Ask HN: What tools/apps/etc. are out there in support of antiracism?

31 points by beermann 5 years ago | 5 comments

This has been touched on in the last few days:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23394972: Ask HN: How can a programmer help with current events? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23388597: Ask HN: Technologies to help prevent abuse of power?

I am re-asking because there isn't a lot of information. I'm aware of the ACLU's Mobile Justice app (https://www.aclu.org/issues/criminal-law-reform/reforming-police/aclu-apps-record-police-conduct). What else is out there?

I'm specifically interested in whether or not tools exist to help hold police accountable. I'm interested in developing something similar to the Mobile Justice app. Similar to the idea of sousveillance, I think there is an opportunity to catalog instances of injustice in order to hold individuals accountable. I am imagining an app that has a real-time, location-aware feed of media references to such instances to corroborate and publicize, potentially supported by facial recognition of offenders to gather evidence of repeat abuse.

twright 5 years ago |

> I think there is an opportunity to catalog instances of injustice in order to hold individuals accountable

Maybe. But after enough years of catching police on camera strangling and killing black people it has quickly become clear that accountability is not the issue. It's that the system in which they operate (brought to you by your tax dollars) protects officers who abuse their power to a superlative degree. Don't forget the police unions are there if the officer is fired, furthermore, they can just start up at the police force in the next town over if it really comes to that (which it _rarely_ has).

I feel like HN has a hard time groking this but there is no app to fix institutional racism and inequality. The tools for this are called law and community organization. Just today, protests and organizing across the country have elevated the charges against the officer who murdered George Floyd as well as his three accomplices. Can you pitch an app or tech tool that can do that?

Only with community organization and changing the law can you create a new reality where people are held accountable. Voting is a good place to start. I'm not saying technology can't help, but it is not the pure means to the end.

beermann 5 years ago | |

Well said. But I could also argue that, were it not for a video of George Floyd being killed, we would not be seeing the community organization we are today. I won't disagree that the community organization is what is driving change though.

DataDaoDe 5 years ago |

> I'm specifically interested in whether or not tools exist to help hold police accountable.

I'm interested in this too. And haven't been able to find much of anything.

> I am imagining an app that has a real-time, location-aware feed of media references to such instances to corroborate and publicize, potentially supported by facial recognition of offenders to gather evidence of repeat abuse.

I think the implementation and specific measures need careful consideration. Remember justice according to Rawls is a form of fairness among all members in society. What about the injustice going on that the police are tasked with stopping on a daily basis and their respective part in ensuring a just society? What about injustices against the police themselves? If we ignore such data points and issues, society will develop a false impression and injustice will supplant the justice we are striving for. IMHO any social justice software should be "context aware" in as broad a sense as possible (history of officers actions - good, bad, everything in between) and probably a history of the "offenders/recorders" public actions (again good, bad, everything in between) as well as specific encounters. Of course, this brings problems such as rights of privacy, among others.

A software which only captures specific encounters, and only makes them public when they are negative is something that on the whole might not be a net benefit for society. I'm unsure and I think it needs some consideration at the least.

beermann 5 years ago | |

Thanks for the thoughtful response. I have discussed the fact that there are repeat offenders on both sides. Nobody has the right to incite mob violence, for example. That could be captured by the same application.

I'm still early in my thinking around this, but welcome the discussion. From my early research and discussions, there is a solution that is needed, but there is a lot of definition that has to happen around what exactly that is in order to take into account issues like the ones you describe.

splintercell 5 years ago |

The thing about racism is that it is used to infer information about individuals.

Cops in America use race as a proxy. They are far less likely do something to an old grandma because they know she doesn't represent the same threat as a young male in his 20s.

There are two approaches to deal with it, but only one is highlighted:

- Either make them not use race for any information

- Or help them identify the problematic individuals better

The first approach is what is actively being pursued by most people today, but it hardly solves the problem and it's fighting a rising tide. The more cops are weirded out by judging a black kid out of fear of racism, the more panicky they would feel while dealing with him because they'd be waiting for other pieces of information. For instance, Philando Castile was immediately shot when the cop discovered that he was armed. In a different world, he would have tried to analyse whether this man with his partner and kid in the car was scared of getting arrested or not.

By running a major antiracism campaign cops are now left to use any piece of information other than race to determine the threat level, and this turns out to badly because their internal compass of threat assessment is distorted.

For the second approach, pro-racial training can be made regarding threat assessments. Better databases can be built regarding information on individuals (obviously a problem for most people, but this is a great way to deal with this issue). China style facial recognition technology and going full on surveillance state can clearly help with this issue. In other words either do Israel style profiling or do China style surveillance, but both these things will have major resistance from Americans (but surprisingly arming cops with military weapons is ok).