Digital Democracy
Press Release
Delhi for Farmers Condemns Twitter for Suspending the DFF Twitter Handle
26 May 2021
While twitterati was concerned about the possible ban of Twitter in India, Twitter was busy suspending an account created less than 24 hours ago. Delhi for farmers is a solidarity of Trade Unions, human rights activists, women’s movements and other concerned citizens who support the farmer’s movement. As the farmer’s movement completes six months of sit-in, DFF created a twitter handle to talk about the problems faced by farmers. A press release and a couple of retweets later, we find the account suspended in less than 24 hours.
This anti-democratic move of Twitter speaks volumes of their policy to cater to governments and suppress democratic voices. Dear Twitter, speaking in support of farmers is not cautionary activity that needs to be shut down. Nor is speaking up against capitalism or corporatization of the economy. Suspending an account will not stop the observation of Black Day by thousands of supporters. We will find other platforms.
The suspension of the account will definitely question the loyalty of Twitter. It will force people to question your intention and motivation. We will be forced to ask if the giving of millions of dollars as aid to a right wing, proto-fascist group was a mere accident. We will question your claim to be a platform for democratic voices. We do hope you understand the responsibility of running a social media platform. Social media is supposed to be an alternative to government media. Over the years we have not seen the suspension of any accounts that spread social polarization or stalking women. Even accounts that sold women were not suspended for criminal content!!
We reiterate, the suspension of an account in solidarity with a democratic movement is misusage of power and anti-democratic. As a platform that is meant to support the voices of the marginalizes, please get your priorities right. Revoke the suspension of @DFF_RFL immediately. You owe an apology to the solidarity movement.
Poonam Kaushik (9811136242)
Mayukh Biswas ( 98744 09081)
Coordinators, Delhi for farmers
AICCTU, AIDSO, AIDWA, AIDYO, AIFTU (New), AILU, AIMSS, AISA, AITUC, AIUTUC, ANHAD, BSCEM, Collective, CITU, CSW, CTF, DASTAK, DSF, DSMM, DSU, DTF, DYFI, ICTU, IFTU, IFTU (Sarwahara), IMK, IMS, JFME,Jan Natya Manch, JNUSU, Khet Mazdoor Union, KYS, LPF, MEC, MEK, NFIW, Nishant Natya Manch, NTUI, SEWA, PDSU, Pinjra Tod, PMSF, Pragatisheel MS, Purogami MS, PACHHAAS Revolutionary Culture Forum,RYA,Swaraj Abhiyan, Saheli, SFI, TUCC, TUCI, UTUC
'Manipulated Media' Controversy: Government Vs Twitter https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/india-news-manipulated-media-controversy-government-vs-twitter/383352 this is the not the first time a post by a BJP leader or celebrity supporter has come under a cloud. This has also reopened the global debate over “fake posts” and free speech, with the right-wing often accusing social media platforms of being leaning towards the left and liberal. https://www.opindia.com/2020/12/us-elections-facebook-twitter-interfere-indian-elections-why-2024-left-wing-bias/ With Twitter admitting that it has a left-bias, it becomes evident that what they did, and got away with, during the US elections was only a blue-print of the times to come.
https://www.opindia.com/2021/05/twitter-civilisational-war-narendra-modi-global-left-woke/ Though Tharoor had some early troubles, Twitter remained a nice playground for liberals until after the ‘other side’ started using it really effectively. This shift didn’t take too much time actually. By 2011, along with Anna Hazare DP sporting youngsters, Twitter was densely inhabited by the ‘Hindutva types’ too.
The platform democratized the narrative. People who had no chance of getting an article published in a mainstream media outlet earlier could now get a distribution platform that was fast matching the reach of the mainstream media. Not just reach, even impact. It broke all barriers that existed in the mainstream media publishing – of language (primarily of style), of access (you didn’t need to know an editor or hire a PR agency to get an audience), and most importantly, of ideology (you didn’t need to toe the same old liberal line to get published). n August 2012, the then Government of India blocked a bunch of Twitter handles – many were ‘Hindutva types’ among those blocked – it remains one of the earliest attempts to censor Twitter by the government. The UPA government simply bypassed Twitter and asked the ISPs (Internet Service Providers) to block access to those Twitter accounts. It created a massive furor, but it also had tacit support from some quarters of liberals.
three-part series on the 'Fourth Industrial Revolution', the World Economic Forum's 'Great Reset' plan (being pushed aggressively under cover of the Covid crisis) and their influence on Indian policy.
