We had racial policy in the form of slavery, then segregation and Jim Crow, to discriminatory housing policies, to inequitable application of drug laws but now, let's just ignore race and all of its historical context when it comes to outreach and public policy.

That is how it is possible to logically disenfranchise a group of individuals by ignoring their group characteristics. The disenfranchisement already happened.

Diversity programs are not about punishment it is about recognizing the historical context in which we are acting.

Diversity programs are doing a lot more than "recognizing". Recognition is just perception and perhaps symbolic communication. Diversity programs are action.

In this case, the action is to shift economic opportunity from one group to another based on visually-identifiable group characteristics. This is justified by the the idea you stated, which is that the group being disfavored is collectively guilty.

Of course, we ignore how many people in that targeted group have no present or past connection to the sins that are being "recognized" by denying them a way forward in life. I'm sure a white male Ukrainian refugee passed over at Google for "diversity" would not be impressed.

If you're in favor of a policy, you should be able to clearly state what that policy actually is, not hide it behind a linguistic smokescreen which minimizes and obscures what's really happening. Own it - the goals, the methods, the unintended consequences, and the victims. Every social policy has them, so own them.

>We had racial policy in the form of slavery, then segregation and Jim Crow, to discriminatory housing policies, to inequitable application of drug laws

All of those examples are the opposite of

>"treat people as individuals, not as just another member of their group"

The majority(>60%) of engineering in big tech companies who are most affected by these diversity initiatives are either foreign born or have parents who are foreign born.

Just because they are considered a group. Our group is "the people", their group is something less. It happens with completely random groups, and when there are racist, sexist etc. excuses they are only a way to make oppressors feel right.