A Department of Defense official recently reported that in fiscal year 2023, all branches collectively fell short of their recruitment targets by more than 40,000. But that shortfall came even after recruitment targets were lowered significantly.
A coalition of lawmakers is pushing forward the ongoing investigation into just how much taxpayer money Pentagon officials are taking away from national defense and putting toward diversity, equity and inclusivity initiatives.
The Pentagon has been under increasing scrutiny for its focus on DEI, even as the Ukraine-Russia and Israel-Hamas wars continue.
The lawmakers sent a letter to the Defense Advisory Committee on Diversity and Inclusion Chair General (Ret.) Lester Lyles expressing concerns that the focus on DEI was a distraction and was hurting recruitment.
“DoD’s emphasis on diversity and inclusion over mission effectiveness and capability concerns our nation’s national security and safety,” the letter said.
The letter comes ahead of an expected report from that committee on its work for DOD.
Military branches have struggled to meet recruitment goals in recent years. A Department of Defense official recently reported that in fiscal year 2023, all branches collectively fell short of their recruitment targets by more than 40,000. But that shortfall came even after recruitment targets were lowered significantly.
“Stand Together Against Racism and Radicalism in the Services (STARRS), an educational organization that includes retired military members, assembled a study of over one thousand unsolicited comments from military service members, veterans, and their respective families,” the letter said. “Their findings showed that many did not feel comfortable recommending military service because of the DEI policies instituted throughout DoD.”
As The Center Square has previously reported, the Pentagon has embraced an array of equity initiatives, from training on white privilege to guidelines on gender pronouns. Recently, the DOD asked for more than $100 million just for DEI initiatives, sparking backlash.
House Oversight Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs Chairman Glenn Grothman, R-Wisc., and House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Personnel Chairman Jim Banks, R-Ind., led other Republicans on the letter.
The lawmakers want a full explanation of what the DEI efforts at the Pentagon are, in detail.
“The Subcommittee remains concerned that under the guise of DEI, promotions are being rewarded based on sex, gender, ethnicity, and race at the expense of merit,” the letter said.
The lawmakers expressly called for transparency in the upcoming report.
“Americans have the right to expect that their sons and daughters in uniform are led, trained, and equipped by the very best,” the letter said. “The Subcommittee understands that the STARRS report was provided to DACODAI, but it is unclear the extent to which DACODAI will incorporate that information into its final report.”
Todayville is a digital media and technology company. We profile unique stories and events in our community. Register and promote your community event for free.
“You’re firing qualified people who are well-trained, and you sit here so smugly [and] act like none of that has any impact on the readiness of our Navy.”
The secretary of the U.S. Navy told senators that he has “no regrets” about the firing of thousands of sailors and Marines who declined to take the COVID-19 shots.
During a Capitol Hill hearing, Senator Eric Schmitt (R-Missouri) pressed Secretary Carlos Del Toro on the impact that both DEI (“Diversity, Equality, and Inclusion”) training courses and COVID jab mandates have had on Navy recruitment and pushed back against the Navy’s prioritization of “climate change” over keeping pace with America’s adversaries.
Schmitt asked Del Toro about the 1,878 sailors and the 3,746 Marines who were fired for not taking the COVID shot: “Do you regret that?”
“I have no regrets,” declared the Navy chief.
“You have recruitment challenges,” said Sen. Schmitt. “You’re firing qualified people who are well-trained, and you sit here so smugly [and] act like none of that has any impact on the readiness of our Navy.”
Del Toro, a Biden appointee, added that “we recontacted 3,500 of the 4,800 people who were fired. You know how many actually decided to come back to the Navy? Two.”
“Shocker,” declared Schmitt, who indicated that it was no wonder the disenfranchised personnel all but unanimously chose not to return because of “the level of disrespect they received from their government.”
The Secretary of the Navy says to Sen. @Eric_Schmitt that he has "no regrets" about firing the thousands of service members who refused to take the covid vax and then smugly says that none of them wanted to come back to the Navy when contacted as if that's a good thing. pic.twitter.com/MzMv7R4qMu
The firings have come at a time when the Navy and other branches of the military have been experiencing worsening recruitment challenges.
The Navy has attained less than 70% of its recruitment goal for the first half of 2024, according to a statement from Sen. Schmitt’s office, and is expected to be short roughly 6,700 sailors from its 2024 recruitment goal of 40,600.
In 2023, the Navy fell short of its recruiting goal by 20%.
Sen. Schmitt suggested that the COVID-19 jab firings aren’t the only reason that recruiting is down.
“Do you believe that the obsession that the political leadership has right now with DEI has helped or hurt recruiting efforts?” Schmitt asked Del Toro.
“I don’t think DEI has hurt recruiting efforts at all,” claimed the Navy Secretary.
Schmitt went further and suggested that the Navy is indoctrinating its personnel through its DEI 101 materials, promoting “cultural Marxism.”
Last June, Secretary Del Toro hosted a Department of the Navy DEI Summit with senior Navy and Marine Corps leaders.
“In order to maintain our strategic edge, the Navy and Marine Corps team must operationalize innovative and cohesive initiatives, rooted in DEI’s goals,” insisted Secretary Del Toro at the DEI summit, according to Sen. Schmitt’s office.
