Bingo. That is literally how the people (term used loosely) currently dismantling government DEI programs have been spinning it — “These programs divided Americans by race […] and resulted in shameful discrimination” — the fault is more in the assumption that this is something unique to DEI programs, and not that any program could be doomed from the start so long as a sufficiently-motivated demagogue is willing to lie through his teeth to see it dismantled. Or that the ones opposed to such a program need to be lied to in the first place. They could probably just say “we’re ending DEI 'cause fuck 'em” and get near-identical results.
Bingo. That is literally how the people (term used loosely) currently dismantling government DEI programs have been spinning it — “These programs divided Americans by race […] and resulted in shameful discrimination” — the fault is more in the assumption that this is something unique to DEI programs, and not that any program could be doomed from the start so long as a sufficiently-motivated demagogue is willing to lie through his teeth to see it dismantled. Or that the ones opposed to such a program need to be lied to in the first place. They could probably just say “we’re ending DEI 'cause fuck 'em” and get near-identical results.