Famed psychologist and talk show host Dr. Phil took aim at Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) ideology during a recent episode of “Dr. Phil Primetime.” Dr. Phil hosted DEI advocate Rachel Kargas, along with Pastor James Ward, Jr. and York College of Pennsylvania Prof. Erec Smith. When Kargas spoke of “the fact that some demographics come to the table and have to overcome racism, unconscious bias, misogyny” Dr. Phil queried, “So that means you're trying to create equality of outcome?” Kargas affirmed that this was her intended goal, something Dr. Phil referred to as “playing God.”
Dr. Phil proceeded to deride DEI as “Marxism,” noting “That's been tried, that didn't work.” Dr. Phil also questioned, “How do you create equality of outcome when people aren't the same? You're right, some people are shorter, some people are taller looking over that fence, they can't both play in the NBA. You can't create equality of outcome. What gives a DEI program the right to come in and try and alter the nature of things to create equality of outcome?”
Prof. Smith agreed, adding “If you apply to, or stick to, meritocracy, it doesn't matter whether somebody is playing golf with the CEO or not. It's about matching those values, those skills that are necessary for the job.”
Dr. Phil is not the only celebrity to call out DEI. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has regularly criticized DEI ideology, in particular roasting DEI proponent and fellow billionaire Mark Cuban as “racist” and suggesting that his DEI stance was projection, as the “same thing happened with #MeToo guys who got bust suddenly becoming fake ardent feminists.”
Musk has also suggested that “it will take an airplane crashing and killing hundreds of people for them to change this crazy policy,” in reference to DEI and said that it has proven a monumental task for airlines to “find enough qualified pilots, even without insane DEI requirements.”
With Dr. Phil now adding his name to the list of celebrities coming out against DEI, it seems as though the pitfalls of this left-wing ideology will continue to become more publicly well-known.