“This is Baltimore’s DEI mayor commenting on the collapsed Francis Scott Key Bridge,” the user wrote alongside a clip of Scott speaking. “It’s going to get so, so much worse. Prepare accordingly.”
The post was immediately fact checked and even came with an advisory.
“Brandon Scott was elected as Mayor of Baltimore in 2020 with > 70% of the vote,” the advisory reads. “He did not come in to office through any DEI practices, appointments, etc.” This isn’t the first instance of a racist swapping out the N-word with “DEI”—but it certainly is one of the most brazen.
Maybe I’m being overly generous here, to me the user just sounded frustrated with the boundaries of civil discourse masking but not solving a problem. I assumed the problem was self-evident/they weren’t denying it.
To me that feels like a call for more action, not less. It’s all too easy to pretend something isn’t happening when the verbiage around it becomes more palatable (exactly what dog whistles are for).
But again, maybe I’m being too generous.