1. Executive Summary
Affinity spaces — voluntary environments where people with shared backgrounds, identities, or experiences can convene — serve a vital role even in institutions opposed to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) frameworks. They provide emotional relief, peer support, strategic coordination, and ultimately strengthen institutional resilience. Yet, institutions hostile to DEI often view these spaces with distrust, fearing division, legal exposure, and loss of control. Understanding this tension is key to safeguarding their benefits.
2. What Are Affinity Spaces?
Definition: Structured settings—whether formal or informal—where individuals unite around common life experiences, identities, or goals. Examples include cultural affinity groups, newcomer networks, parenting circles, or even interest-based communities . Purpose: To foster mutual support, knowledge-sharing, collective resilience, and strategic action within an emotionally safe environment ().
3. Why They Matter — Even in DEI-Resistant Institutions
Emotional Sustainability & Belonging Participation nurtures resilience and reduces burnout, especially among those who feel isolated or undervalued . Innovation Through Shared Insight Smaller, trust-based communities enable the emergence of new ideas and solutions that might be stifled in broader institutional settings . Strengthening Retention and Engagement Members often report increased confidence, persistence, and institutional commitment after engaging in affinity spaces . Collective Knowledge and Advocacy Shared experiences provide collective clarity on subtle challenges within the institution and support targeted responses .
4. Why Institutions Resist or Mistrust Them
Perceived Segregation or Division Critics—especially in DEI-averse environments—label affinity spaces as exclusionary or divisive, equating them with formal segregation . Yet, these groups are voluntary and supportive, not enforced separations. Fear of Critique and External Pressure Spaces where private critique or solidarity flourishes may trigger internal alarms, especially when leadership sees them as incubators for institutional critique (). Legal and Regulatory Risk Institutions wary of Title VII/VI constraints may interpret race- or identity-based groupings as legally non-compliant—heightening suspicion . Ideological Backlash Movements and policy shifts opposing DEI cast affinity spaces as vehicles for political agendas, framing them as antithetical to “merit-based” or “colorblind” ideals .
5. Evidence of Impact vs. Suspicion
Benefit of Affinity Spaces
Impact & Research
Institutional Concerns
Boosts morale & belonging
Members report higher engagement and retention
Viewed as cliquish or favoring protected groups
Drives innovation & creative strategy
Safe small-group dialogue leads to fresh solutions ()
Fear of echo chambers or bias
Supports mental wellness
Helps process stress and microaggressions ()
Branded as “complaint clubs” requiring resources
Enables collective advocacy
Shared insights fuel reform ()
Seen as incubators of disruption or political mobilization
6. Overcoming Institutional Resistance
Even in environments hostile to DEI, affinity spaces can be supported by:
Reframing the Narrative: Presenting them as wellness or professional-development groups, rather than identity politics. Opening Participation: Making them voluntary but inclusive—welcoming allies and maintaining transparency to reduce legal concerns (). Embedding into Broader Objectives: Highlighting their tangible benefits for community engagement, retention, and problem-solving. Neutral Oversight: Ensuring groups have clear governance, explicit volunteer leadership, and autonomy over their internal affairs.
7. Conclusions & Recommendations
Affinity spaces deliver real, measurable benefits in institutional cohesion, morale, and innovation—even where DEI policies are contested. These spaces help participants manage stress, build networks, articulate collective challenges, and drive change. However, when framed as exclusionary or politically motivated, they face unwarranted suspicion.
Recommendations for DEI-averse leaders:
Adopt a pragmatic framing: Emphasize support, wellness, retention, and innovation. Promote transparency: Invite all who are interested, without imposing quotas. Monitor outcomes: Track participation, engagement metrics, and qualitative feedback. Build credibility slowly: Pilot small, low-risk groups to demonstrate value.
Key Citations
Community building and emotional processing () Innovation and strategic conversation () Perceived legal risks and backlash dynamics
Final Thought:
Affinity spaces remain valuable across institutional contexts—especially in settings that resist DEI—because they support individuals, improve institutional health, and foster invisible but powerful networks for long-term resilience and progress.
Edge Induced Cohesion 
I will be concise in this, and make every attempt to be polite.
