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Black Kos Tuesday: A muse on D.E.I. [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2025-01-28
A muse on D.E.I.
Commentary by Chitown Kev
I’ve had a lot of thoughts about this past eight days in America and in the past couple of hours they seem to have settled on a former boss of mine, my all-time favorite boss, in fact.
Since I haven’t worked for the organization in decades, I feel safe in using her full initials, CP.
CP transferred to my division with the title of Program Director from another division within the company. Prior to her five years in that previous division, she had worked for over a decade, I believe, at one of the local banks here in Chicago (which was nationally known) and (I know now) she had the battle scars from her time in corporate America to prove it.
When she got to my division, she had a lot to do, not enough time to do it, and she was on it. CP is also the most demanding boss that I’ve ever had. She was a perfectionist. I had just been hired in my first job as an A/P Clerk right out of the recovery house and, frankly, did not know what the hell I was doing. I received a minimum of instruction and...I began to churn the work out as best that I could. Frequently, I was complemented and rewarded with promotions and complements on general and very specific work matters. One time, I was “sentenced” to work in another unit temporarily when I went into a hissy fit because she hired another A/P Clerk because I was unable to say that I was being overwhelmed by the massive workloads that were coming my way. It was challenging, frustrating, exhilarating, work as I had never worked before working in a positions, that frankly, I had no business being in other than being able to repeatedly prove that I could do the job.
I was recommended for a permanent position at the job by a project consultant to that job, PP (who let everyone know that he graduated from Harvard Business School, it seemed, receiving his MBA during a time where George W. Bush was probably attending Harvard). PP, I observed, was superb making deals and getting job sites up and operational, and was every bit as demanding as CP. CP and PP were also not-so-friendly rivals with PP, at times, making moves to upstage CP.
To make a long story a little shorter; eventually PP was given a position above CP and CP was eventually, rudely, pushed out. PP proved to be every bit as much of a tyrant as DJT and, in fact, since DJT’s arrival in American politics, I have often said to myself that I would not work for DJT under any circumstances or for any amount of money because DJT reminds me too much of PP.
Clearly, I loved one boss and hat...uh, disliked the other. But I will say that PP gave me the greatest complement that I have ever received about my work before or since when, during his first few months I overheard him telling one of his peers that, “Kevin is the glue holding this place together now.”
I have to stop and think on that for a minute.
I am proud of the work I did there. Especially today.
I say all of this to say...look, I don’t know all of the legal and cultural ramifications and what-not of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (D.E.I.) policies.
I do know that over three decades ago, my two bosses, their boss, and their boss’s boss, all Black people, set a standard for work-related excellence that I’m still striving to reach. Those are my standard-bearers (as are my Mom and Stepdad, in other ways).
I can’t believe that white people have made it so obvious that they accept the mediocrity of having people like an unqualified cleaned-up Otis the Drunk in the position that he’s now in. (at least John Tower was qualified at a professional level).
I’m supposed to want to be integrated into and assimilated into...that (even if I am unwanted)?
No thank you, I’ll keep my standards.
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News round up by dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
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Rutgers Center for Minority Serving Institutions has been instructed to “cease all work” under the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility HUB at Jobs for the Future. The Grio: Rutgers University forced to cancel HBCU conference to appease Trump’s anti-DEI executive orders
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President Donald Trump’s anti-diversity, equity, and inclusion executive orders are already impacting higher education where Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) are concerned.
On Friday, Rutgers Graduate School of Education’s Center for Minority Serving Institutionsannounced it was canceling the center’s HBCUs and Registered Apprenticeship Mini Virtual Conference to appease Trump’s recent anti-DEI executive orders enacted days after he took office.
“We were very excited to bring you the HBCUs and Registered Apprenticeship Mini-Conference next week—an event designed to amplify the voices of HBCU leaders and students planned by our team,” university officials wrote in a post on Instagram explaining the move.
The virtual event, originally planned for Jan. 30, has been canceled to comply with two executive orders: “Ending Radical and Wasteful Government DEI Programs and Preferencing,” issued on January 20, 2025, and “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity,” issued on January 21, 2025.
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Filmes de Plástico has filled cinemas and won acclaim by focusing on Black characters living in poor urban areas. The Guardian: New accents: the company reshaping Brazilian film by showing ‘ordinary’ life
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After arriving late several times at work, a librarian is dismissed from his school. The HR employee tasked with presenting the bad news offers him a lift, their conversation deepens and by the end of the night they discover they have a lot in common – including a shared history of mental health treatment – and end up falling in love.
In The Day I Met You, the scenarios, the characters’ professions and the actors playing the protagonists – Renato Novaes and Grace Passô – challenge the conventions of Brazilian romantic films: two Black actors in their 40s defying the genre’s usual slender body standards.
Directed by André Novais Oliveira, the film – which last week won the 2025 APCA award for best direction and earned Passô the best actress award at the 2023 Rio de Janeiro International film festival – is the latest example of how an independent film production company is reshaping the country’s audiovisual landscape by highlighting the experiences of the “ordinary” Brazilian.
“Brazilian cinema doesn’t always think about that guy who works as a librarian at a school, who might be going through depression and could also fall in love,” said the film-maker Gabriel Martins, 37, who along with Oliveira and two other friends founded Filmes de Plástico (Plastic Films) in 2009.
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On Sunday, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials boasted that they arrested 956 undocumented immigrants after being enabled by President Donald Trump to outdo Elon Musk’s (alleged) Nazi salute by invading neighborhoods, workplaces and schools Gestapo style while enacting Trump’s mass deportation agenda. (OK, ICE didn’t say all that, but the officials did appear to be pretty proud of the 956 figure.)
According to ABC 7, ICE posted about the more than 900 undocumented migrants they have in custody in addition to 554 detainees temporarily lodged with other agencies across metro Atlanta, Chicago, Los Angeles, and other major cities and smaller cities like Omaha, Nebraska.
While Trump and his minions focus on the deportation and dehumanization of Black and Latino migrants who have crossed over the southern border, a lot of people are asking one question:
What about the white immigrants?
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WELCOME TO THE TUESDAY PORCH
IF YOU ARE NEW TO THE BLACK KOS COMMUNITY, GRAB A SEAT, SOME CYBER EATS, RELAX, AND INTRODUCE YOURSELF.
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