When Inclusion Backslides From The Edges - Edition 4
Published about 2 months ago • 4 min read
August 2025
When Inclusion Backslides
From The Edges - Edition 4
Mo and Kaia
It's easy to talk about inclusion when it's trending. It's so easy to talk about being inclusive and challenging biases and discrimination. It's much harder to live and work on inclusion through everything you do. Were you one of those brands that posted a black square on Instagram five years ago? What has happened since then? We're looking at the backslides in inclusion this week.
What happens when the momentum stalls, or when it starts to backslide at pace? In the last week, we have seen a council cancel diversity training, a platform remove protections for trans users, and a major brand stumble into a racially insensitive campaign. Even the Lionesses’ historic win couldn’t escape racism and sexism. Did you see some of the comments on social media? These are not isolated incidents, and this has not been an unusual week. These are all signs of what happens when inclusion isn’t embedded, protected, and actively maintained. For companies that want to lead, the question is clear. What will you do when inclusion backslides?
We have followed and scanned the news to see what's happening. Here's what caught our eyes this week. If you know someone who should be in the loop, share this newsletter.
We spotlight the stories that show us what is working and what is going wrong. The wins inspire us, the failures teach us. For People Leaders, paying attention to both is important. And have you seen a story we should share? Email us at hello@edgeofdifference.com
Join us at the edges. Understand differences. Spark inclusion
News from the edges this week...
Lionesses Win At The Euros But Still Face Sexism and Racism
Were you cheering them on? The England Women's football team, The Lionesses, triumphed over Spain in the UEFA football tournament, winning in a nail-biting penalty shoot-out. Fabulous news, and so brilliant to see such representation for girls.
With the celebrations over, we looked at the coverage and social media. Across the internet, there were many stories about the racism faced by Jess Carter. There were many comments about the team that were blatantly sexist. The Head of Sport England has written to Ofcom the communications industry regulator, to express deep concerns about this. This could discourage the next generation of Lionesses.
Sydney Sweeney's Campaign And The Racial Undertones
American Eagle's new campaign starring Sydney Sweeney has caused gasps with the tagline 'Sydney Sweeney Has Great Jeans'. Did the creators of the campaign not know that 'great genes' is a phrase used historically to celebrate whiteness as superior? Many thought it had undertones of 'master race' propaganda and echoed eugenics movements.
This campaign makes us wonder who created the idea, and who reviewed the campaign? How diverse was their team? And we wonder if there were people who raised concerns who were not listened to? It's a clear example of not thinking about your audience and considering inclusion when marketers create campaigns.
Did any of those news stories make you think that you need to do something about this with your teams? Our training programmes are filling up fast! We have launched some great new programmes to look at:
Commercial Edge training - For customer-facing teams on inclusive communication
Edge Awareness - for everyone to learn about conscious and unconcsious biases
Allyship Edge - understand what allyship is and how to be an ally
That's just some of our training courses. We have a whole range of courses.
Are you a People Leader or a diversity, equity and inclusion lead looking for some help and support? You can now book time for individual sessions with us where we delve into your diversity, equity and inclusion strategy and help you create ideas to drive change. And we are offering 20% off to our newsletter subscribers!
Need some help?
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Inclusion Edge - 1 hour session
We get it, sometimes you want to talk through where you are with someone. Book our one-hour session and we will talk you... Read more
