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ICANN kills off diversity and inclusion

Kevin Murphy, May 15, 2025, 10:03:19 (UTC), Domain Policy

ICANN seems to have become the latest American organization to back away from commitments to “diversity” and “inclusion” in the wake of a universe now controlled by the whims of Donald Trump.

The Org has recently started removing references to the D-word from its web site, sloppily editing its diversity-related web pages, replacing it with the less politically loaded term “representation”.

The “Diversity at ICANN” page is now called the “Representation at ICANN” page, and ICANN’s stated commitments have been changed from:

ICANN is entrusted with ensuring the stability, resiliency, and interoperability of the Internet’s unique identifier systems in an open Internet, and was founded on the belief that it should reflect the diversity of the Internet community.

to:

ICANN is entrusted with ensuring the stability, resiliency, and interoperability of the Internet’s unique identifier systems Internet and was founded on the belief that it should represent the broad Internet community.

The words “inclusive” and “inclusion”, also from the now apparently toxic “DEI” abbreviation, also seem to be deemed inappropriate. ICANN has changed its web site language from:

To live up to this responsibility, ICANN is committed to promoting greater diversity and supporting broad, inclusive participation in its processes.

to the apparently hastily edited (random comma in original):

To live up to this responsibility, ICANN is committed to supporting broad, participation in its processes.

The page no longer contains links to ICANN’s Diversity & Inclusion Toolkit, a set of educational materials designed to tell people that asking other community members where they come from means they’re a racist.

Also gone is the link to an ICANN Learn course on “Unconscious Bias”, which teaches you that not all nurses are female and not all CEOs are white men and apparently ICANN has money to burn.

While ICANN previously said it offers its staff “Diversity & Inclusion Training”, it now says it offers “Culture Training”.

All six references to “inclusion” present in the November 2024 archived page have been removed from today’s live page. All five uses of the word “inclusive” have also been deleted.

The November archive uses the word “diversity” 32 times and “diverse” twice. On the live page, those counts are down to two (where the word was used to refer to a named group or report), and none, respectively.

The link to “Diversity at ICANN” in the web site’s site-wide footer has also been removed.

Some of the edits are incredibly sloppy. The old page had a bullet point that read:

Community-wide surveys on Age Diversity and Participation and Gender Diversity and Participation

The findings offer insights into perceptions of gender and age diversity in the community, potential and perceived barriers to participation, and the community’s support for initiatives to enhance age and gender diversity.

But that now reads:

Community-wide surveys and

The findings offer insights into perceptions of gender and age in the community, potential and perceived barriers to participation, and the community’s support for initiatives to enhance understanding.

ICANN’s backtracking from earlier virtue signalling comes at a point in history when corporate America is steering away from DEI initiatives lest they incur the wrath of US President Donald Trump.

The question is: is this all just cosmetic, or will it affect ICANN policy?

The Org is currently considering changes to its Community Anti-Harassment Policy that would change the boundaries of what is considered acceptable behavior at ICANN meetings.

The proposed changes would either, depending on your point of view, a) make life more comfortable for people with protected characteristics, or b) make it easier to get cancelled for a cultural faux pas.

It’s been a few months since the public comments closed on the policy changes, so ICANN board action shouldn’t be far off. Will the Org’s retreat from DEI have an impact on its decision?

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Comments (8)

  1. V Greimann says:
    May 15, 2025 at 11:33 am

    Shame! Bloody kneelers! Apparently people no longer are born with spines!

    Reply
  2. facesymmetrytest says:
    May 15, 2025 at 2:46 pm

    Wow, ICANN ditching diversity and inclusion? That’s a bummer. Makes you wonder if it’s just cosmetic or if real policy changes are coming.

    Reply
  3. MF says:
    May 15, 2025 at 3:09 pm

    Looks more like budget cuts rather than fully motivated by changes to in corporate policies. This blog alone has already pointed out plenty of inconsistincies in ICANN’s supposed DEI policies in the past. It seems like ICANN is reorganizing their existing budget in the wake of a new CEO.

    Reply
  4. avri doria says:
    May 15, 2025 at 6:55 pm

    Perhaps as a US corporation
    they must bend a knee.
    The point of the yet
    unaddressed Transition issue?

    Reply
  5. JP says:
    May 15, 2025 at 10:29 pm

    Kissing A$$ for an international organization? Maybe their responsibilities should be moved to an org whose fealty isn’t to a deranged criminal.

    Reply
  6. ex staffer says:
    May 16, 2025 at 7:56 am

    Who is the MAGAT in the Executive team that called for this change ?

    Reply

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