According to this author, by now everyone in America has learned to celebrate diversity. People do so to signify that they are a good person, they are hip, trendy, and "down with the program." He claims, however, that in academe, the word "diversity" still functions as a rhetorical trump card, always uttered with the tonal implication that the speaker is taking some kind of brave moral stand. The author examines the consequences of the mantra of diversity losing its oppositional stance and becoming just a ritual profession of faith. He further argues that academe can deal with its avowed concerns with social justice more effectively and honestly than it presently does, and, in the process, it might be able to save affirmative action. Lastly, he contends that for an educational setting to become truly diverse, it must take many variables into account, particularly class, or it will, in the end, just become a magnifier of social inequality and a source of inter-group antagonism. He states that when people who claim to be in favor of diversity actively help economically disadvantaged people of all colors; when they count people from China, Iran, Lithuania, South Boston, Camden, and Appalachia, as "diverse"; when they support the constitutional rights of people who disagree with them on ideological grounds, or on matters of faith; then he will believe that they mean what they say about diversity.