SedaG Profile picture
Apr 29, 2020 18 tweets 4 min read Read on X
"Watched and still dying"
"I never imagined I would experience more loved ones dying in similar isolation and uncertainty [as AIDS] in my lifetime."
From the wise @Combsthepoet
odbproject.org/2020/04/26/wat…
"I have spoken with several social justice organizers and survivors who confirmed the stigma that accompanied not only the patients, but family members, friends and anyone who came into contact with someone suspected of having HIV or AIDS."
"We have since discovered much more about HIV and AIDS, but not without failed experiments, constant tracking of people living with the virus, and lots of government mistakes, most prominently from the White House."
"Late President Ronald Reagan would admit after his presidency, that he failed to act in a manner that would have saved many lives."
"HIV and AIDS continue to be stigmatizing. I know people who lost loved ones over 30 years ago and are still afraid to speak publicly about it. Stigma is dehumanizing, and at times as permanent as the disease itself."
"This moment feels eerily similar to the United States’ response to AIDS in the early years. Bans on travel, international surveillance, press conferences that initially downplayed the crisis, blanketed and changing assessments on how the disease could be contracted,"
"Those who test positive for HIV and AIDS, remain among some of the most tracked people in the United States. Their surveillance has not led to a feeling of safety for survivors I have spoken with, nor has it led to a cure."
"As typical with most crises, the impact on the Black community cannot be overstated. In 2018, Blacks/African Americans accounted for 42% of HIV diagnoses and 13% of the population. In 2020, Black Americans represent 13% of the population, but suffered 32% of the COVID-19 deaths"
"In predominantly Black Detroit the numbers are even slightly higher. Although Black people make up less than 14% of Michigan, they account for more than 40% of COVID-19 related deaths. Grief has become synonymous with trying to breathe, something that isn’t a given in the city."
"Detroiters aren’t just suffering poor air quality, further exacerbating the crisis, thousands lack clean and affordable water. "
"For several months, and to pretty much anyone who would listen, including in front of the Board of Police Commissioners (civilian oversight body of police), I would warn about the implications of biometric surveillance in Detroit mirroring the Tuskegee Experiment."
"[however], Detroit’s Project Green Light surveillance program and real-time crime centers were championed as the solution for monitoring compliance to the city’s “stay at home order,” and filling in the shortage for the department."
"In Detroit, and other Black and Brown communities, surveillance and increased militarization tend to be default responses to situations that would actually benefit greater from resources and empathy."
"Over the past month, Black Detroiters have been demonized in the media for the actions of a small percentage of residents, mostly youth who vocalized their frustrations to the quarantine by gathering in large groups. When caught, they are ticketed up to $1,000"
The narrative around the Black Detroit youth, differs drastically from the narrative circulating about the thousands of mostly white Michiganders who have ...behaved equally as irresponsible by not maintaining social distances, or practicing other safety measures."
"If there is any solace to be found in this crisis, its the neighbors who are pulling together in this moment to look out for each other, the hospital workers, delivery drivers, frontline workers who are ..administering aid, responding to emergencies & taking care of the elderly"
"While tech companies chomp at the bit to have their apps considered for tracking Detroiters, while the Mayor commands flyovers to ensure folks are social distancing, and while local hospitals pursue residents for medical experimentation,"
" I hold out faith that the perseverance that has gotten Detroiters through tough times on many occasions, will get us through again...We will rediscover that interactions we most value are the ones that happen away from video and surveillance cameras."
Thank you @Combsthepoet

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More from @sedyst

Mar 15, 2021
One year into the pandemic, in Germany we are encountering debate around apps (see #LucaApp or #ImmunityPassports) that promise to solve the Corona crisis. The current debate forgets important questions for public interest 1/x
Currently the debate is all about "data privacy". But, is that all that is at stake?
Are there other questions that journalists, politicians and civil society could be asking that could ensure these apps serve the public interest? 2/x
Serving the public interest does not begin and end with good data security and privacy but needs to start with whether the apps serve the purpose they are designed for and do so effectively. 3/x
Read 17 tweets
Mar 15, 2021
Ein Jahr nach Beginn der Pandemie erleben wir in Deutschland eine extrem verflachte Debatte über Apps (z.B. #LucaApp oder #ImmunityPassports), die bei der Bekämpfung der Corona-Krise helfen sollen. Problem: Diese Form der Debatte ist nicht hilfreich.
Aktuell konzentiert sich die Debatte auf "Datensicherheit".
Aber ist das die einzige relevante Frage?
Was sind die Fragen, die Journalist*innen, Politiker*Innen und die Zivilgesellschaft stellen sollten, wenn es darum geht, das Gemeinwohl nicht aus dem Blick zu verlieren?
Ob etwas dem Gemeinwohl zuträglich ist, hängt nicht nur von guter Datensicherheit ab, sondern muss sich zuerst mit der Frage beschäftigen, ob diese Apps tatsächlich dem Zweck dienen, zu dem sie eingesetzt werden.
Read 19 tweets
Oct 24, 2020
"part of what we in an American university have to consider now, what it is for us to have been made custodians of those principles [of free speech] even as we are made to watch when they are dissolved in an infernal public private partnership." Fred Moten
"it is that this ought not to drive us to defend an abstract principle of free speech, which is only ever concretized, and usually at the same moment dishonestly and disgustingly sacralized, in exclusion."
"instead and in refusal of that, lets claim and eruptively assert our fugitive speech, which is fueled by the realization of the conditions we live in"
Read 5 tweets
Oct 4, 2020
For those interested in the political economy of AI this report has a lot of teasers. Many of them are aligned with some recent papers that talked about the concentration of research in the hands of a few (corporations and their research collaborators).
Report claims OpenAI and Deepmind, but also other big players in the industry are important players in research but do not/cannot publish their code (I hope all our colleagues who now do ethics at these companies consider these structural issues!)
Tools are an important but of expanding infrastructural power of these companies into research institutions, and the report claims Facebook is outpacing Google.
Read 10 tweets
Aug 25, 2020
When Alex Irpan of Google writes about compute as the way forward for AI, you wonder how much of this is AI pulling on compute vs. compute (and the investment into chips) pulling on AI.
The whole article is as much about economics as about AI, in fact it conflates the two 1/x
It starts with artificial general intelligence being equated with "economically valuable work":

"artificial general intelligence (AGI) [is] an AI system that matches or exceeds humans at almost all (95%+) economically valuable work

2/x
According to Irpan, economics determines also how AI will spread:
"We also don’t have to build AI systems that learn like humans do. If they’re capable of doing most human-level tasks, economics is going to do the rest, whether or not those systems are made in our own image."
3/x
Read 7 tweets
May 22, 2020
This WP article has highlighted important problems with Gapple's contact tracing efforts & quotes some of my mentors in tech policy. But, from my vantage point, it creates (unintentionally) a false dichotomy between national sovereignty and Gapple (1/x)
washingtonpost.com/technology/202…
My gut response to the first Gapple announcement was not only lack of sovereignty but also democratic process. Sovereignty is not sufficient give the complexity of the relationship between governments & Gapple (2/x)

radicalai.org/e5-seda-gurses
To this day most app initiatives are techno-centric and top down and have side-stepped health authorities as well as civil society. Governments across Europe got pushback for this, and some changed course, e.g., Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands. (3/x)
Read 15 tweets

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