Equality, diversity and inclusion: each word taken alone is deceptively anodyne. Brought together, however, these words produce a buzzword, variously known as EDI, DEI or (most aptly, perhaps) DI, which has become a jarring reminder of the scourges of pseudo-intellectualism, wastefulness and virtue signalling afflicting our institutions.

EDI gained particular traction in the wake of the “Black Lives Matter” protests of 2020, when there was a sudden flurry of institutions in sectors from education to the arts, health to sport, trying to prove their righteousness and indeed how “cool” they were. As an aside, to those who will predictably argue that such actors were and are not virtue signalling but rather motivated by an earnest desire to do good, it is worth noting that their speedy and uncritical endorsement of “Black Lives Matter” was triggered not by the true humanitarian crises caused by the wars plaguing Africa, or by the tragic and needless knife crime perpetrated by young African and Caribbean-descent men against fellow young men of that demographic, but rather by the killing of a single American man whose skin happened to be “black”.

It would appear that, at last, the unpopular yet influential hysteria about BLM, EDI and their sister causes is waning. Even many of those who might once have been flag-wavers have seen the light, growing demotivated upon realising that something they had thought was inspired by a genuine yearning for a better society has transpired to be something all along designed to further personal and corporate interests instead. Yet the institutional pandering has continued, albeit more quietly: the so called “anti-racism taskforces” which were set up to tackle the nation’s mythical structural racism and the somehow uniquely-qualified diversity chiefs and “Inclusivity Ambassadors” appointed to hector against unconscious bias, have continued to proliferate in institutions across the country. Why is this?