The U.S. Supreme Court wrapped up its 2022 – 2023 session last week, making major waves with controversial decisions.

Not only did the country's highest court weigh in on student debt and gay marriage, but they also announced a decision in Students For Fair Admissions, Inc. v President and Fellows of Harvard College that Harvard University and the University of North Carolina were violating the Fourteenth Amendment for including racial disclosure on admissions forms. 

The decision has far more wide-reaching effects than just re-inviting discrimination into the college admissions process, however.

Supreme Court Decision Impacts Major Hollywood Players

In the weeks leading up to the Supreme Court's decision, Black Women who held senior leadership positions at Netflix, Disney, Warner Bros., and the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) left their roles, Variety reports. Most held key roles in DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) departments, ensuring companies had fair hiring practices. 

This includes Karen Horne and Terra Potts of Warner Bros. Discovery, Jeanell English, executive VP of impact and inclusion at the Academy of Motion Pictures and Sciences, Vernā Myers, the first head of inclusion at Netflix, and Disney's Latondra Newton, who stepped down as a senior VP and chief diversity officer on June 20.

Did these women see the writing on the wall? Perhaps. In their first wave of layoffs, Netflix cut staff for their DEI initiatives, including Con Todo (Latinx) and Strong Black Lead. However, as Variety states, the reasons the rest of the women have stepped down are unclear.

1. No Article

Unfortunately, the fact that the Variety article raises more questions than answers about what's going on with DEI in Hollywood was published too soon. One commenter thinks Clayton Davis, the writer of the Variety piece, needs to flesh out more information.

“Until you get any of these women to talk, you don't have an article of any substance,” they tweeted. “You have a statement of fact surrounded by conjecture, hyperbole & opinion. Do some legwork (and if you don't know what that means, you'll NEVER have an article).”

But these women aren't alone. According to the 2022 Women in the Workplace report by McKinsey & Co., women are “breaking up” with their workplaces in record numbers. They, as the commenter pointed out, just aren't speaking on the record.

2. The Difference

“Their tenures were marked by nothing but disaster,” someone else tweeted. “Of course, they got axed. The studios they worked for (WB, Disney, Netflix) are losing hundreds of millions by producing “diverse” content nobody's watching.”

Unfortunately, they have their facts wrong. While English was laid off, Myers, Horne, and Newton all stepped down from their role on their own. Actress Yvette Nicole Brown pointed out on Instagram that these departures came one day after the Supreme Court's ruling.

According to the 2021 “Inclusion in Netflix Original U.S. Scripted Films & Series” report created by the University of Southern California's Annenberg Inclusion Initiative, White women were the most represented group next to White men, missing from only 4.7% of films and 4.4% of series. 6.2% of Netflix films were directed by women of color.

Black people, the report shows, make up one-fifth of the main casts in both film and television.

3. Keep Rising

The fact no one is watching diverse content is also false. During Memorial Day weekend, Disney's The Little Mermaid broke box-office records, earning $117.5 million in one weekend.

One interested party wanted to encourage these women of color. “CONGRATULATIONS, LADIES!!! KEEP ON DOING WHAT YOU DO!!! THEY ARE POSTING ON OTHER SITES ABOUT YOU. THEY ARE ASKING IS ANYONE CONCERNED ABOUT YOUR RISE. KEEP RISING!!!”

4. Hire The Best

Someone thinks these networks should focus on their human resources departments. “How about hiring the best person for the job and not creating non-jobs?”

If only the hiring process was free from subjective opinion. The best person for the job may be someone whose background reflects the content you want to create and the audiences you want to reach.

“When a woman director is attached to a film,” Stacy L. Smith, founder and director of USC's initiative, explains, “there are more leads and co-leads that are girls and women, more female-identified main cast members and more girls and women as a speaking characters on screen.”

5. Good for Them

One person thinks these women realized there was more opportunity elsewhere. “I'm guessing they're all smart women who realized they were going nowhere helming manufactured-for-virtue-signaling departments. Good for them.”

For many, these signals are showing companies were happy to pledge diversity but never actually planned on following through. What we're seeing now, according to Rehhan Ayas, a senior economist at Revelio Labs, are companies reversing the “tide” on the promises they made — if they intended on keeping them at all.

“I always say that it is so easy to make public statements and commitments because no one will eventually check if you're committed to the things that you are committed to, Ayas told NBC News in an interview. “In 2020, a lot of companies made big commitments, big statements around the DEI roles and goals.”

What are those companies doing now?

6. Imagine

So people are leaving their jobs, no big deal — right? Clayton Davis, the writer of the Variety article, believes otherwise. Losing this many Black women in leadership positions in such a short time span is not a sign of good things to come. 

“Hollywood seems to be taking a step back from that investment,” he tweeted. “There are already so few women, especially Black women, in leadership positions, so when we lose one, it's pronounced. Imagine losing six in a month?”

7. Hard Choice

One individual thinks DEI heads have a tough job. “Diversity execs are in a terrible bind. If they follow their company's true wishes (to stay white/male), they fail. If they actually manage to make progress despite the odds, they get booted out.”

8. Exhausting

Some believe Hollywood is experiencing “diversity fatigue.” During TheWrap's Power Women's Summit in December, Hartbeat CEO Thai Randolf warned that DEI roles would be on the “chopping block” when budgets tightened unless companies started prioritizing diversity.

“If you do not look at building inclusive organizations as critical to the success, the profitability, the scaling of your company and its objectives,” Randolf warned, “those are the things that are greatly at risk.”

But if Hollywood thinks they're tired, they should try being a Black woman. “Black women are not allowed to be difficult, vulnerable, weak, or challenging,” one woman tweeted. “We must be perfect, have unlimited understanding, and continuously validate a white person's guilt and empty gestures on how we're fixing things. It's exhausting.”

9. Commitment

Someone else correctly states that diversity and inclusion require a daily commitment. “We won't get to equity if this industry isn't where Black women leaders thrive,” someone tweeted. “Devoting resources to inclusion during a crisis isn't enough. Change requires a 365-day-a-year commitment.”

Stand Up, Step Up

Another commenter thinks we should repeat it. “Say it again, for the people in the back! Affirmative action might be sliding into the background, but we don't have to.”

Affirmative action guaranteed that minority groups had legal recourse against discrimination in the workplace and when applying to colleges or universities. With that legal avenue gone, discrimination may again be prominent in promotions, raises, and acceptance to the best colleges.

Source: Twitter.