the hottest words
in use today is the word "diversity." And
from the context in which it’s usually used, it’s viewed
by its supporters as the cure-all for which people have been searching, Lo these many
millennia.
Do you want to put an
end to war-making? Simple. Diversify.
Do you want to eliminate
social inharmony? Same thing. Diversify.
Do you want to make racial
strife a thing of the past? Elementary, my dear Watson. All
you have to do is diversify.
Yes indeed, to its
protagonists, diversity and Nirvana seem to be two sides of
the same coin. You do one, you reach the other.
But this is superficial thinking at its
best.
Or worst, depending how you look at it.
For one, diversity — which really
means different, distinct, separate, nothing more — has always been
around. And yet there have always been wars, social inharmony, and
racial strife.
And for another, from the context in
which the word diversity is usually used, its proponents are talking
about physical or material diversity — such as diversity of dress,
of cuisine, of skin color, of ethnicity. But nowhere among the
seekers of diversity do I find expressed the need for intellectual
diversity. The diversity of ideas.
Indeed, it seems to me that some of
the more fervent supporters of material diversity are some of the
more fervent oppressors of intellectual diversity.
You see, some of us don’t think that
diversity is all that it’s cracked up to be. And, therefore, its
promises have no way of being realized.
But we’re not allowed to say
that.
Why? Who knows? Maybe it’s because the proponents of diversity
believe that anyone who thinks that way is being just too
diverse.
Sounds crazy? Well, it it looks like a
duck, walks like a duck. You know the rest.
Think about it.