Yes, it is DEI.
It is discriminatory against the American baseline demographic, as a “White, Anglo-Saxon, gun-carrying, MAGA-hatter males who date girls” safe space would never fly.
“Voluntary” fails the reality test. As we learned in 1995, a “voluntary” practice can very quickly and easily be made by circumstance into a compulsory/prohibited action. One of the reasons I never married during my time in Armstrongism was concern over providing for a family. I would often tell people, “It’s one thing if I starve for the Sabbath. But I’m not gonna put a family through that.” Under the Tkach doctrine, “voluntary” Sabbath rest would actually be prohibited in a tight enough circumstance. I would not under the doctrine in good conscience be able to refuse to work during that time if my making a living was put in danger by it. It would constitute tempting God, and it would violate my DUTY to provide for my family (cf 1Tim 5:8). Put another way, Sabbath WORK is “voluntary” until it isn’t. You can easily imagine scenarios where participation in safe spaces for certain demographics could be compelled.
Insert standard Civic Duty arguments about a cohesive society, and add in Anglo-Israelist factors.
If people don’t like the circumstances in they live, they can move. If they can’t move and can’t deal with it, then as my drill sergeant would tell us, “[Stinks] to be them.”
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It is amusing to see you completely misinterpret what is being discussed mainly because you see everything written as being imposed from the top down rather than being built from the ground up, and worry about people being coerced into safe spaces rather than seeking places to feel free from such coercion.
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I was just about to comment on this response as well. These safe spaces promote trust within the community and have nothing to do with woke ideology or politics. Distrust of them has everything to do with preconceived ideas, loss of authoritarian power or control or other factors that necessitate their existence in the first place. We have the responsibility to help one another develop their gifts and help with their overcoming without fear, guilt or judgment. Authenticity is of paramount importance in our Christian journey. This also flows seamlessly with the mentoring model that Paul describes to Timothy.
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I will, though, pass on a little story, you might use to support a “Armstrongist Space”: Back in the Worldwide days, a member was sent by his company to another location. For a week he worked with this one particular fellow. That Friday night, the fellow and his wife took the member out to dinner. After a long period of exchanging personal stories, and realizing that they had been at the same odd place at the same particular time more than once, somebody popped the question – and yes, the fellow and his wife were members. The two have worked together for a week and never realized their commonality.
Of course, we know that traditional Armstrongists are encouraged to hide their faith, so in that sense it was a success. Never had any idea about the other.
Interesting, though, how members of a small protected class is looked down upon by some aspects of the mainstream population seemed to get along fine without a collective safe space – even to the point of not recognizing one another. Hmm.🤔
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It nothing to do with interpreting you. It has to do with the reality in which we live. There’s a big difference there.
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Your reality isn’t based on absolute reality. It’s based on what you know of it, a subjective filter from your experiences and disappointments.
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Fortunately, this is no longer the case. We are not to hide our light under a bushel so so speak.
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“No longer the case.”
Yet another departure from the legacy of Herbert Armstrong.
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Maybe the legacy of Worldwide culture but not of Herbert Armstrong. He didn’t hide his ministry under a bushel either. The levels of bureaucracy under him muddled the calling.
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Ma’am,
Regarding reality: It’s just the way it is.
Regarding legacy: Correct that Armstrong didn’t hide his ministry. He hid that of those under him. Armstrong wrote extensively of how it was not the members’ job to preach the Gospel. His ministry followed his lead. He gets the credit as the apostle and the Elijah, and so he also gets the blame. With all due respect, ma’am, “If the Czar only knew” didn’t work for Nicholas, it won’t work for Putin, and it frankly doesn’t work for Armstrong.
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I’ve read his works extensively and I never understood his writings to state that the brethren were constrained from preaching the gospel. This is unscriptural and he, of all people, constantly said to prove it for ourselves and not to automatically trust what he said (not that he told us to hide our faith anyway). This is just another gross misinterpretation filtered down by those underlings he trusted who were thwarting and deconstructing the very work he was doing. I was around when all that filtering was going on, attended Ambassador College and saw the chicanery firsthand, and got to know and converse with Mr. Armstrong personally. I know what he believed and what the people directly under him (evangelists and highest level leaders) twisted around to teach the laity into thinking that it came from the very top. I initially thought that this was how it was working with Tkach as well but, no, that time it was from the very top.
