Dannie Lynn Fountain - Ending Checkbox Diversity: Rewriting the Story of Performative Allyship in Corporate America

(A Note from the Author)

While these pages tell the tale of modern-day Corporate Americas experiences and failures with DEI, they also hold the impact, trauma, and outcomes of my own experiences as an other navigating this countrys white-collar, buttoned up, still-too-stodgy offices. Ive removed some personal details, not to protect those within the stories, but rather so you might more easily find your own experiences mirrored or magnified in mine.

Every personal story and public news piece discussed in this book is written from my perspective, the way I remember it happening, through my lens as a human defined by the many labels assigned to me by society. Your labels might be different. You might shoulder more; you might be burdened by less. You might remember these stories differently depending on your perception of the situation. Your reactions to these stories and suggestions for what to do next might be different than mine. In fact, reading this book might make you feel angry, frustrated, discouraged, or a myriad of other heavy negative emotions.

I encourage you to sit with how you feel before you react. Consider whether your reaction is to the words Ive put on these pages or to thoughts, feelings, and experiences within your own existence that have been magnified by the book you hold in your hands. Know that the weight of your own experiences is not a weight youve created but one that Corporate America has set on your shoulders. And if you feel light, not bogged down by the heaviness of the tales herein, consider why that might be.

And above all else, I encourage you more than anything to take action not just when this book ends but along the way. Make notes in the margins, snap photos and text to friends, read passages aloud to your partner as you consider your own experiences in Corporate America. Once youve done that, consider how these words might leave the page, how they can spark deeper conversations in your organization. Let the words move you toward change.

Dannie Lynn Fountain

You might find yourself wondering what exactly my labels are. Although many of our labels change over time, based on our own self-concept and those created by our society, here is a brief list of some of my labels at the time of writing: queer, multiethnic, neurodivergent, heavily tattooed, married, plus-size, first-generation, cisgender, woman. I was raised in a lower-class household and currently am a debt-free member of the upper class.