On Tuesday night, Pharrell Williams stitched his name into history with a remarkable leap from music impresario to fashion designer. He opened Paris Fashion Week with a show that underscored why Louis Vuitton (LVMH) was inspired to tap him as creative director in 2023. Reviews now crown LVMH as “the new luxury leader in streetwear.”

Yes, that term is replete with contradictions, which I’ll address below. The point of this post is that the diversity Pharrell represents matters even more than the sales his collection generates.

Pharrell personifies the diversity in fashion Trump wants to end in politics

Pharrell is Black. Yet he’s the face of LVMH, the world’s most prestigious fashion brand. Fear not, I know better than to critique his collection. Instead, I’ll highlight how he personifies the innovation, creativity, and success that validate diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) – not just in fashion but all industries.

In fact, organizations across industries — law firms, manufacturers, retailers, and governments — can attest to the benefits of DEI in hiring. Yet President Trump is leading a global crusade to eradicate DEI, not just in politics but in every facet of professional life.

On January 20, his first day in office, Trump theatrically signed an executive order to fire all federal employees tasked with promoting DEI programs. Only ingrained notions of White supremacy explain this absurd move. Because it suggests that Trump only wants DEI (“didn’t earn it”) hires; you know, like the predominantly White, entitled, and incompetent (WEI) men he appointed to his cabinet.

Hypocrisy of LVMH owner supporting Pharrell and Trump

Pharrell’s show was delayed to accommodate the Arnault family, owners of LVMH, who attended Trump’s inauguration in Washington. This juxtaposition highlights a strategic dance between politics and culture. Yet this hypocrisy pales compared with Trump leading his anti-DEI crusade while featuring Black entertainers, including rapper Snoop Dogg, at his inaugural balls.

Still, to be fair, Trump’s hypocrisy pales compared with America’s Founding Fathers, who declared all men equal while enslaving Black people. But I digress…

Of course, if LVMH were an American company, it would be following Amazon, Meta, and others in heeding Trump’s crusade against DEI initiatives. Like religious leaders, their CEOs would pretend compliance by purging literature and reassigning staff dedicated to DEI programs.

But the bottom line is that the Arnault family would be as loath to fire diverse employees like Pharrell as Trump was to feature only White entertainers at his inaugural balls. I suspect this perverse duality will hold among all companies ending DEI programs just to curry favor with Trump.

In an admittedly superficial way, Pharrell’s fashion show serves as an indictment of America’s DEI discourse. It lays bare the racism and hypocrisy of vilifying DEI as a bogeyman rather than embracing it as the talisman it truly is.