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I guess I have to go nuclear. Armstrong said his “Don’t believe me; believe your Bible” line does not apply to you if you are in his church. He said, “But I DO NOT — or, at least, SHOULD NOT HAVE ever said that to our own brethren!” (See below.) What your son does here on this blog would not be allowed.
Herbert Armstrong, April 1979 Good News magazine Personal: https://www.hwalibrary.com/cgi-bin/get/hwa.cgi?action=getmagazine&InfoID=1374325663&GetMag=GN&byYear=1979&page=&return=magazines
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Now suppose a member thinks he or she has found an error in our doctrines. How must you proceed? IF you have found truth, we all want to know and embrace it! But how MUST you proceed? NEVER by trying to convince another member of your “finding,” lest you fall guilty of Romans 16:17-18.
WHAT, then?
Take it to your local minister or write to headquarters. What must a local pastor do? Send it to headquarters. If it is felt to be a valid truth, it will be brought to me personally, and the LIVING CHRIST will make it clear to my mind!
We have covered the question of how does the living Christ put His doctrines into the Church. But the Church is made up of many members. How does each member come to understand each doctrine?
How Christ put His Church back on track
Now let us pull together all that has gone before.
Now we have to ask, HOW did this division and doctrinal disagreement get its ugly head inside the Church, and HOW safeguard the Church from any further Trojan-horse invasions?
I have said through the years, over the air and in print and before audiences, “Don’t believe me because I say it — look in your own Bible and believe what you find there!”
But I DO NOT — or,
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PART 2
I have said through the years, over the air and in print and before audiences, “Don’t believe me because I say it — look in your own Bible and believe what you find there!”
But I DO NOT — or,
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PART 2:
But I DO NOT — or,
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This is now the third message that has contained this. Do you have more to add?
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For some reason, the blog will not allow any more of that quotation. I urge you to go to the link provided and read the rest of that article.
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But I DO NOT — or,
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Attempting rest of the paragraph: “…
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That didn’t work.
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trying directly on the site:
”But I DO NOT — or, at least, SHOULD NOT HAVE ever said that to our own brethren! But my son writes: “I tried with all my being to encourage our brethren to think for themselves.” In other words don’t believe our deep-rooted Church teachings — think out NEW, DIFFERENT beliefs for yourself!
But GOD’S WAY is THIS! This is the way the original first-century apostles preached. They spoke the TRUTH with POWER! To the unconverted Thessalonians, the Bereans were complimented for checking up on Paul’s preaching (Acts 17:11). But none should be accepted IN THE CHURCH until that person either has come to KNOW and accept and believe Christ’s true doctrine, OR has repented so THOROUGHLY, CONQUERED BY GOD and with an attitude of a little child, so that the minister doing the baptising feels sure he or she will accept and believe fully Christ’s true doctrines in His Church.
In other words, Christ commands that we all speak the same thing. THAT BECOMES A QUALIFICATION FOR MEMBERSHIP!
…
Once in the Church, WE MUST ALL SPEAK THE SAME THING! I have covered earlier in this “Personal” how a member should proceed who thinks he has found where the Church is in error on a doctrine, or where he thinks he has discovered “new light” the Church does not yet have. It must be cleared finally by Christ’s apostle.”
The reality is, you would be disfellowshipped for this blog.
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That may have been true, but it is also thankfully irrelevant.
