In the wake of Martin Luther King Jr. Day earlier this month, a federal court case now pending in Denver underscores how King’s long-celebrated message of colorblindness is under assault.

Depending on how, if and when a judge rules, the state Department of Corrections and Department of Public Health and Environment may have to halt mandated training that it claims is intended to combat racism – but that critics say is itself discriminatory.

As reported by news site The Center Square, a former officer at Colorado’s Limon Correctional Facility, Joshua Young of Colorado Springs, is suing the state over its mandated diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) training program.

The rationale from proponents of DEI training say it is imperative to educate people about how unchangeable characteristics like skin color, sex and racial background must be acknowledged if an individual is to properly assess their standing within society.

But Young alleges the training violated his right to a discrimination-free workplace.

He and his counsel, the nonprofit legal advocacy group Mountain States Legal Foundation, say the training requires corrections officers to “internalize racially discriminatory messages about white people.”

Young and his lawyers don’t hold back in their complaint, saying the kind of forced professional coaching is “state-sponsored racism” that creates “a racially hostile and abusive work environment.”

“Josh was forced to listen to a bigoted official training (session) telling him that he was a racist and white supremacist because of the color of his skin, and that his daily actions contributed to white supremacy,” William Trachman, Young’s lawyer, said. “Colorado’s prisons are worse off, and the state is worse off, because of this training.”

What Young and other Colorado corrections officers experience – on the taxpayer’s dime, mind you – is the same workplace browbeating and bullying so many employees at private companies and public institutions across the country have been forced to sit through in recent years.

Undoubtedly, the advocates of DEI training have the best of intentions in aspiring toward racial justice.

But critical thinkers should realize these trainings – by definition, and by nature – cultivate the exact things they claim to cure: self-censorship and interpersonal division and mistrust among colleagues.

That division and mistrust can be particularly acute when it comes to race. That’s because these teachings whittle relationships between individuals down to what are supposed to be inconsequential differences – like skin tone.

You and your co-worker both are vegetarians?

Not as important as the color of your skin.

You each are fervent fans of the Colorado Rapids soccer club?

Not as important as the color of your skin.

You both love Motown music?

Not as important as the color of your skin.

Young is right, as he says in the suit, that people’s morale will suffer when the message delivered from on high is “that we can’t trust each other to overcome our skin color.

“Which, to me,” Young continued, “seems like a very superficial thing to have to overcome.”

We agree. It is likely MLK would, too.

Denver Gazette editorial board