Inclusion Rider: Difficulties In Implementation

At the tail end of the 2018 Academy Awards, Francis McDormand gave an incredibly powerful speech meant to embolden women and diversity in the film industry. At the end she said, “two words: inclusion rider.” This then led to a mass of googling on the part of those inside the industry and out. “What does that mean?”

An inclusion rider for those that didn’t look it up, is an addition (or rider) to a contract that states that 50% of the cast and crew be “diverse.” But the better question is what does THAT mean? If you were to go based on the context of her speech (where she asked all of the nominated women to stand up and be honored) you could assume that she meant that 50% of the cast and crew must be women. But that doesn’t NAIL diversity. Black Panther was recently criticized because in one early draft, there was a lesbian love interest sub-plot that was later scrapped. A movie that was directed by a black director, almost entirely cast with black actors, and set up to edify black culture still wasn’t diverse enough.

So then what does it mean? How do we quantify diversity? Is it by measures in equal parts in specified categories? Do we make Race, Gender, Age and Sexuality the four categories? And if that’s the case then what do we do about overlap? Or is it that only 50% or less can be straight white cishet males between the age of 25 and 50? Do we lump all “diversity” into category two and just ensure that is crossed off the list.

The discussion on whether this type of rider will improve the industry is a completely different question. But for now, I’d just like to hear a discussion on HOW this can even be implemented, as industry players (most recently Michael B. Jordan’s company and Ben Affleck / Matt Damon’s have both pledged to include this in all future contracts.)

How do we do it?