An actionable anti-racism plan for geoscience organizations by Hendratta N. Ali and 18 co-authors in Nature Communications (open access) https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-23936-w
This is an excellent article and a must-read for all who are concerned about the overt and covert discrimination and racism that occur throughout and underlie geosciences.
The very first sentence says it all: "Racism thrives in geoscience." Not too many sentences after that, the authors state, "Racism has led to the geosciences becoming one of the least diverse among all science and engineering fields."
The authors pull no punches in their review of the status of the geosciences. However, unlike many who point out the problem and leave it at that, this team of authors then do what all good professionals sounding alarms should do: they then go on to provide 20 concrete action steps within 6 categories that must be taken to address the problems they have elucidated. Describe the problem - provide a specific solution. The action steps proposed are broad-reaching and simply stated, but that simplicity of construct does NOT in any way match the difficulty in which these goals can or will be accomplished.
It is the fad now to recognize the racism and discrimination in geosciences. Many organizations are developing statements decrying it, talking about how it must stop. A new one pops up almost daily, like the carnival "whack-a-mole" game. It is hard to keep up with them all.
In my opinion, though, this is all sound and fury signifying nothing. Lots of hand-wringing and statements of good intentions, but I propose that they are self-serving, designed to make the sources feel like they are doing something so they can pat themselves on the back for their efforts but continue on with operations as usual, perhaps a little more aware, but nonetheless, fundamentally unchanged. The geoscience discipline and all of its organizations and departments need to stop talking and start doing.
Academic departments are disappearing across the U.S. at an alarming rate within the declining popularity of the geoscience discipline and the guise of fiscal challenges. How can an educated citizenry NOT be literate in Earth system science? Every aspect of our daily lives is impacted by the Earth System, its processes, the cycles within it. Young people openly and vociferously care about our planet and want to take concrete action to prevent its destruction. So, how is it that they are not signing up for geoscience and Earth Science courses in droves, overwhelming teaching capacities? Is it a marketing problem, or do our young people see the lack of diversity in the geoscience ranks, do not see people that look like them and are driven away? Politicians, as they work internationally, still do not see the value of understanding the diversity of our world, the value of "otherness" in both humanity and physical features. They allow the ignorance of Earth to continue. Our beloved science is disappearing entirely. How much of it is, in fact, due to the racism and discrimination issue at its core?
Correcting this in-bred problem that has existed as long as our discipline has existed will take hard, hard work, determination, and likely many tears and much anguish. Beloved practices and precepts will have to be torn asunder and new ways of being put in their place.
I say categorically and unflinchingly - enough is enough. Everybody recognizes the elephant in the room - perhaps better, the cave beneath the floor and the subsidence cracks developing that faithfully signal the impeding and catastrophic collapse about to occur in the near term. Stop talking and start doing. The verbiage is nice, but the work is LONG overdue and needs to happen before geoscience as a profession goes extinct.
#diversity #genderequality #equality #DEI #diversityandinclusion #geosciences #BIPOC
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