As The Devil Wears Prada 2 makes waves internationally, I left the theatre smiling. I adored the nods to the first film and thoroughly enjoyed the endless product placements. Yet after sleeping on it, I was left with one lingering thought: did the film normalize micro aggressions?

Miranda’s tone deaf comments stood out to me throughout the film. Her primary assistant, Amari, whose role often seemed to involve reminding Miranda when a comment should not be made, struck a nerve. I was not disappointed in Miranda’s portrayal; if anything, she felt familiar. She reminded me of how many people in corporate environments climb to the top while carrying complete ignorance with them, never fully seeing the damage they caused on their way there.

The film presents Miranda’s ignorance as quirky, sharp, and almost charming at times. But it raises a larger question: when does ignorance stop being excusable? Did audiences silently accept it because she is a fashion icon who built an empire? At what point in someone’s life does ignorance become threatening rather than eccentric? Only when their visibility becomes large enough for the consequences to matter?

I would say I have a diverse friend group, primarily composed of people of colour and women. When we get together, we discuss the good, the bad, and the ugly of working in corporate environments. Sometimes the rude comments we hear from colleagues are exactly that: rude comments. Other times, our casual debriefs spiral into long winded debates about whether a comment was intentional or not.

When we decide that it was intentional, it changes how we move forward with that person. We become more reserved, more calculated, and more guarded in future interactions. Many of our reactions eventually culminate in the same realization: by becoming smaller versions of ourselves, we are trying to protect ourselves from creating another opportunity for a similar micro aggression to occur.

Sadly, that does not solve the issue at hand.

If we internalize the aggression and choose not to address it, are we normalizing it?

That question sent me into an entirely different spiral. In a corporate era where diversity, equity, and inclusion are constantly at the forefront, why are the same micro aggressions my parents faced still so prevalent?

My parents are extremely political people, but they never worked in intensely corporate spaces the way I have. Their advice is often more restrained, usually along the lines of: “Don’t make it a big issue. Most people face this… There may be a bigger issue one day, and you do not want to make every little comment an issue.”

Sadly, it is not bad advice.

It makes sense because micro aggressions rarely arrive in obvious forms. They exist in an uncomfortable grey zone where one person views the comment as racism while another dismisses it as an oversight. Somewhere within that grey is where the aggression survives best.

That is the thing, though. Over the years, these moments accumulate. They stack quietly on top of one another until they eventually force themselves to the surface. The same way an annoying pimple comes to a head, the anger from those aggressions slowly begins boiling over.

Suddenly, someone mispronouncing my name or asking where I am really from no longer feels like innocent curiosity. It begins to feel deliberate. Repetitive ignorance starts feeling less like a mistake and more like a choice.

A part of me almost enjoys watching the mental gymnastics people perform when they try explaining what they “really meant” or why something “wasn’t intentional,” yet still somehow fail to get it right.

Part of me believes I will spend my life oscillating between silently accepting these comments and resisting them. Another part of me still hopes that one day these conversations will no longer be necessary.

But while the world continues learning how to pronounce names and understand cultural nuance while proudly boasting about multiculturalism and melting pots, people of colour remain trapped in one of the bleakest shades of grey. We tuck our micro aggressions into hidden parts of ourselves, careful not to disrupt the status quo too much, because we still need to survive and succeed within predominantly white Western spaces. Simply assimilating, because while the West enjoys parts of our culture it understands, it cannot make space for the parts it does not.

One day, I will no longer explain why policing my tone or telling me that it is not a big deal when my name is not written/said correctly is offensive, but we will hold the aggressor accountable. One day, the needle will shift.