The quiet Chicago suburb of Hinsdale has had an unanticipated and unpleasant few days in the spotlight as a plan for racial-equity training dissolved into avoidable acrimony and a New York Times story about a Hinsdale man fighting the rising cost of a burrito at Chipotle was seized upon by social media activists as indicative of American blindspots over who really feels the brunt of food costs.
Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin threatened to invade Ukraine.
We point this out as a reminder that the current American obsession with internal racial and class division often means our attention is not always falling as expeditiously as it should on geopolitical threats to international stability. While burritos trended on Twitter and Hinsdale made the front page, thanks to social media algorithms that feed on this stuff, bigger problems abounded. It’s hard to lead the world when this country, amped up by those sowers of disunity at Facebook and Twitter, so enjoys ripping itself apart.
But back to Hinsdale. One issue involved the equity and anti-racism consultant Valda Valbrun, CEO of Charlotte, North Carolina-based Valbrun Consulting Group. Valbrun was hired in December to provide training to the faculty at Hinsdale Township High School District 86, although apparently a formal contract had not yet been signed. But before Valbrun could make her presentation to the board of education, she pulled out of the deal, citing personal attacks and calling Hinsdale a dangerous place.
It appears that a parent, presumably one less than enamored with racial equity training in general, found a post on Valbrun’s personal Facebook account wherein Valbrun went after not just Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott but the entire Republican Party. The post reportedly said, “DeSantis and Abbott are the devil. Just like Trump. I hope the entire GOP implodes.” Once that discovery was publicized, Valbrun herself became the target of similar rhetoric, if not yet worse.
We can all benefit from racial equity training. And harassment of all kinds on social media should be condemned. Anyone who has been the object of such pile ons can attest to the fear and anguish they can cause. Such threatening comments should be no part of life in Hinsdale nor any other community. And we’ll further stipulate that if Valbrun hopes the entire GOP implodes, she is entitled to that opinion. Just as Republicans are entitled to argue against their desired implosion.
But, surely, reasonable people can see that if your business involves training people to see their own biases so as to bring about a more equitable America, calling duly elected Republican leaders devils is not the best business strategy. Nor is it the moral or compassionate thing to do. Nor does it help cool the very divisions that this kind of training is supposed to heal. As far as we are aware, Valbrun’s training would have been a resource for that faculty. Not any more.
Where are the Hinsdale leaders who can pull both sides together and bring about some reconciliation?
As for the stock trader and the burrito, the issue here is the growing American inability to see that several things can be true at once.
The primary impact of rising food costs is on the poor. That said, all Americans still share some of that burden. The citizen in the story was assumed by many to be rich because the words “trades stock options” were used, as if that were some sinful guarantee of lifelong affluence. Not at all, especially with the market gyrations of the week. This merely was an anecdote in a story and, for all we know, the man might need his burritos to remain affordable. Frankly, many of us do.
Both these issues have something pernicious in common: seeing the worst in everyone. This is the new American curse.
