GOP leans into 'homogeneity, inequity and exclusion' with all-male House leaders | Opinion
After securing the presidency and both houses of Congress, Republicans set forth to bring fairness back to the patriarchy.
If there’s one thing Republicans hate, it’s diversity, equity and inclusion programs, which they see as the demonic spawn of “wokeness,” a word they’ve never been inclined to define.
To prove just how unnecessary DEI is in America, GOP leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives have chosen men to head up all the House committees. And all but one of those men is white. (Rep. Brian Mast of Florida will head the Foreign Affairs Committee and his maternal grandparents immigrated from Mexico.)
See? Republicans believe we should focus on “merit” and not on “identity politics.” And if that just so happens to mean no women are leading a House committee for the first time in two decades and virtually every committee head is white, well … merit!
White Republican men have suffered greatly under DEI, you see
It’s important to consider all that these white Republican men have gone through since 2020, when DEI programs surged in universities and corporations across the country in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd.
They have, at times, been forced to think about people other than themselves, to recognize the inherent value in every human being and, worst of all, consider a world in which they are not fully in charge.
These experiences likely forced many of them to have to Google things like “am I experiencing empathy?” and “how to get rid of empathy” and “why are my feelings not the most important ones?”
Few can imagine the discomfort a white man experiences when threatened with the world not revolving around him.
Nothing shows DEI is unnecessary quite like all-male leadership
So, after securing the presidency and both houses of Congress, Republicans set forth to bring fairness back to the patriarchy.
In announcing his all-male cast of committee heads, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise released a statement decrying “four years of suffering under the radical policies of the Biden-Harris Administration” and said: “With Republicans taking control of the White House, Senate, and House, it is imperative we are in position to move President Trump’s agenda efficiently and thoughtfully so we can quickly restore our nation to greatness.”
And who better to restore our nation to greatness than 17 dudes – 16 of whom are white – and zero women?
Republicans need to show their work with homogeneity programs
Moving forward, to help Americans understand the importance of the end of wokeness, I think Republicans should conduct mandatory “homogeneity, inequity and exclusion” programs.
These HIE programs would give them a chance to explain why their leadership teams generally look like a 1950s group photo from an all-male golf club, and why “the best candidates” are almost always white men.
I’d be quite interested to sit in on one of those trainings and see which studies show the benefits of homogeneity in politics and the workplace, as well as the risks of not having men in charge.
The charts alone would be illuminating – probably a bell curve or two, I imagine.
If diversity is bad, we deserve to know why exclusion and inequity is good
The bottom line is this: If Republicans are going to dismantle or ban DEI programs while demonstrating that their idea of diversity is hiring 100% men and 94% white men, I think they should have to detail to a diverse nation exactly how that math works.
I, for one, don’t want to be guilty of any micro-aggressions against my fellow white guys, even if they are Republicans.
So give us the homogeneity, inequity and exclusion training, fellas. Let’s go.
Follow Paste BN columnist Rex Huppke on Bluesky at @rexhuppke.bsky.social and on Facebook at facebook.com/RexIsAJerk