“The Navy’s DEI 101 online training facilitator guide focuses on the need to nurture a culture that ‘values diversity and emphasizes inclusion,’” despite the fact that a recent Department of Defense survey reported that “just 2% of the workforce lists racism as a problem,” noted Schmitt’s staff.
Schmitt’s office also noted that the Navy ceded the title of the world’s largest Navy to Communist China’s People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) in 2020 and that currently, the Navy is retiring more ships than it is building, shrinking the Navy as the PLAN continues to grow.
Your digital identity will be your passport in the metaverse, where it will be used to surveil, predict, and mimic your behavior while determining your level of access to information and spaces.
Your metaverse identity, with its digital ID, biometric data capture, and behavior profiling, will be central to your everyday life, according to a World Economic Forum (WEF) report.
“Metaverse identity” is a relatively new concept that the WEF and Accenture describe in great detail in a new 48-page report entitled “Metaverse Identity: Defining the Self in a Blended Reality.”
According to the report:
“As people spend more time exploring, playing and socializing in digital experiences, a person’s metaverse identity will be central to their day-to-day life as well as to the way they express their personal identity.”
But what exactly do the unelected globalists mean by “metaverse identity?”
Metaverse identity encompasses three components:
Representation: including personal, social and role identity, be it through avatars, pseudonyms or other digital expressions.
Data: capturing the intricate web of knowledge about individuals generated by metaverse supporting hardware and software.
Identification (ID): be it through driver’s licenses, government-issued IDs, passports, birth certificates, attestations, labels, or usernames and passwords.
According to the report, “Metaverse identity broadens ‘identity’ as it is known today and combines it with the digital underpinnings of the internet. It is a multi-layered construct of an individual or entity, including everything from representation to data and identification.”
[Source: WEF, Accenture]
With these three components, identity in the metaverse “connects and anchors a person to the physical and virtual world.”
Let’s break them down, starting with representation.
The notion of ‘representation’ is not just about pixels and graphics; it’s a reflection of societal values, inclusivity and the human desire for authenticity […] Representational design choices extend to the design of digital entities – from embodied virtual agents to non-embodied virtual assistant.
Representation has to do with how you present and express yourself in the metaverse, whether it’s a realistic likeness of yourself or an abstract, creative, or artistic version.
The authors say that, “These expressions may extend to include words, actions, behaviors and mannerisms,” so there is an element of behavior profiling going on in the representation category, which we will also see in the data capture and identification categories.
Representation in the metaverse will also take on a new meaning with the introduction of digital entities that act on your behalf.
According to the report, “Digital entities may represent humans, objects, systems or abstract concepts, and are capable of varying degrees of interaction, autonomy and behavior within digital experiences […] They are capable of mimicking human communication and may be used as sales assistants, corporate trainers, social media influencers and more.”
[Source: WEF, Accenture]
Like non-player characters (NPCs) in videogames, these digital doppelgangers attempt to mimic human behavior.
And like a virtual voodoo doll, if something goes wrong with your digital entity, it could spill over into your personal life in the real world.
“While digital entities can offer innovative interactions and functionalities within the metaverse, they may commit real-world harms,” the report cautions, adding, “The ability to manipulate or create misinformation through digital entities – such as chatbots and photoreal avatars – raises ethical and security concerns.”
Now let’s dig into the data category.
Identity goes beyond ID, like a passport or driver’s license. Metaverse identity includes data points.
The data category of metaverse identity is aimed at gathering and analyzing data to make inferences about you, and it will be used to predict your behavior, thanks to AI and Machine Learning.
“Paired with artificial intelligence (AI)/machine learning (ML) models that can analyze a person’s interactions, movements and preferences further generates identity,” the report reads.
Whether these (inferred) data points are capturing a person’s current activities, predicting their next action or future preferences, these data-based breadcrumbs provide information into one’s identity.
These attributes may influence the way the virtual environment responds to an individual, and outsiders perceive an individual or entity.
This data aspect of metaverse identity is important to unelected globalists who are obsessed with manipulating human behavior and controlling what people think and do.
There is a risk that governments could use aggregated inferred data for surveillance, monitoring dissidents, or suppressing certain groups without their active consent.
[Source: WEF, Accenture]
Inferred data, “now aided by AI/ML, can examine seemingly unrelated behaviors, actions and choices to draw meaningful conclusions about a person’s preferences, background and intentions,” according to the report.
Once you know intent, whether of an individual or an unelected globalist think tank, then it becomes a lot easier to predict what they’ll do or say next, even if they deceptively try to mask their true intentions.
And, “While this data is collected to enhance the person’s experience, it could also be analyzed to make inferences as to their real-world identity or preferences and used for targeted advertising or other purposes without their consent.”
Making inferences for “other purposes” without the user’s consent is what defense and intelligence agencies are after in the metaverse.
A recent RAND Corporation report suggests as much with respect to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) looking to spy on users in the metaverse, stating, “As DHS grapples with emerging challenges by monitoring and analyzing users’ activity in metaverses, it should undertake legal and ethical reviews of what information is collected and how it is managed.”
