{"id":321447,"date":"2021-08-11T12:00:03","date_gmt":"2021-08-11T09:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/american-express-tells-its-workers-capitalism-is-racist\/"},"modified":"2021-08-11T12:00:03","modified_gmt":"2021-08-11T09:00:03","slug":"american-express-tells-its-workers-capitalism-is-racist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/american-express-tells-its-workers-capitalism-is-racist\/","title":{"rendered":"#American Express tells its workers capitalism is racist"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#American Express tells its workers capitalism is racist<\/strong>”<\/p>\n

\n

American Express, which made a $2.3 billion <\/em>profit last quarter, invited the great-grandson of the Nation of Islam\u2019s founder to tell its employees that capitalism is evil.<\/p>\n

It was part of the credit-card giant\u2019s critical-race-theory training program, which asks workers to deconstruct their racial and sexual identities, then rank themselves on a hierarchy of \u201cprivilege.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to a trove of documents I\u2019ve reviewed, AmEx executives created an internal \u201cAnti-Racism Initiative\u201d after George Floyd\u2019s death last year, subjecting employees to a training program based on the core CRT tenets, including intersectionality, which reduces individuals to a tangle of racial, gender and sexual identities that determine whether he is an \u201coppressor\u201d or \u201coppressed\u201d in a given situation.<\/p>\n

In a foundational session, the outside consulting firm Paradigm trained AmEx employees to deconstruct their own intersectional identities, mapp<\/a>ing their \u201crace, sexual orientation, body type, religion, disability status, age, gender identity [and] citizenship\u201d onto an official company worksheet.<\/p>\n

Employees could then determine whether they have \u201cprivilege\u201d or are members of a \u201cmarginalized group\u201d: White males presumably end up in the oppressor position, while racial and sexual minorities are considered oppressed.<\/p>\n

In a related session, trainers instruct employees how to change their behavior in the office based on their relative position on the hierarchy. The trainers provide a blue flowchart with specific rules for interacting with black, female and LGBT employees: If members of a subordinate group are present, workers should practice \u201cintersectional allyship\u201d and defer to them before speaking.<\/p>\n

In another handout, the instructions for white employees are even more explicit: \u201cidentify the privileges or advantages you have\u201d; \u201cdon\u2019t speak over members of the black and African-American community\u201d; \u201cit\u2019s not about your intent, it\u2019s about the impact you have on your colleague.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"American
American Express employees were taught about concepts like \u201cprivilege\u201d and \u201cmicroagressions.\u201d<\/figcaption>
Alamy Stock Photo<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Even common phrases are subjected to race-based regulation: White employees are told not to utter phrases such as \u201cI don\u2019t see color,\u201d \u201cwe are all human beings\u201d and \u201ceveryone can succeed in this society if they work hard enough.\u201d \u2014 all categorized as \u201cmicroaggressions.\u201d<\/p>\n

At one high-profile \u201canti-racism\u201d event, AmEx execs invited Khalil Muhammad \u2014 great-grandson of Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad \u2014 to lecture on \u201crace in corporate America.\u201d He argued that the system of capitalism was founded on racism and that \u201cracist logics and forms of domination\u201d have shaped Western society from the Industrial Revolution to the present.<\/p>\n

\u201cAmerican Express has to do its own digging about how it sits in relationship to this history of racial capitalism,\u201d Muhammad said. \u201cYou are complicit in giving privileges in one community against the other, under the pretext that we live in a meritocratic system where the market judges everyone the same.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n
\"Khalil
Khalil Muhammad lectured the American Express employees on \u201crace in corporate America.\u201d<\/figcaption>
Photo by Gary Gershoff\/WireImage<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Muhammad then encouraged executives to begin \u201cthe deep \u00adredistributive and reparative work\u201d and to \u201clobby [the government] for the kinds of social<\/a> policies that reflect your values.\u201d<\/p>\n

More, Muhammad argued, the company should reduce standards for black customers and sacrifice profits in the interest of race-based reparations.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf American Express cares about racial justice in the world, it can\u2019t simply say the market\u2019s going to define how we price certain customers, who happen to come from low-income communities,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you want to do good, then you\u2019re going to have to set up products and [product] lines that don\u2019t maximize profit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Finally, in the flagship Anti-Racism Initiative training module, AmEx recommends a series<\/a> of resources for employees to, quoting Ibram Kendi, \u201clearn about covert white supremacy\u201d and dedicate themselves \u201cto the lifelong task of overcoming our country\u2019s racist heritage.\u201d<\/p>\n

Employees are encouraged to listen to the Beyond Prisons podcast, which advocates for \u201cprison abolition,\u201d a movement committed to \u201celiminating imprisonment, policing and surveillance\u201d altogether. Workers are also \u00addirected toward a series of articles that promises to \u201cforce white people to see and understand how white supremacy permeates their lives,\u201d demonstrate that white children become racist before they can speak and persuade employees that Congress should pass legislation for race-based reparations.<\/p>\n

Last October, AmEx announced a $1 billion \u201caction plan\u201d to increase diversity, invest in more minority-owned businesses and donate to nonprofits that promote \u201csocial justice.\u201d
Whether the company will forgo profits or abandon capitalism, as it encourages its employees to do, remains to be seen.<\/p>\n

Christopher F. Rufo is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Twitter: RealChrisRufo<\/a><\/em>\n <\/div>\n