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Meta has become the latest major corporation to end its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs amid pressure from conservative critics.
In a memo sent to all employees Friday, Meta’s VP of Human Resources Janelle Gale said the company is eliminating all DEI measures, including “equity and inclusion programs and changing hiring and supplier diversity practices.”
In the memo, first reported by Axios, Gale said that a shift in stance is in part due to a “changing” legal and policy landscape surrounding DEI in the US.
“The Supreme Court of the United States has recently made decisions signaling a shift in how courts will approach DEI,” she wrote. “It reaffirms longstanding principles that discrimination should not be tolerated or promoted on the basis of inherent characteristics.”
The policy reversal times with the forthcoming inauguration of President-elect Donald Trump, whose administration has a firm anti-DEI agenda. Trump has vowed to dismantle federal DEI programs and revoke related requirements through measures like the Dismantle DEI Act.
Meta to scrap ‘charged’ DEI programs
Meta’s VP of HR added that DEI has become a “charged” term, writing that some have used it to demand “preferential treatment of some groups over others.”
Her comments echo criticism from anti-DEI activists, including Robbie Starbuck, who has vehemently lobbied companies – typically Fortune 500 companies with a heavy conservative-leaning customer base – to end their diversity measures.
Some of the changes appear to reflect little more than a change in terminology away from the language Gale described as ‘charged.’
“Instead of equity and inclusion programs,” the memo continued, Meta will “focus on how to apply fair and consistent practices that mitigate bias for all, no matter your background.”
However, other changes are more substantial. Meta will no longer require hiring managers to source candidates from underrepresented backgrounds and efforts to work with minority-owned vendors and suppliers have been scrapped.
Gale stated that the principles Meta uses to guide its ‘People practices’ will remain “the same.”
“We build the best teams with the most talented people… This means sourcing people from a range of candidate pools, but never making hiring decisions based on protected characteristics (e.g. race, gender etc.),” she wrote. “We drive consistency in employment practices to ensure fairness and objectivity for all.”
The elimination of the DEI department means team members will take on new roles, including Meta’s Chief Diversity Officer Maxine Williams, who is now responsible for “accessibility and engagement.”
Zuckerberg calls for more ‘masculine energy’ at work
The DEI U-turn follows similar cuts at companies including McDonald’s, Ford Motor Company, Jack Daniels, Molson Coors, Tractor Supply, John Deere, Amazon, and Walmart.
Meanwhile, firms such as Microsoft, Apple, and Costco have pushed back against calls to dismantle DEI measures, arguing that changes are unnecessary and detrimental to the mitigation of workplace bias.
The controversial announcement by Meta also times with other major changes at the social media business, including the removal of third-party fact-checking and the loosening of hateful conduct policies.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg addressed the changes to Meta’s stance on free speech in an episode of the Joe Rogan podcast on Friday.
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“The whole point of social media is giving people the ability to share what they want. It goes back to, our original mission is just give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected,” he said.
Some of Meta’s LGBTQ+ employees have reportedly criticized the changes to hate speech policies, including lines such as: “We do allow allegations of mental illness or abnormality when based on gender or sexual orientation.”
According to 404media, some employees are taking time off and “considering leaving the company.”
Helle Thorning-Schmidt, Co-Chair of Meta’s Oversight Board, told the BBC she was “very concerned” by the decisions made at Meta: “We’re very concerned about gender rights, LGBTQ+ rights, trans people’s rights on the platforms because we are seeing many instances where hate speech can lead to real-life harm.”
During the podcast episode, Zuckerberg also decried the “culturally neutered” companies that he said have moved away from embracing “masculine energy.”
The executive asserted it was good when a workplace “celebrates the aggression a bit more.”
“Masculine energy I think is good, and obviously society has plenty of that, but I think that corporate culture was really trying to get away from it,” he explained. “It’s like you want feminine energy, you want masculine energy… I think that that’s all good. But I do think the corporate culture sort of had swung toward being this somewhat more neutered thing.”
Zuckerberg clarified his remarks, echoing some of the phrasing used by Gale in the memo on Meta’s DEI cuts.
“You want women to be able to succeed and have companies that can unlock all the value from having great people no matter what their background or gender,” he explained.
