The Boys’ Club Is Still Running the Show—And We Wonder Why Everything Is On Fire

Let’s be clear: what we’re seeing in our current political climate isn’t shocking. It’s not a fluke, a wave, or an unfortunate anomaly. It’s the natural outcome of a system that’s been rewarding sameness and ego over skill and soul for decades.

Politics is simply reflecting what corporate capitalism has been doing in plain sight:

White men at the top, hiring other white men, awarding contracts to their golf buddies, investing in their sons-in-law’s startups—not because they’re the best people for the job, but because it keeps everyone in the room comfortable, powerful, and rich.

This is about favor, not function.

It’s about status preservation, not excellence.

It’s about protecting the club, not building the best damn company—or country—possible.

This is why DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) is non-negotiable. It’s not a sensitivity seminar or a social media statement. It’s the antidote to a closed system that has prioritized power over progress.

When people from different lived experiences come together around a shared mission—whether that’s building a better product, providing a more human-centered service, or creating a company that doesn’t make you question your will to live—magic happens.

Why? Because they’re not operating inside a centuries-old ego contest. They’re not distracted by the seductive act of impressing each other with private jets and legacy money. Marginalized groups such as women and the BIPOC community aren’t just trying to do better, heterogenous groups, research suggests, are better.

Research summarized by the NeuroLeadership Institute highlights that diverse teams tend to think more logically, are more creative, and are more adept at identifying errors in thinking compared to homogeneous teams. This implies that diversity can enhance critical thinking and innovation within groups.

Cue Patagonia

Take Patagonia. A wildly successful company that proves you can make money, make meaning, and not destroy the planet or your workforce in the process. That’s what happens when you build a company around values, not vanity metrics. It’s what happens when leadership cares about people and planet instead of protecting their place in a 1950s Mad Men fever dream.

But to get there, we need homogeneity of a different kind:

A group of people united by values, not backgrounds.

A collective that shares a mission—not just a tax bracket.

The future doesn’t belong to the loudest man in the room. It belongs to the rooms we haven’t built yet.

The rooms where voices of all kinds — the rebellious, the dissenting, the forward-thinking, the tender-hearted creatives — are heard, considered and amplified, not silenced. A sustainable future will only be built in a place where decisions are made with long-term impact in mind—not just short-term shareholder gain for a chosen and protected few.

The world does not need another roundtable of ego-stroking, power-hoarding legacy hires. Our companies and communities have failed to benefit from the boardroom mental masturbation that drives executives salaries higher and wages for the working middle class into the ground. Our precious climate — the gorgeous nature we all enjoy and the plants and animals that add to that beauty — can only survive if we functionally dismantle the systems that have led to their destruction.

The richest men in the world are not the smartest people or the best businessmen, they’re just the most comfortable with shortcuts, the most rabidly obsessed with financial gain at any cost, and the least capable of thinking more than one step ahead.

We deserve leaders who understand the bigger assignment. Who understand nuance. Who listen more than they posture, and who realize that building echo chambers doesn’t mean they’re right, it means they require a well of endless validation to support their confidence.

If you’re tired of the headlines, the hypocrisy, and the performative inclusivity—don’t just rage. Rebuild.

Start the company.

Fund the people who’ve been left out.

Refuse to play the game.

Create new ones.

Include others and learn to look for those who are truly passionate and fantastic at what they do.

The old system isn’t broken. It’s functioning precisely as it was designed.

And that is exactly why we need to design something new.