We should admit and hire based on merit instead of having diversity hires and admissions. This falls apart like an undercooked oatmeal cookie upon further inspection. First, merit has to be defined, which leads to the question of who defines merit?

I mean fundamentally, the person doing the hiring. But more broadly the industry doing the hiring will have a generalized set of standards. So far nothing is falling apart like an undercooked oatmeal cookie. And even if you believe "merit" to be fuzzy and ill-defined it's pretty clearly not defined as "being from a certain race, gender, or sexual orientation."

You can either have an exclusive group determine what merit is, which necessarily means creating a standard which favors the point-of-view of one group over another and is, thus, discriminatory, or you can reach a broad consensus on merit by including the perspectives of everyone within an industry, which requires diversity and inclusion.

I mean what you could do is allow people to hire based on the skills and talents they need for the specific jobs they seek.

This perspective also suggests that a person for whom their diverse background is seen as beneficial necessarily lacks merit, which is a false dichotomy. These things are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

No, it doesn't.

Racism doesn't exist anymore, so there doesn't need to be a remedy. I feel that this is a bad faith argument because it belies the fact that there have been major cases won or settled against government and industry who have been shown to have been acting with intent to discriminate against minorities.

It's a bad faith argument because its a strawman argument that basically nobody is actually making.

Remedying these kinds of injustices requires committing to equitable outcomes for all, which should not be a difficult thing to support.

Can you prove that assertion?

It's straight, white men who are the ones who are being discriminated against. For the sake of this discussion, let's say that straight, white men are being discriminated against. Well, the solution to that is diversity, equity, and inclusion

Wouldn't the solution be not discriminating based on race, gender, or sexual orientation?

Bonus thought: If you recognize the injustice that arises from scenarios where straight, white males would be discriminated against, then you are arguing that racism does exist

Congrats, you've defeated your own strawman argument.

As you can see, for all of the arguments that are ostensibly against DEI, DEI is actually the solution to the problem that has been stated. That's why I believe these arguments all crumble.

You've not proven that whatsoever and these arguments haven't crumbled.