Thread by @jhybe

Listening in on this and trying to livetweet, cause I miss it :) #CSW65 #feministinternet

https://twitter.com/APC_News/status/1374418844383543296

The last 10 years have seen a lot more feminist engagement with the internet.

Feminist Principles of the Internet is key to own political journey (feministinternet.net)

- @lulifera

#csw65
#feministinternet

Some amazing examples of feminist imagination in reappropriating tech shared by @lulifera - check out marea verde on protest on abortion in mexico. #metoo and manifestation everywhere and how this transformed tolerance of sexual harassment.

#CSW65 #feministinternet

The FPI principle on resistance - building on the history of womn-led protest - @marwaazelmat

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Speaking abt the revolution of dignity in Arab countries - where feminist movements successfully transgressed norms to bring in a new body politic. Multiplicity of identities. Internet a key space for building local and global solidarities - @marwaazelmat #CSW65 #feministinternet

@marwaazelmat Feel proud and hati kembang to be named by @marwaazelmat on my role in building the collaboratively developed #FeministPrinciplesoftheInternet <3

Surveillance and censorship is a prevalent context in organising. Building our own feminist tech infrastructure is important in countering this - but has been a gap. @ealshafei speaks about #NumunFund as a feminist vision to meet this. Yay! #CSW65 #feministinternet

Tension between the desire for visibility and the extractive economy that social media platforms provide to feminists and marginalised communities, esp in global South - NE speaks at the @GlobalFundWomen #csw65 session on #FeministInternet

"The job of feminists is not to make bad tech less bad.
Radical feminist futures. Feminist tech needs to invest in feminist to build, experiment and make tech that are rooted in rights, not profit." - NE #csw65 #feministinternet

Mindblowing example given by NE - an app built in the global North jst to say "yo" given USD1million. #csw65 #feministinternet

"The future of the internet is in the global South."

Feminist infrastructure is not for individuals, but for societies. We need to build technology and innovate from and for our realities - NE

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Tech also has the potential to reproduce structural inequalities and sexist systems that exist. Asking deeper questions based on reality & experience critical to reveal this.

@lulifera #csw65 #feministinternet

E.g. not taking gender disaggregated stats on access at surface level. Assumptions under the idea of "household" - disparity in distribution of resources within. Remote learning in Covid - what is the gendered reality of this? Who has access to tech at home? - @lulifera #CSW65

Our imagination of what the internet is, is captured by (global North) techno-capitalist values. We need ways to learn about tech that hacks the system, not reproduce it - @lulifera #CSW65 #feministinternet

Luchadoras have been researching online attacks against women - increasingly sophisticated & organised. Impt for us to know in building our response - @lulifera #CSW65

We have become conditioned to exist in a state of #surveillance --> a compounding of capitalism & technology (and I'd add, colonial) power - @marwaazelmat #CSW65 #feministinternet

Govts have also learnt how to organise to push back against our resistance. Creating a disciplining of our spaces - @marwaazelmat

(Yes! Online, offline, and also embodied?)

#csw65 #feministinternet

There is a serious under-resourcing of experimentation and exploration in feminist tech and feminist tech infrastructure - @marwaazelmat

#csw65 #feministinternet

Also seeing increased criminalisation of online activities that is fueled by mass surveillance. Including, in some countries, use of VPN - @marwaazelmat

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Comment from participant - The lack of control and management of online abuse by platform operators mean that it's really easy to be found online and targeted.

Do more! @Twitter @Facebook @youtube #CSW65 #feministinternet

Surveillance increasingly a condition for access (and also, mobility as we can see on Covid response) - @ealshafei

#csw65 #feministinternet

Quick adoption of new apps - e.g. TikTok and Clubhouse - despite huge privacy risks - @ealshafei

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Social media platform have a diff criteria for global North when responding to harassment & are shameless abt it. Language barriers - but do little to address it for more than a decade - @ealshafei

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Complicity from tech companies is a serious issue. Not acting on reports. Moderators bringing in their own biases into this area. And trolls and abusers knowing how to game the system - @ealshafei

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Inaction and slow action by platforms result in persistent and extended circulation of abusive content that continues the damage and violence faced by those being attacked - @ealshafei

#CSW65 #feministinternet

If tech companies and soc med had done their due diligence and engaged broader stakeholder, including feminist & HR activists, to get a sense of their impact - much of the violence and harm can be prevented - NE

#CSW65 #feministinternet

The tech value of "move fast and break things" cannot apply to the impact to human lives - NE

#CSW65 #feministinternet

@Facebook knew as far back as 2013 that their platform causes widespread devastation. Using fake feminism to "lean in" and mess w complex democracies e.g. in India in 2014 - NE

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Companies know they are unsafe, and doing it anyway. @Facebook afraid to moderate hateful content by Hindu right in 2014 because "can't protect safety of own staff." If you can't protect your own staff, what are you doing messing w democracy in these countries? - NE

#CSW65

Where is the international observation on the role of big tech companies being involved in democracies all over the world?

There is a genocide in process e.g. in Myanmar - what is the tech company's process & commitment in this moment? Still making money? - NE

#CSW65

We have been brought to the brink with crap patriarchal, capitalist tech. Feminist alternatives need to be funded w ambition, to allow us to see a path through this violence. - NE

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Loving the call for AMBITION in our action and imagination as feminists engaged in tech by NE

#CSW65 #feministinternet

All of us have to deal with the complicity of technology-enabled genocide happening all over the world. In Myanmar, in India - everywhere. Future generations are going to ask us - what were you doing when the largest global genocide fuelled by tech was happening? NE

#CSW65

Think about the billions it took to build Silicon Valley. Philanthropy need to stop thinking about funding women and feminist work in tech as dealing w the aftermath - but investing in the people who will lead ALL OF THE WORLD out of this current disintegration - NE

#CSW65

We need to resource feminist tech from a movement perspective. This means resourcing this across the ecosystem. Philanthropy needs to take risks and supporting work that don't fit into neat boxes. Intersectional funding! #NumunFund - @ealshafei #CSW65 #feministinternet

Feminist tech movements need to step up our leadership game. Forget about being polite. We don't need to be protected, but be part of the global decision making processes that often happen without us - @marwaazelmat #CSW65 #feministinternet

Me too @lulifera - reflecting a lot abt the conversation we had a couple of years back on what it takes to build alternative feminist infrastructure.

"Do we stop? Or do we mobilise? We need both. And also we need to build alternatives" - @lulifera

#CSW65 #feministinternet

We need multiple responses and transformation. Not jst on technology development, but judiciary, laws, policy, practice. We must insist on accountability and platform responsibility for the violence that happens on their space. - @lulifera

#CSW65 #feministinternet

Collective and community accountability for violence faced on the basis of gender and sexuality. We can all do something - @lulifera

#CSW65 #feministinternet

What everyone can do? One small thing leaving here:

Imagine - @lulifera
Participate and shape the body politic - @marwaazelmat
Create - @ealshafei
Dream ambitiously & demand everything - NE

Love the energy seeded here.

#CSW65 #feministinternet