Final Paper Summary- Caleigh Avramis

Racial injustices can occur through various communication technologies. This is known as techno-racism, which occurs in a plethora of digital coding platforms. Racist language has played a role in this and has been implemented into programming systems. Master-Slave command (Programming) is known to be a form of techno-racism. It is program that allows for specific entities to have control over other entities. This essentially maintains systems of superiority complexes and power dynamics. Many people in the Black community have understandably found this to be insensitive, demeaning, and inappropriate due to its correlation with slavery 400 years ago. Racial inequality can also be found through image processing in coding systems. Facial recognition systems have exhibited forms of racial bias and exclusionary practices in their machine learning algorithms.

This digital divide also exists in the world of cyberbullying. In a study conducted by Professor Brendesha M. Tynes, most young minorities have reported to experienced a form of cyberbullying and racial discrimination online. This was taken in the forms of racist images, language, and comments. In the study, it was concluded that almost half of these individuals experienced cyberbullying through social media networks. While other experienced racial discrimination through text messages or online chats.

In order to prevent this from occurring in the future, tech companies need to take more accountability for the racial inequalities in their technologies. This begins with having computers need to become more accessible for students and employees. The lack of technology provided for minority communities, makes it more difficult for their skills to advance in communication technologies. Secondly, coding programs need more Black engineers in their workforce. There not only needs to be more representation of Black workers in predominantly, white male institutions. There needs to be more workers to educate these software programmers on creating coding systems that cater to Black individuals. This will work towards reducing the amount of facial misidentification for Black internet users.

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