Steven Mintz, Professor Emeritus from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and also known as “The Ethics Sage,” is a serious, thoughtful, aspirational ethics commentator whom I have enjoyed reading for a long time. Thus it is with profound sadness and disappointment that I must report that his perception and objectivity have been corrupted badly, probably, I’m guessing, by living in California and by being stuck in the biased bubble created by his colleagues in academia. That someone like Mintz could be so addled regarding his perceptions is a cautionary tale.

In his most recent post, “The Fallacy of D.E.I.,” Mintz begins with a list of what he says are evidence that “We have lost our moral compass as a society and it’s likely to get worse before it gets better.” Here is the list:

• Gun violence in our streets has risen by epic proportions.
• Racial injustice persists in our society.
• Black Americans have been gunned down by police for inexplicable reasons even with the #blacklivesmatter movement.
• Sexual harassment in the workplace has not been abated even after the #MeToo movement.
• Sexual assaults on college campuses have been increasing over time.
• Social media continues to post inappropriate images that can affect the behavior of young Americans.
• Politicians continue to say one thing but do something else – just to get elected—and some engage in inappropriate behavior.
• The behavior of “heroes” in sports and entertainment is frequently found wanting.

If I were starting to read an essay by someone I had not read before, that absurd list would have ended the session. It’s sloppy and factually wrong, largely reflecting the Left’s partisan talking points and Big Lies rather than reality.

Gun violence has not risen by “epic proportions.” In fact, on a percentage of the population basis , it hasn’t changed at all besides a blip up during the pandemic lockdown. “Racial injustice persists in our society” sounds like an over-long protest placard. It is a meaningless statement: what is being alluded to? Does prejudice still exist? Sure, and it always will. What are the markers of this injustice that the professor is talking about?

Black Americans are not “gunned down” by police for inexplicable reasons any more often that white Americans, and randomly unprovoked police-involved shootings are extremely rare. Mintz makes it sound like cops just decide, “Let’s kill us some blacks!” and start shooting. Does he believe that? It’s a fantasy designed to impugn police and relieve blacks from their own accountability. “Even with the #blacklivesmatter movement”? Does the professor live in a cave? BLM was and is a Marxist, anti-American scam aimed at putting the police, law enforcement, and white American on the defensive.

Yes, sexual harassment has not abated, in great part because the same people who championed the #MeToo movement politicized it, weaponized it against their favorite targets and quickly demonstrated their own hypocrisy, electing a serial sexual harasser (and sniffer) President after peviously fawning over a sexual predator in the White House and his enabling wife. There is little reliable evidence that “sexual assaults on college campuses have been increasing over time.” What has occurred is that accusations of sexual assaults have been encouraged as gender power-plays while the definition of “sexual assault” has been expanded to include the impulsive stolen kiss.

As for the last three bullet points, they sure look like padding to me. What’s an “inappropriate image” on social media? Gee, politicians lie, break promises and behave inappropriately: when did that start? And the heroes in sports and entertainment don’t measure up any more? Horrors. What is America coming to? Ah, how I long for the halcyon days of Elvis, Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Jerry Lee Lewis, Jim Brown, Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Barry Bonds and Shoeless Joe Jackson—you know, when we had heroes who were role models for our children!

Believe it or not, the essay gets worse, as he descends into stating the obvious as if it requires special powers of perception. “As a college professor, I have started to wonder about the value of DEI education. Have the protests against Jewish students met the “Diversity” and “Inclusion” standards? I think not.”

Gee, Steven, ya think? Then he scrubs the concept of “diversity” as it is applied into something benign, which it is not. “The concept of diversity encompasses acceptance and respect,” he writes. “It means to treat each person as unique and to recognize our individual differences. It means understanding each other and moving beyond simple tolerance to embracing and celebrating the rich dimensions of individuality.” None of this is true in the context of how the DEI movement operates. Each person is treated as a racial, ethnic and gender package with inherent virtues based on these characteristics alone. It is a system that elevates group membership over “individuality.” Moreover, it is desigend to exclude whites, especially white males. What the hell is the Sage talking about?

On “inclusion,” he writes, “An inclusive society is one that overrides differences of race, gender, class, generation, and geography, and ensures inclusion and equality of opportunity, as well as capability of all members of the society to determine an agreed set of social institutions that govern social interaction.” What? How does he presume to write about the DEI fad when he apparently hasn’t been paying attention to what is being done in its name?

I think I’m going to give the Ethics Sage a mulligan and pretend he never wrote this.