The Racist Roots of Jedi-Inspired Justice: How Scientific American is Addressing Social Justice Through Science

In his Spring issue article for City Journal, James Meigs discusses the increasing focus of Scientific American on social justice topics. The magazine has published a series of articles that address scientific issues from a social justice perspective, including “Modern Mathematics Confronts Its White, Patriarchal Past” and “The Racist Roots of Fighting Obesity.” While these pieces were related to scientific topics, in 2021, SciAm published an opinion essay titled “Why the Term ‘JEDI’ Is Problematic for Describing Programs That Promote Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion”.

The essay critiques the expansion of the DEI acronym to include “Justice” and argues that the Jedi knights from Star Wars are inappropriate mascots for social justice. The authors suggest that the Jedi knights were prone to white saviorism and toxic masculinity in their approaches to conflict resolution. They used violent duels with phallic light sabers and gaslighting with “Jedi mind tricks.” The connection between these social justice topics and science was unclear to many readers.

James B. Meigs is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor for City Journal. He is also the cohost of the How Do We Fix It? podcast and the former editor of Popular Mechanics. The content was adapted from City Journal and was originally published in The Wall Street Journal (paywall). A photo accompanying the article was taken by Andrew Brookes/Getty Images.