Meaningful Equity Requires Meaningful Loss

Equity. It’s so hot right now. Everyone wants a piece of the action. Give me a D. Give me an E. Give me an I. What’s that spell? Diversity, Equity, Inclusion! Hurayyyy! I survived 2020! I didn’t get canceled and donated my quarters into the DEI merry-go-round, the one with the rainbow horses. I should save that receipt for tax season right?

No. Not right (well, I guess you can save the receipts). It’s not that easy. Equity requires loss. To be specific, it requires privileged people to give up power. Here’s the real challenge. Meaningful equity requires meaningful loss.

Meaningful

As someone in the business of discussing moral masculinity and principled leadership — not to mention independent school education in New England — it’s on brand to be woke. However, staying on brand can be a most dangerous game. It’s easy to become a hot air balloon. To be meaningful is to be significant.

For example, I just dropped the term woke. Like many people (particularly of the white hue), I’ve grown suspicious of the word over the last couple of years — “Woke activists hurt cause with ‘self-righteous toxicity’: left-wing think tank.” The more I saw in the media and heard in conversations about social justice, the more I was convinced that woke should never be used seriously and without a hint of sarcasm.

In joining the ranks of wholesale woke haters, I was a hot air balloon. I joined a conversation without saying anything of value or meaning (full of hot air) because my understanding of woke was built on what I was seeing and hearing. My limited perspective missed several critical facts, like the origins of “woke” (it was a watchword for Black Americans as early as 1938 and was a basic survival tactic). Who knew it wasn’t intended for liberals and conservatives to replenish their ammunition for an eternity of stone throwing? Though I didn’t know it, my input lacked meaning and was invalid.

Equity

Meaningful equity requires meaningful loss. It’s not just being alert. It’s an action that precipitates a swing of power, not to be confused with everyone getting more. Helen Lewis explains how so many have failed to promote meaningful equity:

Those with power inside institutions love splashy progressive gestures — solemn, monochrome social-media posts deploring racism; appointing their first woman to the board; firing low-level employees who attract online fury — because they help preserve their power. Those at the top — who are disproportionately white, male, wealthy, and highly educated — are not being asked to give up anything themselves.

Here’s where we struggle as people. It’s good that I have read The Color of Law, but I’m not trying to swap living situations with someone in a redlined district. I want my school to become more inclusive, but not to the point that a new hire takes my administrative position. I might be “at the top,” but I’m on the good side. You’ve got the wrong guy. It’s Trump’s money you want.

Loss

Meaningful loss is hard. I had the privilege (my work funded the opportunity) of listening to Clint Smith speak at a conference recently, and he talked about how terrifying it would be to wake up and have his kids be missing. He was getting shaky just thinking about it. Then, he explained how millions of people had to live with that fear every day of their lives under the oppression of slavery in America. To give something up willingly is one thing, but to actually live with uncontrollable loss every minute of every day…let’s reconsider what might qualify as meaningful loss.

If you’re reading this article from the comfort of a home that you aren’t afraid of losing, off of your personal laptop or tablet or phone — or maybe it’s a work device — and you can read at your leisure, when you’re not walking the dog or sitting down for breakfast with your family or re-watching your favorite TV show. You’re like me. Privileged. If we lose some of our current assets, we will survive — and still be privileged.

What then are we willing to give up? And how in our hearts do we become willing? How do we become convinced that the elevation of others is worth the lowering of ourselves? Sorry, but I don’t have the answers. I started looking up Dalai Lama quotes, but that might not be your jam. I am not writing this as an authority or a shining example or a critic. Taking the good advice of a better person, I am writing to learn about what I do not understand.

I do know three things. We should study the story of the past with all the available facts. All we have is owed to those who came before us. And our kids only care that we love them. There’s a lot of happy meal toys and escargot in between that we can go without. I hope that’s helpful.

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Previously Published on medium

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Photo credit: Nicholas Fair Nowak Created by the author on stencil.