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...Truly diverse... Truly free

Why does it Matter?

Freedom of conscience is what guarantees our other freedoms. It enables a liberal democracy to function, because it enables people to debate public issues without fear. Until relatively recently, everyone was encouraged to contribute to public debate and no one needed to be afraid of expressing their opinion. At least, any fear would be generated only by extremist groups of which society, as a whole, disapproved. No one needed to fear mainstream society.

Now, all that is under threat as a new kind of pseudo-liberal who will tolerate nothing except their own position has gradually replaced the genuine liberality which allowed all positions to co-exist. A society aspiring to be genuinely diverse has been replaced with a one-size-fits-all orthodoxy of diversity, which is no diversity at all, and will pillary and stigmatise any who dare hold a different view. Moreover, it will use that stigma to threaten people’s security and livelihood in order to generate fear and force compliance.

Because this behaviour is more akin to totalitarianism than liberalism, the Diverse Diversity Campaign uses the term Pseudo-liberalism to refer to it. This is a tendency which masquerades as liberalism but is clearly false in that claim because it is fundamentally intolerant. Other terms (such as wokeism) could be used but whatever we call it, the negative impact is the same.

This is a kind of intolerance that cannot form part of a free and fair society. Support the DDC and show the world you value freedom and fairness and proper informed debate.

Fairness without Division

A new Equality Act

Had enough of Identity Politics, toxic quarrels, extremist activists, and Cancel Culture?

There is a better way. We can have a free, fair, and tolerant society without dividing people up into special interest groups and allocating rights based on supposed membership of those groups. All we have to do to fight intolerance is champion tolerance, fairness, and freedom. To do this we need a new, fairer, Equality Act – one based on justice and fairness for all and not limited to specific pre-ordained characteristics.

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I am no lawyer, so I do not propose to draft a potential new Act here. However, we need a law which ensures decision taking, when it is necessary, is always fair and relevant to the context in which it is needed. This means selecting a candidate for a job, for instance, on the qualities needed for the work involved and not on arbitrary characteristics based on taste or prejudice. We need an act based on protecting people from unfair treatment or harms such as intimidation or slander, which prevents anyone being the victim of incitement by outlawing inflammatory language without preventing people presenting evidence if they come across something the public needs to know. We need a law, in short, based on demonstrable truth, justice, equality of all, relevance in decision-taking, and preventing incitement, slander, intimidation, and unfair treatment in employment or service provision, so all can feel safe and all can participate in society on an equal basis, and without hampering debate on matters of public concern.

The current Act is unfit for purpose because all it does is cement into law the arbitrary characteristics decided by a few “Identity Politics” activists while providing little or no protection for those who fall outside those categories and can even become an instrument of oppression because it protects categories, not rights. Equality for some only is not equality!

Let’s replace it with something better and fairer.

What is Diverse Diversity?

Diverse Diversity is formally defined as:

“Diversity which seeks to enable all groups to conform to their own internal beliefs and practices inasmuch as these do not prevent the conformance of other groups to their own principles. Diverse Diversity therefore opposes any view of diversity which seeks to impose a universal perspective across all groups, as if there were only one correct way of viewing the world to which all others must conform. That is not to deny the right of any group to believe its principles are absolute, but it does prevent any group being subjected to principles it considers alien by another group which considers itself superior in some way.”

Which is a rather lengthy way of saying it’s about the Freedom to be Different, the freedom not to conform to someone else’s expectations, the freedom to be oneself.

Diverse diversity seeks to unite people rather than to divide them, and to protect the integrity of public and private life for all, to ensure fair and equitable treatment of all without denying freedom to any.

Diverse Diversity encourages respectful informed debate on controversial issues and seeks to protect all participants from bullying or coercion. No viewpoint is considered unacceptable provided it can be demonstrated by well-founded and logical argument. Such argument and engagement is seen as a positive way to enhance understanding and reach consensus or mutual respect where consensus is not achieved.

At the heart of Diverse Diversity is the belief in the existence of absolute truth accompanied by a recognition that such truth cannot always be reliably discerned and some truths imply a need, by exercising judgement, to form an opinion which cannot be reduced to facts. Where facts are unknown provisional policies might be needed to cover ambiguity.

Diverse Diversity welcomes all to participate while protecting the viewpoints and identities of all participants from others’ demands. That is not to suggest arguments cannot be won or lost but that any such win or loss must be by logical reason and recognition, not by emotional or any other form of coercion.

Why Diversity must be Diverse

It might seem obvious, if we talk about diversity, that it will be diverse, but that is not the reality. In practice, many who claim to champion diversity have a limited view of what it means. In particular, they might single out certain categories of divergence as legitimate but refuse to recognise those who define categories differently, or who disagree about the limits of diversity or whom should be protected. Frequently, protection will take the form of oppressing those who disagree for some reason with the protected group, denying the legitimacy of disagreement in the name of protecting the particular group against criticism, which will be said to favour their enemies and thus encourage harm to those whose diversity must be protected.

There are fallacies here. Firstly, disagreement, even disapproval, is not the same as oppression and violence, and should not be treated as equivalent. If we are not able to disagree we are not able to debate, and it might well be that preventing debate is the real purpose of delegitimising disagreement. It is politically convenient for those who have some form of power to suppress dissent.

Secondly, it is not true that agreeing with a position is the same as justifying any means to secure it. I do not approve of burglary; it does not follow that I would support a gang of vigilantes patrolling the streets claiming they were hunting burglars or wish to see such a gang assaulting a passer-by in the belief he or she might be one. I can be against violence without supporting one side in a fight. It is not a straight choice between supporting one side’s violence or the other’s. I can disapprove of violence as a method, whichever side I support. I do, in fact, disapprove of violence as a method. Those who claim otherwise are limiting choices in order to force people to take sides, when taking sides might not be the most constructive thing to do. They are manipulating the situation for their own purposes.

Diverse Diversity resists that manipulation. It is based on the belief that a truly diverse society tolerates all ideas including conflicting ideas. Rather than trying to eliminate conflict by disparaging one side of the argument and trying to silence those who support it, Diverse Diversity sees such conflicts as an opportunity to hone arguments more sharply, to examine underlying issues, and to develop methods of promoting fair debate. This is where Diverse Diversity differs from other ideologies; it is about methods rather than content. Methods of expression and promoting ideas must be fair, rather than the ideas themselves. Fair debate will enable listeners to understand and evaluate the content without fear or favour and make up their own mind. Fair debate will enable those who disagree to argue without harm to each other or wider society. Ideas must stand and fall on their merits as understood by those who hold them, but for that to work the methods employed in argument must be fair and no one must feel intimidated because their views are unpopular. Equally, no one must be allowed to pretend to feel intimidated as a means of silencing others.

Only in a truly diverse, truly tolerant society can truth flourish as arguments are weighed by their hearers. Only a society based on truth can be truly fair and just, and only in a fair and just society can human beings flourish and find their true potential.

That is why Diversity must be diverse, and not limited by one faction’s views of what it should mean. Truth is a collective good, and to be true must be collectively held in plurality so its relative facets can all be accessed and considered.