Organic Chemistry: A Call to Action for Diversity and Inclusion
Abstract
By now, most of us in the field of organic chemistry have become aware of the recent Perspective Article by Hudlicky published on the Angewandte Chemie, International Edition website(1) and then quickly removed as a result of rapid and strong denunciation on social media and in other forums. We have had complex emotional responses to the opinions expressed in this piece regarding the effects of diversity and inclusion efforts in chemistry: anger, that such regressive views were provided a platform in one of our leading chemistry journals; surprise, that the piece made it through the peer review process; and disappointment, that these views continue to persist, despite our hope that the climate for researchers in organic chemistry had improved since we were all trainees.
Additional Information
© 2020 American Chemical Society. Published: August 10, 2020. We thank the students from each of our groups for their invaluable advice and feedback as we wrote this Editorial, including Hanna Clements (U of Utah), Kristen Gardner (UC Berkeley), Shane Lies (UW Madison), and Brandon Wright (UC Berkeley). In addition, we are grateful to all of the students in our groups, who have taught us so much over the years about being better mentors. We are indebted to Prof. Brian Stoltz (Caltech) and Prof. F. Dean Toste (UC Berkeley) for their important contributions in the early stages of writing this Editorial. This Editorial came about after significant private conversations among many of us in the organic chemistry community following the publication of the Hudlicky Perspective. After these discussions about the persistent, baseless premises, we realized that it would be important for members of our field to repudiate them. Although we are all rightfully proud that the science of organic chemistry has made revolutionary advances over the last three decades, we have not yet succeeded in uprooting our field's problematic history of unhealthy, exclusionary practices. We view this moment as an opportunity to initiate substantive change. We must act to realize a more diverse, equitable, and inclusive culture in the field of organic chemistry. Views expressed in this editorial are those of the authors and not necessarily the views of the ACS. This Editorial is jointly published in The Journal of Organic Chemistry, Organic Letters, ACS Central Science, and Organometallics.Attached Files
Published - acs.organomet.0c00519.pdf
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- CaltechAUTHORS:20200810-142124575
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2020-08-10Created from EPrint's datestamp field
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2021-11-16Created from EPrint's last_modified field