Could we make tech's harms and remedies more visible?
by Katie Singer
Technological developments have given our food extended shelf life, washed our clothes, sped transportation and communications, cleared diseases and infections. Computers can predict weather, collect and analyze data about pollution, identify forest fires when they are small--and much more. We know these stories well--while technology's unintended consequences remain invisible.
In the early 1970s, manufacturers transformed Santa Clara County, California, from a place for fruit orchards to Silicon Valley. They named the rooms for sterilizing computer chips "clean". The unsuspecting public did not know those factories' toxic impacts on ecosystems or workers' health--until they got sick from their drinking water and noticed a startling rise in miscarriages and babies born with birth defects.
Unless the public knows how the Internet, solar PVs, industrial wind systems, electric vehicles and batteries degrade ecosystems and public health, it likely won't pressure manufacturers to develop healthier practices for manufacturing, operating and discarding our tools; and manufacturers will likely be unmotivated to change.
Could we make questioning the technologies that surround us... common?
In Voices of a People's History of the United States in the 21st Century, the just-released update to Howard Zinn's A People's History, editors Anthony Arnove and Haley Pessin present writing about social movements including Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, indigenous struggles, immigrant rights, the environmental movement, disability justice and frontline pandemic workers.
Neither book challenges technology's ecological or social harms.
Could we make reporting on our technosphere's harms... common?
Telecom corporations now aim to end wired phone service in California. Without landlines, emergency calls can occur only by mobile service--which can fail without electric power (an increasingly common emergency).
Without landlines, only mobile phones and voice-over-Internet protocols (VOIP) are available. Alas, mobile devices, Wi-Fi routers and cellular antennas emit electromagnetic radiation (EMR). EMR and screen-time exposure have been linked to addiction, anxiety, attention deficit disorder, autism, cancer, dementia, depression, vision problems and much more. In-utero exposure to a cell phone's radiofrequencies increases children's risk of behavioral problems by the time they reach school-age by 85%. Besides withdrawing from society, what can protective parents do? (Limiting social media use to 30 minutes/day reduced college students' loneliness and depression.)
Could we make remedy for techno-harms... common?
Artificial intelligence takes away jobs, traditional know-how and the eye-to-eye or voice-to-voice contact that creates our social fabric. Recently, after trying to pay a bill online, I admitted that I need to learn to relate with robots without harming myself.
Surveillance capitalism abounds. "Smart" utility meters track what appliances and devices you use and when you use them; utilities sell this data to marketers. Newer cars track where you work, shop, socialize. French police may now access suspects' location through suspects' devices.
All electronics--including mobile phones, cell towers, smart utility meters, solar PV systems, electric vehicles--pose fire hazards. With 5G (fifth generation of mobile access networks), cell sites' fire hazards and EMR emissions get much closer to our homes.
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