‘King of the Hill’ can teach Fort Worth a lesson on inclusion | Opinion
Since I more or less write for the Arlen Star-Telegram — and I will never turn down an excuse to watch TV for work — I took the new “King of the Hill” season for a spin.
The reboot flashes forward Hank and Peggy Hill — who escaped the worst of the pandemic when Hank’s propane sales job relocated to Saudi Arabia — to the present day United States, turbocharging the show’s recurring theme of a traditional man finding compromise with a changing world. The Hills’ expatriate experience left Arlen unrecognizable; its suburban streets tarnished by protected bike lanes and illegal U-turns and inundated with unfamiliar fast casual food (Hawaiian poke) and outright blasphemy (Oklahoma barbecue). Rapid change compelled the Hills to contemplate a return to the nostalgic Saudi Arabian company town that Peggy said was “more Texas than Texas.”
Right when hope in Arlen seems forever lost, a Girl Scout restores their faith in America. The jaded Hills assume all Scout cookies are gluten-free and $50 a box. No, the girls gently correct them, noting that the price is still five bucks, with only a dollar more for those suffering a wheat allergy.
Hank then asks if they have his favorite kind of cookie: Samoa. The Scouts still sell the same beloved caramel, chocolate and coconut creation, but they don’t call them Samoas anymore, the girl says. Now they’re Caramel Delites because, the girl explains, the new name is more respectful to actual Samoans.
“Now, that’s a good change,” Hank says. “It’s nice to be nice,” the scout replies. Indeed.
“King of the Hill” might be flexing some artistic liberty — Dallas Scouts sell Samoas, while Fort Worth Scouts sell Delites. (I hope you get your life lessons from places other than the creator of “Beavis and Butthead,” heh heh.) But I can nonetheless appreciate Mike Judge’s interpretation of the spirit of an organization that has, despite its loud critics, maintained its commitment towards training young girls to facilitate an inclusive and just world.
In America, the loudest critic of Girl Scout values is also its most powerful. President Donald Trump signed an executive order banning what he called “radical and wasteful” DEI programs and threatened to pull federal funding from cities that upheld diversity policies.
As a result of Trump’s demands, the City Council in Arle — ahem, Fort Worth — had to make a choice about exactly how nice it is to be nice. Should the city continue supporting its minority and women entrepreneurs by explicitly recognizing and rectifying the roadblocks they face? Or, do they appease the president and cling to roughly $40 million in annual federal funding, along with $270 million in grants that supported housing, parks, and critical services?
Fort Worth is not the only city or state facing presidential punishment for refusing to prostrate itself to his urges.
In New York, the Trump administration attempted to terminate the city’s “Congestion Relief Zone,” a newly-tolled section of Manhattan’s urban core that not only seen immediate traffic reductions since launching in January, but, through a $9 toll, raised enough money to start the city’s most expansive rail project in a century. Steamrolling years of state analysis and federal review, Trump himself prematurely declared victory by posting an AI-generated magazine cover of himself wearing a crown, which he captioned “LONG LIVE THE KING,” to the official White House social media accounts.
New York state leadership could have easily complied in advance, fearing the president’s warning that he would (stop me if you’ve heard this before) pull federal funds. Instead, it called the president on his bluff. “New York hasn’t labored under a king in over 250 years,” said Gov. Kathy Hochul in response to Trump’s monarchical decries. “We sure as hell are not going to start now.”
Fort Worth’s leadership could have stood tall on its good work like New York state. The city could have joined Baltimore, which sued the Trump administration, alleging that pulling federal funding for cities that preserved DEI initiatives violated the First Amendment. Instead, seven of the 11 Fort Worth city council members, including Mayor Mattie Parker, voted to protect the city’s privileged access to his purse.
During the council meeting, Parker alternated between praising and slamming those who participated in the marathon public comments, which overwhelmingly supported preserving city diversity initiatives, delivered with the approach of a jaded Scout Master disabusing their troops of their values by introducing them to the real world.
“While I am so proud we have over 90 people come here to speak or submit comment cards, there are one million people that this dais has to be responsible for,” Parker said. She argued that voting against DEI was the best way to save jobs and critical programs for the city, adding: “While this is a consequential vote, this is not the time to virtue-signal.”
I have a real problem with what the mayor said. But first, a word on DEI, and virtue signaling, both which carry more complicated connotations than many realize.
Too often, DEI exists as a compromise that evades the comprehensive repair of race, class, and gender inequalities our country desperately deserves. But the Trump administration erasure of baseball and civil-rights legend Jackie Robinson’s military history and cancellation of scientific research on women’s and queer health issues, they shows the people running this country have no interest in any of these nuances.
In practice, the president and his acolytes use DEI as a slur for anyone they believe took something a white person deserved. As Trump told Time magazine during his latest presidential campaign, “there’s absolutely a bias against white, and that’s a problem.”
DEI is not inherently performative and insincere. When DEI is directly under attack from the highest office, signaling the virtues of investing in your Black, Latino, or women constituents isn’t performative, it’s courageous.
But more than that, it’s not just nice to be nice. As recently as 2020, Fort Worth commissioned studies that found ample evidence of discrimination in city government. Are we going to pretend this taxpayer-funded research and its findings never happened because President Trump doesn’t like what the city found?
Fort Worth leadership, like our favorite propane salesman and cartoon Girl Scout, should see protecting DEI not not an empty performance, but as a value worth fighting for. It’s nice to be nice.
This story was originally published August 14, 2025 at 4:54 AM with the headline "‘King of the Hill’ can teach Fort Worth a lesson on inclusion | Opinion."
