Thread by @phat_controller

The Netflix film "The Social Dilema" provides a mass audience for critiques of social media surveillance but gives tech bros a platform to absolve themselves and no voice to the women scholars who have worked for years on these issues. @safiyanoble @ruha9
slate.com/technology/202…

I liked the part in the film "The Social Dilema" where they pushed on past the simplistic slogan that "If the product is free then you are the product" to Lanier's re-formulation "the product is actually imperceptibly small and unconscious changes in your beliefs and behaviour".

The film makes a valuable contribution by using Netflix to popularise how surveillance capitalists use social media to identify our psychological vulnerabilities and triggers in order to profit from suruptiously shaping our consciousness, consumption and voting behaviours.

As the article points out the failure of the film "The Social Dilema" was to fail to push through to the outstanding intersectional analysis of scholars including @ubiquity75 @safiyanoble & @ruha9. Instead of doing this the film bizarely pivoted to 'social media is bad for kids'!

The film did feature the fairer skinned @shoshanazuboff and @mathbabedotorg who pointed out that "algorithms are opinions embedded in code". Social Media algorithms are optimised to maintain our attention, manipulate thoughts & change our behavioral change to maximise ad revenue.

Most interesting was the tech bro who confessed they consciously knew they were manipulating users behind their backs, against their personal interests & those of freedom & democracy - but chose to carry on doing it anyway. Quote: "you gotta grow quarter on quarter, right?".

If you agree with the original article by @Pranavmalhotra8 and the gist of this thread but haven't yet read "Race After Technology" by @ruha9 then I earnestly recommend that you aquire a copy. It's everything that the film "The Social Dilemma" lacks. #mustread #intersectionality

What wasn't covered in #TheSocialDilemma or in #SurveillanceCapitalism but is central to #RaceAgainstTechnology & #AlgorithmsOfOppression is that use of digital technologies reflects, reproduces & amplifies (dis)advantage along intersectional lines, widening existing inequalites.

By further amplifying the voices of Pale Male Tech Bros & by silencing the insight & analysis of established black women analysts #TheSocialDilemma itself also reflects, reproduces & amplifies (dis)advantage along familiar intersectional lines of gender & race privilege.