Another “quick takes” on items where there is too little to say to make a complete article, but is still important enough to comment on.
The focus this time: We can’t all be equal if some are not made more equal than others, after all.
First, a little mood music:
Carrying on…
Crimes against those of Asian descent have been increasingly in the news lately. Rather than deal with actual criminals, some in Minnesota would rather track expressions of wrongthink.
“Separate from the reporting of hate crimes to the police — reports that are collected and reported annually by the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension — the bill sets up a system to report incidents that fall short of criminal acts or are not reported because the victim chooses not to. People could report events to community groups that might be more trusted. And those reports could be gathered to provide a fuller idea of what is happening on the ground.
“Rebecca Lucero, commissioner of the state Department of Human Rights, told the House Public Safety Committee last week she supports expanded options for people who face slurs or verbal attacks to report them. She said her office and state lawmakers would then have a better idea of the volume of such incidents.
“‘Using the data collected can help you and community groups inform next steps — education, outreach or some other decisions you decide to make,’ Lucero told House members last month. Neither the human rights law or the hate crimes provisions apply, for example, to slurs shouted at a person because of their race, she said.”
Does painting an entire group of people as morally inferior or morally culpable for the evils of society constitute discrimination. The courts aren’t sure, but sooner or later they’re going to have to find out.
“As the legal battle intensifies, DEI training is coming under special scrutiny, with at least seven court cases pending nationwide alleging that it constitutes workplace discrimination. Some practitioners have responded by voluntarily dialing down aspects of their “anti-racist” curriculums — increasingly in demand since the murder of George Floyd in 2020 — which critics say go beyond traditional efforts to awaken White people to their inherent biases and instead paint them as inherently racist.
“In his lawsuit, for example, Young claimed that mandatory anti-racism training in the Colorado prison system fomented a ‘hostile’ workplace for White employees. Though the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit dismissed the suit, a three-judge panel found the training ‘troubling on many levels,’ saying its ‘ideological messaging’ and ‘race-based rhetoric is well on the way’ to constituting harassment.
“In what legal experts have called a blueprint for future challenges, the majority said Young failed to demonstrate that the harassment was ‘severe and pervasive.’ So Young refiled his lawsuit in June, alleging that the training made his job more difficult and strained his relationships with co-workers who agreed with the lessons.
“‘There hasn’t been that much attention paid in the trainings to how much the trainings themselves vilify dominant groups,’ said Kenji Yoshino, director of New York University’s Meltzer Center for Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging, who called the volume of cases challenging such efforts ‘unprecedented.’”
Yet again, an attempt to re-legalize Affirmative Action in California has been defeated, yet again… for now.
“A coalition of equality activists in California celebrated on Sunday their successful effort to kill an effort by the state’s Democratic-controlled legislature to reinstall affirmative action.
“California Democrats this year backed a bill that sought to create an exemption to bans on race-based decisions.
“The proposal, ACA-7, was put forth despite California’s famous Proposition 209, which amended the state constitution to outlaw state-sponsored preferential treatment based on race, sex or ethnicity, as well as in the wake of the 2023 Supreme Court decision that struck down the use of race in college admissions.
“While the bill sailed through the Calif. state assembly, it stalled in the state senate — missing a summer deadline to make it on the November ballot.”
TTFN.