Now, we shall move on to the identification category.
The concept of identity is contextual, flexible, complex and fluid […] Identity extends into the intricacies of an individual’s behaviors, actions and choices.
[Source: WEF, Accenture]
Perhaps the most confusing part of metaverse identity is the identification or ID aspect because digital ID and digital identity are terms that are often used interchangeably, including by yours truly, but they are quite different.
Identification is about identifying, verifying, and authenticating who someone is.
Identity on the other hand, “consists of layered aspects of cultural heritage, ethnicity, age, professional and social roles, hobbies, gender identification, sexual orientation and much more,” according to the report.
Now that we’ve taken care of the distinction between the two, your digital ID will be your passport to the metaverse, and like with a passport, there will be certain areas that you will not be able to access.
According to the report, “Similar to today’s traditional identification systems – like passports and driver’s licenses – IDs may evolve to include unique avatar designs, new body-based attestations or unique virtual signatures that validate one’s existence and grant access to specific realms or activities.”
To illustrate how digital ID plays into digital identity, the authors say, “Forms of ID – such as passports and government IDs – formalize an individual’s identity; additionally, these can serve as credentials or means of authenticating and verifying individuals across physical and digital spaces.”
Metaverse identity is integral to future internet interactions.
[Source: WEF, Accenture]
Now that we’ve gone through the three components that make up metaverse identity, what are some of the potential drawbacks?
For starters, the report says, “There is a risk that governments could use aggregated inferred data for surveillance, monitoring dissidents or suppressing certain groups without their active consent.”
Your metaverse identity can include your real-time biometrics, such as pupil dilation, heart rate, and brainwaves, so that companies and governments can infer how you are feeling and reacting to their goods, services, or policies.
Historian Yuval Noah Harari spoke of this same technology falling into the hands of dictators at the 2020 WEF Annual Meeting in Davos. There, he said:
Just imagine North Korea in 20 years where everybody has to wear a biometric bracelet, which constantly monitors your blood pressure, your heart rate, your brain activity 24 hours a day.
You listen to a speech on the radio by the ‘Great Leader,’ and they know what you actually feel – you can clap your hands and smile, but if you’re angry, they know you’ll be in the gulag tomorrow morning.
Having a biometric data capturing device attached to your body that knows what you’ll do before you do it raises serious ethical questions about how the data is collected, where that data goes, and who has access to some of the most intimate details of your life.
For the past few years, Meta has been working on Project Aria, which combines augmented reality with artificial intelligence to create realistic 3D renderings of people, places, and things, including living spaces.
When Mark Zuckerberg explained his vision for the metaverse at Connect 2021, he highlighted how Project Aria could map a person’s apartment, including everything in it (see video below).
Imagine how valuable that information would be to companies – knowing which products you use, which ones they think you’ll want, and how you organize your living space, so they can manufacture extremely personalized ads.
What could insurance companies do with that data? How would landlords react?
Now, think about how governments, intelligence agencies, and law enforcement would love to get their hands on that type of data.
With the data collected from someone wearing a pair of AR glasses, who needs facial recognition, geolocation tracking, or contact tracing when governments and corporations can see what you see, hear what you hear, and know where you and what you are doing in real-time?
Of course, these dystopian scenarios need not come to pass, and indeed great efforts are being made to safeguard privacy in the design of these tools and systems – at least for now.
The metaverse identity report is replete with cautionary tales and references to building systems that are fair, just, diverse, equitable, inclusive, privacy-preserving, and every other type of virtuous buzzword they think you want to hear.
Over time, however, goalposts may shift, emergencies may be declared, and laws and regulations may be circumvented.
And what do the authors of the metaverse identity report propose to safeguard the metaverse and its integrity?
Their solution is to put “the onus on the global community.”
The metaverse could be fertile ground for powerful manipulative tactics, putting the onus on the global community to establish robust frameworks that not only facilitate the growth of the metaverse but also safeguard its integrity.
Is “the global community” ever defined in the report? No, but the WEF calls itself the “International Organization for Public-Private Cooperation” and has its Global Innovators, Young Global Leaders, and Global Shapers communities, which might give us a clue as to whom they are referring.
The metaverse will no doubt change the way we work and play, leading to exciting cross-disciplinary collaborations, scientific discoveries, and untapped marketplaces.
But if the unelected globalists and unaccountable technocrats are in charge of governance, the metaverse will be nothing more than a digital playground for the great reset agenda where your digital identity determines your level of entry and where anything you say or do in the virtual world will come back to haunt you in the physical one and vice versa – there will be no distinction between the two.
Once everyone is hooked up to a digital identity while plugged into the metaverse, all that is needed to quash dissent is a simple flick a switch on someone’s digital identity and voila! it’s like that person doesn’t exist anymore.
Your metaverse identity, with its virtual voodoo dolls, autonomous avatars, and digital doppelgangers will be your passport in the metaverse, where it will be used to surveil, predict, and mimic your behavior while determining your level of access to information and spaces.
But not to worry, your metaverse identity will only be essential to your day-to-day life and will only be integral to all your future internet interactions.
