The University of Michigan is shutting down its diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives, which has only made the university more divided and hysterical.
University leaders have decided to “close the school’s DEI offices, shutter its DEI plans, and end diversity statements in hiring.” This is a massive change for the university that had one of the most expansive DEI programs in the country. The university had poured upwards of $250 million into DEI since 2016, and in 2023, they ramped up operations by increasing the number of DEI employees by 70%. Every department and office was forced to have a DEI action plan, and university administrators met monthly to “put on a good show” of how they were hitting DEI goals.
The result was a campus culture that had became more toxic and divisive. A survey from the university itself in 2022 found that students and faculty alike thought the campus was less positive and that there was less of a sense of belonging than before.
According to the New York Times, “Students were less likely to interact with people of a different race or religion or with different politics,” and “everyday campus complaints and academic disagreements … were now cast as crises of inclusion and harm, each demanding some further administrative intervention or expansion.”
TRUMP MAKES THE UC SYSTEM A LITTLE LESS RACIST
The University of Michigan is only taking this step because the Trump administration is threatening to restrict federal funding from universities that embrace DEI; it is not as if Michigan administrators learned lessons from their failures. Anyone who was paying attention has, though, because the divisive, negative environment fostered at Michigan is the natural result of DEI. Dividing people up by their identity groups encourages isolation. Making group identity central means that any form of criticism against a person is taken as an attack on their identity group.
Leftwing bureaucrats at Michigan and journalists at the New York Times can talk about how “well-intentioned” DEI is. But this is always what it looks like in practice. It is an inherently divisive ideology that encourages people to be thin-skinned and to constantly view life as a struggle against unseen racist forces. The University of Michigan, and every other university, will be better off without the negative obsessions that come from DEI programs and policies.