Headlines that warn of impending doom for the diversity, equity, and inclusion industrial complex have accelerated in recent months, sparking fears among DEI foot soldiers that the end is near.

Axios and others have reported on the slowdown in corporate DEI hiring this past year, citing Republican efforts to poison the social justice money well. DEI programs are also being slashed in universities and state governments following the Supreme Court’s decision to strike down affirmative action in universities and a bevy of new anti-DEI bills passing in statehouses across the country.

The shift has been accompanied by heaps of bad press for the cultural movement following the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks in southern Israel. The Chicago Black Lives Matter chapter’s revolting decision to post an image praising the paragliding rapists and murderers has been rightly linked to the DEI worldview since its tenets justify all forms of resistance by the oppressed against their oppressors. To be sure, BLM Chicago didn’t get in trouble for going too far; it got in trouble for remaining loyal to the letter of the DEI law under duress.

Likewise, the omnipresent chant “from the river to the sea,” more than a call to finish the job Hitler started last century, is an expression of “decolonization” ( despite the state of Israel not being a colony in any coherent sense ), which is a central priority of the DEI movement. Following years of moral bullying, Americans are now largely familiar with the term — they’ve “decolonized” everything from their bookshelves to their refrigerators — and they refuse to see the state of Israel as but another item to be eliminated out of heightened cultural sensitivity.

The bad press isn’t showing any sign of letting up. Last week in Queens, New York, a frothing mob of 400 high school students hunted down a Jewish teacher for the apparent crime of saying, “I stand with Israel'' on the internet. Days later, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) failed to unequivocally condemn the mass rape of Israeli women in the Hamas attack, crystallizing the toxicity of the cultural movement she represents.

Indeed, each time the media spotlight shines upon a prominent cultural progressive, a DEI department is gutted.

For the tens of thousands of foot soldiers of the multibillion-dollar global industry , these developments are cause for alarm. After all, DEI workers earned specialized degrees and certificates that only qualify them to work in the DEI field. It is no small irony that an industry based on the commitment to ensure equal outcomes for all Americans is subject to the whims of the free market, same as any.

The only thing that could be worse for the DEI industry would be the definitive end of human inequality. There has always been little incentive for any of this stuff to work, which perhaps explains why DEI initiatives often exacerbate existing problems in professional and educational environments. This is unsurprising since, as anyone who’s ever encountered DEI training can tell you, these programs are not designed to solve immediate problems but rather to instill a revolutionary re-understanding of social conditions.

So it was no surprise that Boston University launched an investigation this fall into the practices of its groundbreaking “Center for Antiracist Research,” headed by DEI kingpin Ibram X. Kendi. The university became concerned by the lack of research conducted in exchange for $30 million in endowments, as well as by complaints from faculty and staff regarding the center's management practices. So it decided to look under the hood. In the end, it didn't find much of anything, least of all a record of accomplishment.

Amid the social panic that led to his rise, no one at BU or anywhere else stopped to ask: what possible incentive could there be for Kendi, about whom there is nary a trace of warmth or goodwill, to solve the very problems that justify his lofty status?

Perhaps he always understood that racial progress was poisonous to his professional ambitions. Perhaps that’s why he’s always been averse to acknowledging progress in the first place.

No matter the fate of the DEI industry, the untold millions of dollars in book sales and grants ensure Kendi’s security in the long term. The rank-and-file do not share this good fortune, however. I, for one, will not hold my breath waiting for Kendi to spread his wealth around — not even for the sake of "equity."

Peter Laffin is a contributor at the Washington Examiner. His work has also appeared in RealClearPolitics, the Catholic Thing, and the National Catholic Register.