Price of Tokenism

 History.  From recent past to the very beginning when man started keeping track of time.  They even call it historic context for a reason.

But to me history is really a matter of perspective.  It is in and of itself just a catalog of events.  How they are perceived or interpreted is what makes it someone's history.

Humankind continues to advance the species through new ideas and innovations each year.  This week a private citizen (albeit richer than god) went flying to the edge of space (defined essentially as air 55 miles above the surface of the earth at sea level) using a special vehicle attached to a rocket.

Richard Branson or as the platitudes suggest a prefix of Sir ahead of his name, made it into space for a few minutes on his own company's aircraft branded Virgin.  Talk about on his own dime.  Quite a lot of dimes this.

What it marked was a milestone in human space exploration where essentially you send an untrained traveler blasting through it.  Much like the first commercial aircraft this was a maiden attempt to allow commercial flights for anyone with the wherewithal to fly into space.  What made it more newsworthy as the news would indicate is the craft also included a woman.  And not just that but one who was born in India and had achieved significant merits along the way to become part of this voyage.

That aspect garnered more social likes and tweets and retweets all the way from governmental heads and so on.  Was that shrewd marketing? Most likely.  But it also underscores our status as a species where we do not just applaud the mission as a remarkable success but also the gender and genetics of who made it on that mission.

We are still learning to walk as we fly when it comes to social mores and feel obligated to call out advancement for minorities.  The fact we still track and qualify minorities of any kind is a flag.  I understand that tokenism in this form is often essential to underscore the plight of a particular group in society or the unusual challenges faced by a certain demographic.  It helps us direct our energy to the underserved in many ways. 

'Black lives matter' or count of female executives in corporations in the world are all markers and metrics used to keep tabs on the pace of human progress.  Indeed subscribing to BLM does not mean that any other race is less material but it helps pin the blame on history where it does belong.  The actions of few that impacted many in history.  This branding helps alter the mindset that needs changing.

A black girl from Louisiana won the 2021 spelling bee against a stiff competition of children of Indian heritage after many years of what was a foregone conclusion on who the winner of this competition would be.  Media went bonkers.  Again it was almost incumbent on them to play the race angle to cheer what would be a role model worthy event.

So while we look to identify new ceilings and the inevitable breakthrough amidst these man made structures I think we should consciously keep in mind that the pendulum still has a ways to go before we truly forget to use the 'equitable' jargon.