Today, I watched Ava Duvernay talk about diversity issues in Hollywood. She said that the word diversity was a medicinal word. It got me to thinking about OTC medicines. Those quick-fixes we purchase at the store only address the symptoms. We have a cough, we get a cough medicine. Our head hurts, we get ibuprofen. How much does it actually help though? Until we actually get to the root cause of the cough or the headache, we will continue to experience the disturbance. What we’re actually looking for, is a cure. But a cure takes longer, doesn’t it?
Inclusion, in my opinion, is the cure, while diversity is the bandage. Diversity may cover up the cut for a while, but it does nothing to prevent a sore from festering. Inclusion is that process of excavating the foundations of our organizations, and taking a 360-degree look at the ways in which bias is entrenched and rewarded. It is looking at how we purposely exclude and then justify the exclusion. It is interrogating how we rewrite narratives to benefit some, or how we blame victims for their survival techniques. It is even how we never permit some voices to be heard.
Diversity is the easy part. The United States is diverse. There’s a neighborhood in Queens, New York named Astoria. It is said that one can encounter a new country every few feet. That is diversity. We’re all here. Inclusion, is an entirely different animal. Inclusion asks us how we know where Jamaicans or Jews live in New York City. Inclusion pushes us to ask why that is the case, and is dissatisfied with simplified answers of immigrant communities populating areas in which they would be most comfortable. Inclusion asks why certain neighborhoods are policed, while others are protected. Inclusion works to ensure that Black and Brown neighborhoods are thriving without gentrification. Inclusion fights the need to ask Caster Semanya to be a different type of woman. Inclusion says all stories matter, and this fabric is not finished until all stories are included.
