☆ Opinion: They used me as a pawn—until I no longer fit their narrative (2/6)
Dr. Tabia Lee was ousted from De Anza College in 2023 for daring to disagree on critical DEI. But isn't the Diversity orthodoxy all about amplifying minoritized voices? Or is its concern for race a facade—for something more dangerous than mere lecture cancellations? An Opp Now exclusive.
Opportunity Now: How would you interpret the “pyramid of intersectionality” in cases like Dr. Lee’s—where someone seems to check all the identity boxes on paper, but is ousted for their viewpoint? Are we missing something?
Tabia Lee: From my perspective, this critical social justice movement isn't about social justice at all. It's always been about power—and seizing power by any means necessary.
So that's why you'll see different groups and individuals being used as pawns in a dangerous political game. That's why you'll see professors demanding that their students protest or stand in solidarity with certain groups when they don't even know what they're doing or what they're saying. That's why you see rampant racism and antisemitism on American college campuses.
Ironically, one of the foundational principles of critical social justice ideology is that racism is baked into American society. This is one of their core beliefs. And it's a very nihilistic viewpoint that completely disregards any progress that we've made. But I think that that's by design—and the cancel culture, that's part of it.
ON: Where did this come from, do you think?
TL: In the ‘60s and ‘70s, there were very violent protests born out of Bay Area universities—journalists were getting attacked, and then-Governor Reagan had to send out the National Guard. Many of the protests we see today are similar. The fruits of their labor.
ON: Tell us more about these protests. What was their aim?
TL: I’ve gone back to primary source documents to analyze the Third World Liberation Front, which pushed these protests on local campuses. Here's what was happening: they were demanding that an Ethnic Studies department be developed—and that we have Native American and Black Studies departments, too.
Their implication here is that only a few ethnicities have experienced any kind of strife in America or are worth studying. And according to this ideology, we get the idea of victims and oppressors, the idea that we need to discriminate now to right the wrongs of the past.
Sound familiar? That's all critical social justice ideology. But there’s no single founder. It's always been rooted in collectivism (by design, I think). So part of my work is to synthesize these seemingly disparate sources, to help people understand the rootedness of critical social justice ideology, and how it became so ingrained in our policies and practices.
ON: Indeed, not just ingrained but compulsory in many higher ed (as well as gov't) institutions.
TL: This is how their rhetoric goes: “If you stand for justice, if you're a good person, you'll stand with us.” Of course I want to stand for justice, right? And of course I want people to feel included. This weaponization and subversion of language has been very intentional; it's been used to cast people out.
But it's more than social pressure. Anyone who shows an inkling of not aligning with the ideology often can't get hired or interviewed. Universities have policed this through DEI statements and other forms of screening.
ON: Which are—at least in theory—being dropped by California Community Colleges and the UC system.
TL: We're seeing some shifts like these right now. Especially with the new administration.
But largely, it's a cloaking. The same things are happening, but we're not going to call them DEI statements anymore, right? We have to name it something different. Implement it in a different, subtler way.
ON: Proxy discrimination—we’ve seen it also in local college admissions. Institutions have pivoted to race-focused essay prompts and other workarounds to affirmative action.
We watch out for the word “holistic”; it often means “subjective.”
TL: Yes, they're very committed to their ideology, which wants equality of outcomes for everyone. But what that means is a system of government and a way of life that America has not known—and hopefully will never know.
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