You're getting downvoted for this because you've painted with an awfully broad brush. I think there's a lot of good work that D&I policies _can_ theoretically do. But in practice? I've seen them implemented by folks that don't really have the creativity or charisma or gravitas to pull it off because make no mistake, it's challenging, risky, failure prone work. I'm going to keep an open mind to seeing it possibly work, but I haven't really seen it at this point. I don't think it's for ill will -- rather, I think it's simply very, very hard to pull off. I think the devil is in the details.

Let me go to bat for you -- it's possible that D&I policies can actually be used at face value to reproduce the very same systems they sought to eradicate, where folks are selected for positions of power that they fail at simply because of something external to their physical identity. And more to the point, I think it's a little naive and hubristic to believe that you can bureaucratize the problems of bigotry away. Such attempts may create surface level effects, but will fail to address the roots of the problem, which will probably just adopt another more cautious disguise and continue onward.

What's the solution, then? Sadly, I don't think there is an easy one. I am inclined to say the solution is creative destruction. We as an industry and society must move forward as a whole, and show how much more effectively diverse, well run companies can perform if we truly believe it's a superior manner of organizing firms. The presumptions, assumptions, blind spots and biases that cause these problems to occur must simply disappear through the process of that; if they don't, then perhaps it would signal to us that something else is going on.

I may be a bit cynical, but that is exactly what I expect to happen. Human beings are cliquey, tribal creatures. Many will be awful to themselves, their close friends and their family, never mind the coworkers that they actually like. When faced with the sheer difficulty and significance of adequate managing and mentoring employees to help mature, how am I supposed to believe that diversity and inclusion are anything but subsections of that greater whole? In the engineering world, what would a shallow, presumptuous thinker be but a junior employee that needs to grow in order to be trusted with more responsibility? I think D&I needs to be looked at through this pragmatic lens rather than the moralistic, sensationalistic and bureaucratic/disciplinarian lens that it is so often seen through. And sadly, this level of creativity and systems design is outside the amount (and seemingly the capability) of many (but not all) who are tasked with it.

The best way to deal with these problems, rather, is to avoid them in the first place. So long as we live in a world where unfair areas exist, leaders that proactively create ideologically, culturally and physically diverse firms, and instill cultures where racism, sexism and all forms of discrimination are not part of the organizational DNA will thrive over those that attempt (usually in vain) to retrofit it. I think this is the only way forward that I can see. And I do agree with you that treating a person differently based on their race or sex either positively or negatively is ultimately ineffective. The former is patronizing, the latter is oppressing. We deserve better.