From: Simon Li
Sent: Friday, April 23, 2021 1:03 PM
To: David Martin; Select Board
Cc: Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Commission
Subject: Resignation to DEIC and an open letter to Acton BoS
TO: David Martin ; Acton Select Board Members;
CC: Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Commission Hi David,
As a member of Acton Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Commission, what happened yesterday about how DEIC members strong armed one another in order to make a ‘unified statement’ is unacceptable to me. This is not what I envisioned how to contribute to my community when sign up for this commission and I would like to resign.
Like what I asked twice during the meeting, just based on a 17 pages letter from Indivisible Acton-Area which was sent a couple of hours before the meeting, to have DEIC to make a unified draft statement to condemn and demand to remove someone from office is not appropriate. Other than me, there is at least one other commission member have not clue about the background and what happened to “Chair’s Update” during the April 5 and 12 public meeting and IAA’s response. In addition, we do not even have time to go through the video clips during the meeting or do a little research to check the other side of the story before the vote to move forward with the draft statement to let someone to complete it. My professional training does not allow me to make the judgment just based on one sided story and condemn the other side. And when I asked you about what exactly happened about Benson’s April 5th statement on “what went on Facebook in the run-up to the March 30th election” and trying to get the whole picture, there was no response and you told me you can discuss with me offline, which is after the vote. Based on that reason, I vote ‘NEY’ to move forward with the draft statement.
What really makes me disappointed is, after I voted “NEY”, I immediately became a target of the meeting. Commission member pointed out explicitly ‘someone in DEI but not advocate for DEI’ and even I talked about the recent feedback from Asian community regarding the recent survey (which is no longer related to this IAA letter anymore) , I was again named out “Simon was not volunteered to help the translation”, even it was not my duty to do it, I did the majority of that translation for the survey to help those in need (and thank you David to clarify it to the commission).
I understand everyone in DEI are with different perspectives, and I speak as a immigrant has been 11 years study and work in this country. There are many people like me in this town, came to this country to study and later got settled, we all love Acton the way it is and want to be a part of the contributing community. However, not everyone advocate the progressives ideology or the other ideology ‘to change’ or ‘get educated about social justice’, most of the people I know just want to have time with their family, be excellent on their work, and walk on the peaceful neighborhood to greet friendly neighbors, and it’s their right to do so.
I tried to stay neutral in the past meetings and have my learning hat on as a new resident to hear other members’ opinions. That was ok until yesterday, only stay neutral and tried to be unbiased is not enough, if I’m not with everyone, then I was considered against everyone, against DEI. This reminds me of internet censorship in China, when it started building the firewall, nobody care because people think only ‘criminals, rebellions, and villains’ are afraid of censorship, now nobody can speak properly on internet even with slight disagreement. It would be sad if the progressives firewall is coming to us in Acton, at the beginning it makes people think only ‘racist’ should worry, but sooner or later, the people who do not condemn ‘racism’ strong enough or do not clap with the group hard enough will start to worry. This type of political atmosphere makes people hard to breath and speak freely without the fear of getting a ‘racist hat’. It is hard to believe this is in America as a free nation where I used to dream about when I was young.
I hereby resignate my term in DEI commission.
Best regards,
Simon Li
P.S
I don’t know Jon Benson personally, but after a few search on Facebook and Chinese American community board, I did find information about Benson that on a community discussion channel (in Mandarin), one of Asian community member commend him that he cancelled his campaign that day when he and his group saw the Stop Asian Hate rally and joined the group to voice for us. It’s hard to believe a man like him has been called racist on Facebook. After looking through a lot of ungrounded opinions towards him on facebook group (for example, ‘Acton Parents’, which I joined yesterday) and his campaign website about his courage to speak and stand out at today’s social atmosphere, I really appreciate what he did for Acton and to uphold the old American values and dignity (ironically, from the perspective of a new immigrant). Even he lost the election, but I know his idea represents a lot of new residents here in Acton probably still need a couple of years to be able to vote, and when it comes, I personally hope he can run the election again.
Again, based on at least 3 feedbacks I heard from Chinese American community about the DEI survey, the survey is over engineered and basically prevented collecting feedback from us by using lots of words that we would need Webster to check out the actual meaning (like Queer, agender, pansexual, etc…). I worried what would be the consequences if Select Board choose to act based on this survey result.
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Well said, Simon Li, thank you.
Thank you Simon, for this strong rebuke of the group-think so prevalent in DEI groups. It really has nothing to do with diversity or inclusion at all. Unfortunately, this thinking has started to bleed into school curriculum across the country, including here in AB.
And for what it’s worth, I had to look up some of those words, too.
Kudos for your principled action. Though… you leave behind a Commission that will be less Diverse, Equitable, and Inclusive. Sigh…
Re. the notion of a unified statement re. Jon Benson: Maybe a silly observation, but he was defeated in the polls, so is not a call for a statement by the Diversity Commission calling for “removing him as Chair of the Select Board and by censuring his conduct” inappropriate overkill?
Hi Miles,
You are right about the apparent involvement of the Acton Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission (DEIC), but it is just Select Board member David Martin using his control of the DEIC. The DEIC was created by David, who got the rest of the Select Board to agree to everything he wanted. David selected the DEIC members, is the DEIC Chair, writes the meeting agendas, runs the meetings. David writes and issues the DEIC “statements”, statements which are his political and personal views, possibly shared by a few of the DEIC members he selected but which have nothing to do with the purpose and “charge” of the DEIC.
As long as David Martin controls the DEIC expect other such statements. There is zero chance that the DEIC report to the Select Board in September will be anything but a condemnation of Acton as a racist community which must be re-educated about its unconscious bias and White Privilege.
Charlie Kadlec