When the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’ Comes Knocking
Why is the Indian government promoting job-destroying ‘smart’ automation when the country is reeling from the worst unemployment crisis in recent history?
https://www.newsclick.in/when-fourth-industrial-revolution-comes-knocking
The Great Reset: Davos Playbook for Post-COVID World
For decades, the World Economic Forum has been trying to influence global policy in favour of the world’s financial super-elite. Thanks to the global crisis unleashed by the pandemic and lockdowns, it may finally have found a way to do it.
https://www.newsclick.in/the-great-reset-davos-playbook-post-COVID-world
Farm Laws, Atmanirbhar Bharat, and the ‘Great India Reset’
The Modi government and India’s business elite are keen to embrace the World Economic Forum’s ambitious plans to shape the post-COVID world. However, the farmers’ protests may enforce a pause.
https://www.newsclick.in/farm-laws-atmanirbhar-bharat-great-indian-reset
Algorithmic Sovereignty is a collective place of documentation gathering research, developments, events and projects related to the topic.
Participants of the project are actively looking for solutions to the problem of powerful hidden algorithms which incorporate invisible logic, though their results are manifest
https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PLcPNMDfEz2hInGx5lj77-4uCu0BqfgfSY&v=BhfFbFKn2tA
Prof. Itty Abraham, National University of Singapore on Friday, changed the title to Technology and the Political: Confrontation and Recognition. He put Rohingya study in the STS (science Technology and Society Frame toward the end of his lecture.. see https://youtube.com/embed/YhTy_vjeB6U?start=2394&end=2877
Main points in ppt:
Broad Technopolitical Vectors
-Older STS traditions: technology as a condition of modernity leading to dystopia, but also as liberator (household technologies, vaccines..
From Politics to Technology – Inserting political values into the technological system
From Technology to Politics – ie manipulation of politics using technology or the absence of it.. Inserting the technological into the political field.
Opening up the Political Field..
Going beyond political binaries – reinforcing inequalities v/s offering new tools for taking back control
Toward a Global STS : technosciences emergent from the informal sectors of gloabal cities like kuala Lumpur, Mumbai, Nairobi, Mexico city...
The other byte that may interest us were in response to questions by Sujatha Raman on radical democracy and Anushree Gupta in the Webinar.. he explained his suggestion was a Global STS saying that STS has mainly been seen as an anti-western stream, a post colonial science and that he would like to posit Global STS as an attempt to expand STS boundaries to include other locations of discourse. He gives the example of Informal Mumbai, where waste is a resource in the people, machine, environment spectrum, or situations where existing life is precarious and therefore risk analysis of technological intervention is marginalised.. or what he calls “contact zones” between heterogenous people, ideas, technologies, are the starting point of discourse.. https://youtube.com/embed/YhTy_vjeB6U?start=5113&end=5529
At KICS we have been talking about this in different ways.. but perhaps someone would like to lead a discussion in one of our “third-Saturday-sharings” ie STS on TSS?
The bulk of the lecture spoke about how the Rohingya Diaspora/Refugess have use the Spectacle Football , Rohingya TV as well as use Block Chain technology for refugee ID purposes. The close association of social media platforms (Facebook, Twitter) with the so-called “Arab Spring” popular movements has reinforced our collective understanding of new media technologies as a great political disruptor. Under some circumstances, digital media can become a force multiplier for an unarmed public against a repressive state. Such a politics of confrontation should be seen as a tactical use of technology, facing certain inherent limits. Political technologies can be strategic as well, however, going far beyond the direct encounter of a movement and state to threaten state legitimacy, as this case study will discuss. My examination of a KL-based Rohingya diaspora group explores the long-term strategic implications of what I call the politics of recognition through discussion of two techno-political moments – the group’s negotiations with the Unicode Consortium to make the Rohingya script visible on electronic screens and efforts to use blockchain to create a transnational refugee database.
Do we have Right to Know about about things that going to run our lives ?
Google fired staff scientist Margaret Mitchell after she questioned an order not to publish a study saying AI that mimics language could hurt marginalized populations. Officially, her violations "included the exfiltration of confidential business-sensitive documents and private data of other employees".
In December, AI ethics researcher Timnit Gebru was fired for exposing bias in facial analysis systems.
the company was starting to censor papers critical of its products. https://www.gadgetsnow.com/tech-news/google-fires-second-ai-ethics-leader-as-dispute-over-research-diversity-grows/articleshow/81121707.cms
In India recently we have stopped "publicly funded" academic institutions from holding zoom webinars with foreigners without MEA permission, which means every college, university, school, laboratory which has received any kind of grant, loan from Government..