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I can certainly understand his mindset when he wrote that statement. He had to disfellowship his own son for “thinking for himself” and then dealing with the church receivership a few months earlier. The systematic theology project (STP) had nearly just slid through while he was traveling extensively throughout the world; an approach that was geared toward dangerously watering down the doctrinal truths we embraced. Trusted leaders were defecting because they hadn’t really searched the scriptures; they read with itching ears. They weren’t grounded. Mr. Armstrong was dealing with a church that was, for the most part—including its leadership—a bunch of babies and children who did what they were told, not out of love for the truth, but out of fear of the prophetic events and God’s wrath. He was also dealing with the truth about his disastrous second marriage at about this time. It’s like the frustration felt by the author of the book of Hebrews; after all these years, they should be teachers yet were still having to be spoon fed milk. They were arguing about basic issues decades after Christ’s resurrection. Mr. Armstrong’s near-fatal heart attack occurred in order for him to be able to become aware that the church was being run amuck by the people he had entrusted it to. He was forced to clean house from his own son on down and become a daddy figure to a church that was still in diapers and being bottle fed, even after years of teaching. His later sermons echoed the theme of half the audience not even getting it. Unfortunately, that was an optimistic estimate. The issue isn’t one of mentoring and lay ministry; it’s one of why we obey God and what our personal relationship with Him is within the structure of His church. Our relationships with each other must reflect and mirror that love.
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My apologies. I didn’t mean it to be such a trick question. Armstrong never does say Paul did it. My apologies for that misstatement, but rather he cites Luke’s work. Nonetheless, it does raise a question of who these “unconverted Thessalonians” were. There is no tradition I know of that Theophilus, the one to whom Luke wrote, was from Thessalonica. But Armstrong does say so. And his apostleship is riding on this. So, here is a explanation which I don’t believe, but which will save the “founder” of your faith tradition, though at a cost:
Theophilus was the leader of a group of unbaptized Thessalonian “coworkers” (in old WCG parlance), referred to as “the church of the Thessalonians.” The two epistles bearing that name are not written to a “Church of God” — that term is never used in them, and we know how essential that term is to your “True Church” claim — but rather to this entity. This would explain the directive of 1 Thess 5:19-21 being given, which decidedly DOES NOT APPLY TO BAPTIZED CHRISTIANS.
The cost, of course, is that open questioning of what your ministry tells you is forbidden. If you do not receive a sufficient answer to a question privately given to a minister, you must either go on along quietly, or conclude that the church in which you are it’s not the (one and only) place where God is working.
The question arises how Armstrong knew this. His 1980 statement regarding his apostleship claim regards honesty.. Honesty is not evaluated on accuracy, but on perception. What reasonable basis did he have to believe something akin to the (IMO) cockamamie story I laid out above? Nathan, I laid out to you my thoughts on his motivation.
The point remains that Armstrong in fact did NOT intend for members to feel permitted or authorized to question his doctrine (outside of consultation with ministry). your work here, Craig White’s work in Australia — indeed, the entire operation of the United Church of God — would be completely rejected by Armstrong. As would be those involved in it.
Again, I apologize for the mistake in the question. That noted, I will make only partly in jest a suggestion of two options: You can go to CGI or similar fellowship (ICG mentioned here as a courtesy to my final fellowship), where some of your views expressed are actually implemented. Or, you can embrace Armstrong, HW in his fullness, and preach the gospel of the End Time Elijah. That means no makeup, no medicine, no military, and no miscegenation. The only thing I would urge is that if you choose the latter option, please do so in full opening. People should know what they are being led to before they start following.
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Yay! It worked. I was trying to reply by replying to the email. Not sure why it wouldn’t take it. But you have the quotation now. My apologies for the bad messaging.
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I have no idea why it didn’t go through.
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I must leave for now. Thank you for your patience.
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You’re very welcome.
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I mean, it will be a while before I can respond to any replies.
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“That may have been true, but it is also thankfully irrelevant.”
_
Interesting and insightful thought all the way around.
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Interestingly, Armstrong said this in a similar context to the article:
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“We must all speak the same thing! Whoever is the apostle, whoever is guiding and putting truth into the Church, must be honest with the Word of God! Now, if you ever find me dishonest, with the Word of God, you reject me as God’s apostle.” Armstrong, 1 December 1 80, Tucson, Arizona. ( https://www.hwalibrary.com/media/global/WhenShouldYouFollowChurchGovernment.pdf )
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I will email you a message with a slightly-edited comment of mine from TruthSocial about the article, with material that might not pass muster on this blog. You will have to judge that. But I will make the same request for information: Please point me to the record of the Apostle Paul expressing a statement explicitly to UNCONVERTED people in Thessalonica complimenting their fellow Thessalonians in Berea, as referenced by Armstrong.
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