Why Those Zoom Fundraisers Matter For DEI

Were you one of the 40,000 Black women on the zoom heard round the world?

Just hours after President Biden endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to run in his place, the virtual meeting organized by Win With Black Women was the place to be. 

I saw an invitation…but I didn’t make the time. The next day I saw so many friends and colleagues posting that they were part of it. I felt left out. 

Then came a series of record-breaking zoom fundraisers, each for another group: white women, white men,  Black men, and so on. I was mad I didn’t recognize what was happening in time to be part of it. 

I don’t think we’ve seen this at this scale before…grassroots, self-organizing, virtual rallies—centered on specific backgrounds.

Two things have struck me as I’ve watched this trend ignite. First, they’re not designed to carve out “special interests” based on those categories. Instead, they are meant to motivate support for a shared goal. They make identity politics unifying. 

People sometimes confuse meeting voluntarily “in affinity” for enforced “segregation.” They are wary of allowing it in workplace settings for fear of seeming “divisive.” 

These calls illustrate that this does not need to be the case. Coming together with people with whom you share a common identity can be exciting. The sense of belonging you feel when you are with your “people” feels good sometimes; folks just “get” things that you don’t have to explain. 

And you don’t expect to agree with everything others believe in that group. There is plenty of diversity within each of these meetings, but what we have in common helps us pursue shared goals and support each other. 

So if your organization has affinity groups or employee resource groups, you don’t need to fear splintering. They provide a real benefit. Just ask Kamala Harris.

The other surprise for me is that these rallies arose amid sustained attacks on anything “DEI.” 

Naming race at all, let alone allowing it to inform decisions, has been deemed unconstitutional in some settings. Some organizations are scrambling to take out words like diversity, equity, and inclusion from programs and job titles for fear of stoking the backlash.

And yet the “White Women: Answer the Call” event just a few weeks later broke a zoom record with 200,000 people. Nearly as many “White Dudes for Kamala Harris” witnessed “The Dude” himself, Jeff Bridges, speak in support after that.

As intimidating as the attacks are, there is something to be said for standing up for ourselves. I hope these calls inspire us to continue to do the inclusion work we know is right, and worry a little less about criticism. The specific groups of people that have been excluded—and our allies—should not give up on the dream of a society that really works for all of us. 

So I didn’t want to miss out on that. Last week I signed up for a rally for Caribbean-Americans for Kamala. It was cool. 

Flipping the Double Standard

I saw this tweet last week, and I thought of job interviews:

“Imagine the media treatment of Kamala if she had five children by three different men. Then add in having sex with a porn star.”

Of course, on the surface, this is political commentary. But the argument it’s making is relevant to the workplace. 

This commentator’s bias is pretty conscious. But he’s using a technique that organizations can use to help them hire and retain more diverse employees. Kristen Pressner called it “flip it and test it” in her TED talk “Are You Biased? I Am.” 

It’s hard to see our own unconscious bias—that’s why it’s called unconscious. But we can run a simple thought experiment to spot double standards. 

As Pressner explains, the idea is to imagine someone with a different gender behaving in the same way, and ask yourself if you’d make the same judgment about them in that case. 

Whether you’re evaluating a candidate for president or a candidate for a job, it’s a useful test. 

When you’re preparing for an annual review and assessing an employee’s attitude, communication style, or leadership, flip it and test it. You might notice a tendency to judge men vs. employees with other genders differently for speaking assertively, or taking time off for family needs. 

When you’re considering someone for a raise, a promotion, or a stretch assignment, flip it and test it. Do you find it easier to imagine an employee with a particular gender playing certain roles or managing certain responsibilities on your team?

Flipping and testing works for any type of bias—not just gender, but also race, age, culture, and so on.

And it’s not a bad practice for election season either.

Identity Politics Isn’t All Or Nothing

Last Monday morning—the day after Vice President Kamala Harris looked like she would become the first Black and Asian woman to head a presidential ticket—I was cruising through Facebook. 

One of my old college friends saw that I had changed my profile pic in support. 

He commented: “Hey, do you like her because she’s part Jamaican lol?” 

My initial reaction was, “Wait a minute—what…?”

Is he making an assumption that I can’t think beyond a shared identity? That women are only going to vote for a female candidate because she’s a woman, or that people of color can’t resist a POC running for office? Maybe he is implying that what some people call “identity politics’ drowns out every other possible factor for me.

All this went through my head for a split second—and then I reread the comment. My friend hadn’t actually said “the only reason.” 

That would have pissed me off. 

Clarence Thomas is Black. And I don’t like him or what he’s done—notwithstanding the fact that he is Black. 

There are women I don’t align with. The way Representative Elise Stefanik treats other women, including university presidents, offends me. 

It’s rude to assume that you know why someone likes a candidate based on something superficial. It suggests that people can’t think beyond affinity. In our discourse around the election, let’s talk about policies and approaches. 

Fortunately my friend wasn’t implying this—he was just teasing someone he knows really well. My reply? 

“It's not the only reason, but it certainly helps! Doesn’t everybody want to be part Jamaican?”