‘It’s Being Mended’. American corporate cancel culture, that is. Along with one of the world’s largest tech giants.
That’s because self-appointed anti-woke crusader and full-time DEI detective Robby Starbuck (pronouns not included), has notched another major corporate win in his one-man mission to rid America’s boardrooms of anything smelling remotely like progressive HR policy.
This time, it’s Big Blue itself — IBM — that has thrown in the towel and bid farewell to the era of corporate “allyship.”
According to Wikipedia, the term ‘allyship’ is a practice of “supporting and advocating for marginalized communities by using one's privilege to challenge injustice and promote inclusion, requiring consistent action, learning, and empathy.”
It came to the fore after the murder of George Floyd and figured prominently in IBM’s corporate culture documents and web pages.
No more.
According to Starbuck — who announced the news with the fervor of a man who just discovered HR had been secretly printing their memos on rainbow-coloured paper — IBM has agreed to a sweeping rollback of its diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives after a direct warning its ‘outing’ was imminent.
In a now-viral declaration (part press release, part victory lap, part subscription pitch), Starbuck listed IBM’s “massive changes” as if they were war trophies.
Out goes the DEI department. Gone is the ‘Be Equal’ podcast. The term ‘Latinx’? Cancelled. For Canadians who don’t know better, ‘Latinx’ is the gender-neutral replacement for ‘Latino’ or ‘Lantina’ that is apparently exclusive to American English and woke-minded corporations.
In that regard, IBM has done away with pronouns altogher — a simple ‘he’ or ‘she’ will suffice.
In the words of Starbuck himself: “We’re winning, and one by one, we will bring sanity back to corporate America.”
It’s just the latest chapter in Starbuck’s campaign to defibrillate corporate culture and restore what he calls “sanity and neutrality” to the shopping malls of America.
His previous targets read like a who’s who of American industry: Harley-Davidson (whose CEO Jochen Zeitz was outed just yesterday for embracing DEI), Jack Daniels, Walmart, McDonald’s, Ford, Target, Coors, and even the folks who make your screwdrivers — Stanley Black & Decker and DeWalt — have all reportedly gotten a ‘woke-up’ call courtesy of Robby.
Now, IBM, with nearly 300,000 employees and a market cap of $250 billion, is the latest domino to fall in what Starbuck is calling the “death of the DEI era.”
Observers said Starbuck’s crusade is playing out against a shifting legal and political landscape.
The US Supreme Court recently declared affirmative action unconstitutional in college admissions — a ruling touted by US president Donald Trump and enshrined in executive orders aimed at banning so-called “woke” training from federal agencies, calling it “divisive, un-American propaganda.”
But for Starbuck, every dropped DEI podcast and revoked supplier diversity program is another win in the War on Woke.
“I’ve now helped shift policy at companies worth over $5 trillion,” he said, subtly reminding readers that if they want to keep the war chest full, they can chip in five bucks on his Twitter (“X”) page or donate online.
Who’s next on the hit list?
No one really knows — Starbuck keeps those cards close to his chest — but he promises that if company HR departments still use the phrase “lived experience,” it might want to unplug the podcast mic and quietly get on board while it still can.
“Companies can see that America wants sanity back. The era of wokeness is dying right in front of our eyes. We are the trend, not the anomaly,” he wrote.