The answer is that humans are human. Don't think of a pink unicorn. Okay? Let me be very clear: absolutely do not think of a pink unicorn, do not think of how the light sparkle and gleams on its pink coat, don't think about whether the subtle hues of its body are salmon or carnation or rose blush, do not think about the twisted spiral of its horn tapering to a needle-sharp point that gleams with gold. Absolutely do not, under any circumstances, think about a pink unicorn.

Well, guess what?

You probably thought about a pink unicorn.

If you have any implicit bias--which is largely subconscious in most cases, don't forget--against pink, or unicorn-ness, it probably got triggered, too.

Oops.

Also, a big part of the problem is correctly identified as "othering", but you don't psychologically de-other by constant attention to differences and grievances (which provoke natural defensiveness regardless of topic). You de-other by bonding over shared experiences and goals. DEI gets that exactly backwards in many cases.

So even under the best of circumstances, a lot of the standard DEI approach is dopey because it tries to swim upstream against human psychology.