FROM this week’s news ON: society generally, and broader issues [Note: Content Warning - may be links to distressing reports on this topic. Reader discretion is advised]

Note: CONTENT WARNING - some of this content is about upsetting, disturbing or triggering events & attitudes. Seek competent help - including professional - if you need it. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that linked articles may contains names and/or images of deceased people. READER CAUTION IS RECOMMENDED! For anyone distressed by anything in this post, or for any other reason considering seeking support, resources are available in Australia here, here, and here. In other nations, you will have to do an Internet search using terms such as “mental health support - <your nation>” (which, for instance, may lead to this, this, and this, in the USA, or this, this, and this, in France [biased towards English-language - my apologies]), or perhaps try https://www.befrienders.org/. 

Note: in my “from the news” posts, quotes are shown italicised and blue, my comments are in a different shade of blue, and “good” items are shown in green. I have loosely grouped the posts where such seemed reasonable, but that is subjective (i.e., my opinion - others are free to disagree), and challenging, as some posts belong in multiple “groups”.

Frrom this week’s news on society generally, and broader issues (note: I may continue to add links for a few days, possibly up to a week, after these are published):

• “Cultural evolution”    https://theaimn.com/cultural-evolution/   “Culture evolves, it changes over time, but that change can go forward or backward, no gains made can be considered permanent, we need to be constantly vigilant to ensure that the rights we have in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are not threatened. These include civil and political rights, the right to life, liberty, free speech and privacy. It also includes economic, social and cultural rights. In other words, to be who we are, to believe what we believe, to not be vilified for who we may be, but to not vilify those we disagree with. The rights and freedoms we have, need to be the rights and freedoms we accord to others.”   

• “The ABC’s Cranbrook school investigation shows why Australia needs to turn its back on single-sex cultures built on exclusion”   https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/commentisfree/2024/mar/05/the-abcs-cranbrook-investigation-shows-why-australia-needs-to-turn-its-back-on-single-sex-cultures-built-on-exclusion   

• “Your face for sale: anyone can legally gather and market your facial data without explicit consent”   https://theconversation.com/your-face-for-sale-anyone-can-legally-gather-and-market-your-facial-data-without-explicit-consent-224643   “The development of legal regulation for these uses is lagging. At what levels and in what ways should our facial information be protected?”   The article describes a situation that is truly disturbing, but also actions that are underway or could be taken   

• “Artificial intelligence and illusions of understanding in scientific research”   https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07146-0   “In general, they warn researchers against imbuing AI systems with ‘superhuman’ abilities. “There’s a risk that we forget that there are certain questions we just can’t answer about human beings using AI tools,” says Crockett.”   
  

• “Billionaires are building bunkers and buying islands. But are they prepping for the apocalypse – or pioneering a new feudalism?”   https://theconversation.com/billionaires-are-building-bunkers-and-buying-islands-but-are-they-prepping-for-the-apocalypse-or-pioneering-a-new-feudalism-223987   “Some have argued the tech industry has invented a new form of “technofeudalism” or “neofeudalism” that depends on “data colonization” and the corporate appropriation of personal data.   We agree, but also suggest what’s going on in Hawaii is actually aligned with traditional understandings of feudalism.”  
  

My links for activism post may aid any activism you may decide to do on any/all of these. If you do, don’t get too fixated on specific instances of problems - important though they may well be: take a moment to also consider the broader issues these incidents and groups of incidents may suggest/reveal.

 

Assumptions / basis 

In writing this, I have assumed / started from the following: 

• this blog states quite clearly that it is about political and human rights matters, including lived experience of problems, and thus I will assume readers are reasonable people who have noted the content warning in the post header;

Possible flaws 

Where I can, I will try to highlight possible flaws / issues you should consider:

• there may be flawed logical arguments in the above: to find out more about such flaws and thinking generally, I recommend Brendan  Myers’ free online course “Clear and Present Thinking”; 
  
• I could be wrong - so keep your thinking caps on, and make up your own minds for yourself.
  

 

If they are of any use of interest, the activism information links from my former news posts are available in this post. 

 

If you appreciated this post, please consider promoting it - there are some links below.

Remember: we need to be more human being rather than human doing, and all misgendering is an act of active transphobia/transmisia that puts trans+ lives at risk & accept that all insistence on the use of “trans” as a descriptor comes with commensurate use of “cis” as a descriptor to prevent “othering”.

Copyright © Kayleen White 2016-2024     NO AI   I do not consent to any machine learning aka Artificial Intelligence (AI), generative AI, large language model, machine learning, chatbot, or other automated analysis, generative process, or replication program to reproduce, mimic, remix, summarise, or otherwise  replicate any part of this post or other posts on this blog via any means. Typo’s may be inserrted deliberately to demonstrate this is not an AI product.     Otherwise, fair and reasonable use is accepted under Creative Commons 4.0 on an Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike basis   https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/