Phase 2, Post 6: Chancey Fleet & Max Evans
Chancey's phrase, "dark patterns in accessibility," I believe refers to a sighted approach to problem solving of a situation involving visually impaired. She made an example of the AT&T store, where she would not ask somebody at the store how to use these tools because they wouldn't know how to. She also brings up ghostwriting in terms of coding, which is code that is written supposedly to help the visually impaired community but is not tested on the visually impaired community. I believe that with no knowledge of a problem, you cannot find a solution, and this is the problem with accessibility tools.
Max's phrase, "cede authority to the algorithm," I believe refers to the avoidance approach most companies take when it comes to identities. These companies act as though they are not blame, that these decisions are made by an external program, and therefore, that blame is shifted to the decision making algorithm. However, I believe this is a weak excuse and that is not approaching or attacking the problem in the proper way, especially since the algorithm is a direct reflection of a company's values and beliefs as they are choosing the parameters. Max also brought up the gender checkbox in so many applications. The checkboxes are usually man or woman, and do not wish to identify. This is incredibly reductionist as being outside of the binary is not shameful and it does not mean that person doesn't wish to identify -- these people do have identities, it is just not included in a limited selection. Also, to include a only third checkbox as other or do not wish to identify and have the other two be male or female, man or woman, is still binary. Other genders should not be an afterthought. I am a cisgender heterosexual male, I grew up in a diverse community and have now moved to a diverse community, so this form of discrimination is not something I was fully in tune with. I was aware of it, but I didn't fully understand it, and I can't fully understand how incredible the level of discrimination is against this community, with such things as the census not being considerate of genders outside of the binary.
Max's phrase, "cede authority to the algorithm," I believe refers to the avoidance approach most companies take when it comes to identities. These companies act as though they are not blame, that these decisions are made by an external program, and therefore, that blame is shifted to the decision making algorithm. However, I believe this is a weak excuse and that is not approaching or attacking the problem in the proper way, especially since the algorithm is a direct reflection of a company's values and beliefs as they are choosing the parameters. Max also brought up the gender checkbox in so many applications. The checkboxes are usually man or woman, and do not wish to identify. This is incredibly reductionist as being outside of the binary is not shameful and it does not mean that person doesn't wish to identify -- these people do have identities, it is just not included in a limited selection. Also, to include a only third checkbox as other or do not wish to identify and have the other two be male or female, man or woman, is still binary. Other genders should not be an afterthought. I am a cisgender heterosexual male, I grew up in a diverse community and have now moved to a diverse community, so this form of discrimination is not something I was fully in tune with. I was aware of it, but I didn't fully understand it, and I can't fully understand how incredible the level of discrimination is against this community, with such things as the census not being considerate of genders outside of the binary.
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