring proportionate-or-better quotas of certain classes of Canadians in employment, education, and government. Unfortunately, this does more to prioritize racial classification than anything else could, and subverts the definition of a person’s inherent worth to an organization. By emphasizing what makes us different, it ensures we will always be different, view the other as different, and not become something as a result of our individual characteristics.
The site names these advantaged and deserving people as “those who identify as Racialized, Black, and/or People of colour (‘Visible Minorities’), People with disabilities (including invisible and episodic disabilities), 2SLGBTQ+ and/or gender and sexually diverse individuals, and Aboriginal and/or Indigenous Peoples.”
This phrase “episodic disability” is new to me, but Statistics Canada recognizes it as “periods of good health interrupted by periods of their limitations.” StatsCan estimates that of the 6.2 million disabled Canadians aged 15 and up, only 2.4 million “experienced conventional continuous limitations.” The “episodic disability” category adds 3.8 million more people to the now-advantageous category of disabled.
If you’re a white able-bodied male full of ambition and void of principles, check the non-binary or LGBT box so you won’t be the victim of Canada’s new systemic discrimination. The irony here is people can identify freely as a sexual minority but not as a racial minority. Biology counts for one but not the other, and the inconsistencies don’t end there.
“The program and participants recognize Indigenous Peoples, including First Nations, Métis and Inuit, as founding Peoples of Canada and underrepresented in positions of economic influence and leadership,” the 50-30 website explains. This is a confession of values as much as it is a statistical observation.
At one time, the founding nations of Canada were considered the French, English, Irish, and Scottish. They were represented in the Arms of Canada authorized November 21, 1921. Today, Immigration Canada names Aboriginal peoples, French Canadians, and English Canadians as the founding peoples of Canada. The latter two aren’t mentioned because the de-emphasis of whiteness is the goal.
The “nation” in First Nations confuses the anthropological and political standing of the Indigenous tribes living in Canada. Similarly, whether they founded Canada is a matter of perspective. Living on the land alone does not by itself make a political state with borders. The Indigenous People weren’t even consulted in the formation of Canada, and ironically, the new equity and diversity advocates want to do the same with white males today—relegate them to second class citizens.
Even so, the Asper School of Business at the University of Manitoba has hired an Indigenous woman to recruit businesses, institutions, and non-profit organizations to take the challenge. Even so, the 50-30 website claims 2,378 participating organizations already, and names 48 “collaborators” to date. This unmistakeable nod to revolutionary terminology tells what this is really about–and it’s not science and innovation, nor is it good governance of these organizations.
The Cultural Marxists of the last century, especially Herbert Marcuse, envisioned raising up women, homosexuals, racial minorities, and university students as revolutionaries for the cause. Their goal was to destroy Western institutions and structures, and build Marxist organizations over the rubble.
Now that innovation and science have become about racial and sexual politics, complete with “collaborators” under the auspices of Canada’s federal government, the Marxist grasp is nearly complete in our country. All that’s left is to remove God from the national anthem, and replace the maple leaf with a hammer and sickle.
Lee Harding is a Research Fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
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