I did not expect this, reported in the Guardian this morning, and shared at sufficient length as the issues are important:
Apple shareholders voted down an attempt to pressure the technology company into yielding to Donald Trump's push to scrub corporate programs designed to diversify its workforce.
A proposal drafted by the National Center for Public Policy Research – a self-described conservative thinktank – urged Apple to follow a litany of high-profile companies that have retreated from diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives currently in the Trump administration's crosshairs.
After a brief presentation about the anti-DEI proposal, Apple announced shareholders had rejected it without disclosing the vote tally. The preliminary results will be outlined in a regulatory filing later on Tuesday.
This is very good news. That is not where I expected the fight back on diversity, equity and inclusion to begin, but I welcome the fact that it has.
Now, more need to do the same. The fascists need to be opposed.
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Good news. DEI seems to sit in the same area as “woke” in the view of conservo-fascists.
The Guardian posted a rather stange photo montage yesterday: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2025/feb/25/mark-laita-america-most-vulnerable-in-pictures
I urge readers to click on the interviews – I listened to a few which I found distressing – my heart went out to these poeple – who live in one of the richest countries on the planet & yet & yet. This DEI territory writ large. woke/DEI = to give a damn (tm. J Fonda). Not woke/NO DEI & this is what you get. Where has all thge empathy gone?
Thanks Mike
Thee are the people the GOP wants to leave behind
The weird thing is that many of these voted for Donald Trump because Biden’s economic packages did not put money directly into their household bank account. The buyer’s-regret, on the street, is getting louder and louder.
I am not surprised…..
It’s much less surprising if you consider Tim Cook is one of the few publicly gay CEOs in a multinational. He has taken senior staff to pride events. He also was misdiagnosed with MS at one point, which he said changed his perspective.
Apple may be quite corporate in some ways but just having Tim at the helm makes them more progressive than most of corporate America, and that plays out on places like this.
And yet, according to the BBC, Tim Cook’s already stepping back from this.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/clyjv8e49deo
The article says Apple doesn’t use quotas which is where I assume the primary legal risk is. Quotas are the main reason for the opposition to DEI: I don’t see how creating “a culture of belonging where everyone can do their best work” could ever be a legal risk.
The other extreme, Tesla is seeing sales fall, in part due to increased competition but much of this is the Musk factor.
I wonder if this is at all related to the latest Apple AI debacle, where it translated “Racist” into “Trump”?
I guess AI isn’t all bad after all…
Apologies for posting again but this is relevant. We can speculate as to why Apple shareholders voted in the way they did: was it that “they give a damn” (= woke) or perhaps they understand that intelligence and the capacity to work is not a function of sex, colour, sex-choice or whether you like marmite, coupled to, in a given population the pool of good workers is fixed and narrowing your choice (based on sex, etc) is perhaps not a good idea, leading to sub-optimal outcomes.
Germany, the recent “let’s send back the immigrants” election. Hmm what is this I see:
https://www.cleanenergywire.org/news/electricians-engineers-most-needed-professions-german-energy-transition-workforce-analysis
“the growing lack of skilled workers is also threatening the energy transition at the global level.” Germany is reputed to have quite a good system to train workers – looks like its creaking. I wonder if some immigrants could fill the gap (keeping in mind that intelligence is not a function of sex, etc or indeed the deity that you worship).
One could characterise the right whingers in a given country as self-harmers – they are happy to slash the arms of the country cos that makes them feel better (the slashing in this case being “send all the immigrants back even if it causes economic harm & no I don’t need my bottom wiped” etc). Right whingers need psychological help (https://dangoyal.substack.com/p/the-de-evolution-caused-by-fascism) – I’m sure there are good psychologists amongst immigrant who could help. It would stop us de-evolving and make the right-whingers like themselves. What’s not to like?
You missed an opportunity for the perfect headline…
Apple gives Trump the pip.
Very good
This is indeed good news, although not entirely surprising. The proposed motion against DEI —and Apple’s recommendation to oppose it— has been public for some time. Apple has a long history (dating back to the eighties) of support for DEI, driven by its employees and some progressive elements in management. It’s not alone; while the current image of Silicon Valley is understandably pretty negative, reality is more nuanced, and there’s been a long history of support for diversity among many of the older established Silicon Valley companies. Proximity to San Francisco counts for something.
I might be wrong, but I suspect things have taken a downturn with the emergence of social media “tech” companies, where people data, rather than innovative engineering, is the product that’s up for sale.
Of course, there have also been some real horror stories; for example the late Bill Shockley (“the man who put the Silicon in Silicon Valley”), co-inventor of the transistor (for which he shared a Nobel prize), was an outright racist and eugenicist, and more recently, there have been numerous dreadful accounts of misogyny, sexual harassment and discrimination in Silicon Valley companies —including Apple.
But talented people can walk away and find plenty of new opportunities. Shockley was smart and initially successful, but he proved to be a very unpleasant human being; his best talent abandoned him and some went on to found more successful companies such as Intel.
To answer Mike Parr, I’ve no doubt that many shareholders regarded the vote as the right way to treat people (some would probably be employees or former employees anyway), but it also makes good business sense.