Diversity
I was re-watching the Good Shepherd the other day, a 2006 film by Robert De Niro. It’s a fictional work about the creation of American Intelligence services. There’s an early scene where De Niro’s character is recruiting Matt Damon’s character to join the new endeavor prior to the US entering World War II. They’re at a Skull and Bones retreat, which is a secret society at Yale. In a quiet room over cigars and brandy, De Niro explains, “I’ll be looking for a few good men to head up various departments, in other words no Jews, or Negroes, or very few Catholics…”
It reminded me of an acronym I hadn’t thought of in a very long time, WASP, which stands for white, anglo-saxon, protestant. It pretty much defined who ruled the roost in post war America. But it began to fall out of favor when the Catholic John Kennedy was elected president, and various civil rights movements gained traction, giving blacks, women, and gays access to the levers of power. Recent attacks on diversity, however, make me feel as though WASP adoration is trying to make a comeback.
Disappointing, to say the least, but although I think they will see some short-term gains, that cat is well out of the bag. Diversity has proven itself as a principle that has value and makes life much more interesting from the food we eat, to the music we enjoy, to the films and TV we watch. Take me, for instance, I’d never eaten cooked onions until I met my Cajun wife, now I love them. And on a larger scale companies trying to do business in our multicultural, mutli-ethnic society will understand that having some of your customers, work in your company and maybe run it, is a good idea because they will already know the value of onions, and the flavor they add to the meal.