For a bit of background, this discussion was had in a safe place, among a group of people whose diversity reflects the population in terms of race, gender, politics and religion/atheism. And as such, they are a tolerant, even embracing bunch of folks.

Because we feel we

• can say anything to each other,
• are bonded as professionals in the same field who buck the conventional wisdom,
• tease each other mercilessly,
• band together in times of trouble, and,
• are free to disagree vigrously without hating each other,

… discussions like these often come up, and are an incredible learning experience.

Another commenter in this discussion who I respect greatly responded to a comment I made about the fact that I didn’t know that Tim Cook might be gay, and that furthermore, I didn’t care, and think that it will be a sign of enlightenment when we all don’t care about that part of a leader as long as they can lead. (Did not express my point as well then as I did here.)

He came back with some great points, among them that some people have said both “embrace diversity” and “be blind to diversity”.This comment was my response.

Love this discussion. And I agree that you can’t say it shouldn’t matter out of one side of your mouth, and then with the other side say it should be worshipped and celebrated.

Though in study of the dynamics which created the present circumstances, those are really two different conversations that got confused and entangled due to politics, weird practices in the government and bad press converage (not just on the part of the media, but in how the popular, but not the influential, got all the news play).

Initially, it was it “my diverse background should neither aid nor hold me back when I’m going to be hired/not hired/included/not included”.

There was then a movement for inclusion for diversity as it pertains to special insights on certain types of adversity.

Which later, got mashed into the inclusion on the basis of diversity itself – BUT diversity is SUPPOSED to include everyone, including all races, both genders, all sexual orientations, religions, etc., reflective of the population of the US, not the world.

Sadly, in practice, it became “let’s exclude the people who are there in favor of people who aren’t there”.

It’s a fascinating journey when you look at it historically – it seems like integration (of both gender and race) is the same as desegregation, but in practice, they boil down to be very disparate.

On another level, it’s the difference between saying you’re gender-blind, and being happy to see both genders around you. One denies that gender plays any part in how we interact – an old model that helped move women’s rights forward politically, but then crumbled in practice.

The other says I may not know to what the differences /benefits /disadvantages/ unique perspectives are to having a man/woman present for this discussion that may have been traditionally exclued women/men, but I’m willing to recognize the strengths/ weaknesses/ differences that having a different gender may be.

On that level, it was a correction of the old dogma that worked in theory. A graduation, if you will. Even a willingness to say, on a general level, there are some tendencies each of our genders has – perhaps from how we were raised or environment, possibly biological or genetic. So instead of pretending we’re all the same, we can be together and equal, without succumbing to the former idea of separate but equal.

Forgive me another chapter of War and Peace. I studied diversity interactions and marketing in school so whenever diversity comes up in a marketing perspective, I’m fascinated.