Why Rebranding DEI Won’t Fix White Supremacy

DEI wasn’t dreamed up in a corporate boardroom. It came directly out of the civil rights movement. It was born from struggle, activism, and the fight for basic equity—hard-won by Black organizers and other marginalized communities who demanded change.

But now that the term has been politicized, made uncomfortable, and misrepresented by bad-faith actors, we’re seeing a familiar pattern—especially among white folks. The instinct to rebrand. To swap out the language. To find something softer, safer, more “palatable.”

Let’s be real: we don’t get to rebrand our way out of this. We don’t get to workshop new phrases to make fairness more comfortable for people who were never invested in justice to begin with. The same people who weaponized “DEI” will do the same with “merit-based hiring.” They did it with “Defund the Police.” With “Black Lives Matter.” With “woke.” They’ll keep doing it. That’s how white supremacy survives—by co-opting, distorting, and discrediting language until the original meaning is lost.

Trying to “fix” DEI with a whitewashed branding exercise doesn’t just miss the point—it reinforces the very systems we’re supposed to be dismantling. And let’s be honest: DEI has benefited white women more than most other marginalized groups. That doesn’t mean it’s failed. It means we have to keep pushing for deeper change, not prettier language.

So maybe the problem isn’t the words. Maybe it’s how quickly we abandon them when the going gets tough. We instantly look for a workaround instead of doing the actual work.

And that—more than any acronym—is the real issue.