Day 139: Outlawing Inclusion?

Photo by Kelsey Chance on Unsplash

Imagine I had a party and I invited 90 students from WVU (where I teach) and 10 students from Pitt.

What if I made sure to greet each of the students from Pitt? What if I made a point to personally offer each of them something to drink and to introduce them to people they shared interests with?

Am I being a considerate host? or unfairly favoring the Pitt students?

If I do nothing special to welcome the Pitt students to my party, are my actions neutral? or am I contributing to an environment where the WVU students enjoy the party more than the Pitt students?

In this bill, the State of West Virginia has proposed to prohibit universities from expending any money — even money from private donations — to “Establish, sustain, support, or staff a diversity, equity, and inclusion office.”

One could say there’s no difference between WVU and Pitt students. But everyone is different in some ways; people can be sorted into all kinds of different groups. People do sort people into all kinds of different groups. (I offer Game Day as Exhibit 1.)

The question is not ‘who is different.’ The question is who decides which of our differences get noticed and which ones don’t.