(DCWatchdog.com) – In a victory for President Donald Trump and conservative Americans, Google Calendar has removed “diversity, equity, inclusion” (DEI) cultural observances like Pride Month, Black History Month, and Holocaust Remembrance Day from its listings.
See the tweet below!
This decision aligns with a broader shift in policies possibly echoing those seen during Donald Trump’s presidency, which sought to curtail DEI initiatives.
This change has sparked a debate about the role of technology in shaping cultural narratives.
Google has announced that it will no longer automatically list cultural and historical observances such as Black History Month and Pride Month on its Calendar app.
The company will now only display widely recognized public holidays and national observances.
This decision seems to mirror changes made by U.S. federal departments regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion practices.
The Verge was the first to report this noticeable change in Google’s Calendar offerings.
Google spokesperson Madison Cushman Veld commented on the rationale behind this decision.
“We received feedback that some other events and countries were missing, and manually managing hundreds of moments globally was not scalable,” she explained.
This change coincides with a political climate that has seen a pullback from DEI initiatives at both corporate and governmental levels.
Donald Trump’s past executive orders have rolled back DEI-focused policies, influencing changes in federal sectors that have ended cultural and diversity observances.
Google users frustrated by these changes are now left to manually add these important cultural observances to their calendars.
Meanwhile, it remains unclear how these changes will affect other Google platforms like Google Doodles, which have in the past marked these cultural observances through digital artwork.
A Google spokesperson noted that, despite the calendar changes, the company intends to continue celebrating significant cultural moments in its other products, mentioning Black History Month and the Lunar New Year.
They also highlighted that Google has long worked with timeanddate.com to populate its calendar with public holidays and national observances.
Many feel that the removal of these observances downplays their importance, sparking backlash across social media.
However, Google’s stance is that the decision was not ideologic and aimed at sustainability.
Google Calendar has removed key cultural events from their site including:
• Pride Month
• Black History Month
• Holocaust Remembrance Day
• Jewish Heritage
• Hispanic Heritage
• Indigenous People Month pic.twitter.com/I5bpuWkVPy— Pop Base (@PopBase) February 10, 2025
Copyright 2024, DCWatchdog.com
