Why DEI Work Should not Give attention to Baby-Free Cat Guys

To the Editor:

I’m penning this letter in response to a “Letter from a Baby-Free Cat Man” (October 17, 2024) which argues that DEI (Range, Fairness and Inclusion) efforts on campus want to incorporate childless and childfree adults. As a sociologist and antiracist educator, I’m discouraged after I see DEI and vital ideas, reminiscent of microaggressions, misunderstood. DEI exists to disrupt ongoing techniques of exclusion, for instance white supremacy and patriarchy, which give unjust historic and current day privileges to some individuals and unjust, historic and current day harms to others. As we all know, DEI efforts are below assault, not solely all through the nation, additionally within the academy. 

In accordance with analysis, college with youngsters are underrepresented on the tenure degree. Within the US, of ladies aged 40-49, 84.3% have had not less than one little one.  For males, 76.5% of the identical age group have fathered not less than one little one. But, on the tenure degree, solely 44% of ladies and 70% of males have youngsters. Particularly so for girls, and nonetheless so for males, in the case of this profession objective, having youngsters depresses one’s probability of ascending rank. 

Additional, the surgeon common not too long ago issued a report warning the general public that folks usually are not okay. Amongst many factors, the report says culturally, the expectations of learn how to mother or father have elevated. These situations affect mother and father in academia. 

Microaggressions usually are not one thing that any class of individuals can declare. By definition, microaggressions should line up with historic and institutional hurt and unjust outcomes. On the mixture degree, being childfree protects individuals from vital societal dangers, reminiscent of poverty. It’s girls, youngsters, Native American, Black and Latine individuals, single mother and father, and particularly single moms, who’re overrepresented in poverty, for instance. 

As an anti-racist training immersed within the analysis underpinning the necessity for DEI, I discover it problematic when individuals with identities that aren’t immediately associated to traditionally and strategically oppressed populations search entry into DEI areas to advocate for themselves. In my years of labor facilitating antiracist dialogues, males and white males, particularly, had been notably absent. Particularly in academia, we’d like males, white individuals and particularly, white males, to assist disrupt white supremacy and patriarchy, to interact in DEI work and to debate the explanations underpinning DEI within the classroom, precisely due to their privileged statuses. 

Understandably, below our socio-economic system which prioritizes revenue over individuals, a variety of us are pressed. If one is struggling, it may be tough to rally for causes that do not embody us. Nonetheless, it’s employee solidarity, not division, that may be a renewable useful resource. Weaponizing DEI to advocate for identities that have a tendency to spice up profession outcomes and shield towards societal threat solely perpetuates the very causes these initiatives exist. 

– Megan Thiele Sturdy

Sociology professor at San José State College and a Public Voices Fellow on the TheOpEdProject