How to cripple the DEI industry at a stroke

Repeal a few words enshrined in the Equality Act 2010 - and watch the house of cards collapse

Paul Embery is one of the most interesting, insightful and original voices to have emerged in British journalism for some time — Douglas Murray

Photo: iStock / Carl Lokko

There isn’t much that would persuade me to slather praise on Donald J Trump, or suggest ways in which the British government might wish to emulate his actions. But in seeking to disempower the ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ (DEI) industry, the US president is undoubtedly correct.

For Trump has recognised that which ought to be obvious to anyone examining the matter with an honest eye: DEI is no longer a well-meaning philosophy designed to tackle prejudice and foster integration; instead it is a pernicious racket which has, in the US and throughout much of the West, wrought deep tensions and entrenched its own grotesque injustices.

Trump has set about his task with gusto, instructing the federal government to roll back its DEI programmes and investigate private sector entities and educational establishments which might be engaged in illegal DEI-related practices. Additionally, he has decreed that federal departments will in future recognise only two sexes – male and female – and the executive branch will enforce laws to ‘promote this reality’. Amen to all that.

Having taken root in the 1960s – when, for many, racism and intolerance were undeniably common features of everyday life – DEI spent the next few decades slowly permeating through public, corporate and academic institutions. Then, in the wake of the protests which followed the death of George Floyd, the whole thing took on a new momentum, as the high priests of radical progressivism, including those in Britain, sought to embed the creed everywhere. That it has mutated into something that now does more harm than good seems to me to be beyond question.