In more ambitious moments I wanted to put together a lil background /further readings list to accompany the event (also for myself to get through), but here are some off-the-cuff related links here to start:
We have an incredible speaker line-up, too!! Ft Kristen as moderator; feminist migration & public law expert @jcyliew.bsky.social; @jamesyap.bsky.social, counsel in Nevsun v Araya(!!); @jeff.doctor, never lacking for 🔥 takes, esp re Indigenous sovereignty; & Jason Toney @cjpme.org, already on it.
So glad sthg like this is finally happening, largely thx to @kristenthomasen.bsky.social. Been ~2.5 years now of layers of disheartenment & sustained moral injury (5 if count covid), and a public discussion focused specifically on Canadian complicity, from a tech /tech law angle, is long overdue.
Posting as much for the quote-tweets as original post & link:
What's been happening to trans people in the US has already been horrifying & beyond the pale—just in the last week, first saw Kansas, now this—and it keeps relentlessly escalating to and past historical-watershed levels. We are way past canaries, this IS the miners dying & tunnel collapsing on top.
Thank you @abeba.bsky.social @oddletters.bsky.social @carlbergstrom.com for this discussion & sharing those experiences!! This is my first year reviewing for FAccT, I'm an AC, have been part of adjacent conferences but never felt so out of sync w/ other reviewers? Saw examples of all these things!!
i’m tired of every paper (even critical ones) on societal impact of AI starting by both-siding the “benefits” and risks/harms of AI
in academia, i would like us to arrive at a collective reckoning that we don’t need to play both sides. it's totally legit to clearly state just the harms. period
don’t punish critical work for failing to solve the colossal clusterfuck the industry keeps throwing at us
critique is, in and of itself, service
3/
great if one can both point out the extent and breath of a given problem followed by actionable solutions. but if a paper only focuses on making a specific problem space visible, legible and understandable but does not propose solutions, it is not a failure
2/
hot take: AI/ML, AI ethics/safety conferences (eg, FAccT) should develop and implement mechanisms that let authors flag industry-critical work to avoid review by industry-affiliated reviewers
as the facct rebuttal period is in session, let me repeat what i've always said: critique is service! identifying & mapping the problem space is in & of itself a legitimate scientific contribution. we can’t proceed to “solve” a problem if we don't have a clear & comprehensive understanding of it
1/
Mind cleanser:
Glad it's not just me!! I'm sure you saw the ad posters all alongside the station walls too. "The future is _____" with a different buzzword each time. The absolute worst ones iirc were "robomaxxing" and "innovation-pilled" 😭🫠☠️☠️☠️ (so sorry to anyone who read this; will add a mind cleanser below)
Interested in Anthropic v DOD? Important thread below from expert on military use of AI 👇👇👇
Posting as much for the quote-tweets as original post & link:
What's been happening to trans people in the US has already been horrifying & beyond the pale—just in the last week, first saw Kansas, now this—and it keeps relentlessly escalating to and past historical-watershed levels. We are way past canaries, this IS the miners dying & tunnel collapsing on top.
I am Canadian and still feel that I should have gotten an apology for having to learn about Ben Mulroney :p (This is, incidentally, also what I think but to an even greater extent about Evan Solomon)
And were told to embrace Necropolitics and eugenics as the norm in the opening onslaught of the pandemic.
When I talk about the intersectionality of modern fascism and its accelerationist adjacent beliefs,this is exactly what I am talking about
The infrastructure of mass murder was built around us
The healthiest way to deal with it is probably not to indulge the innocence but to say "you absolutely knew this was who they were, you just didn't want to think about it". Anything else feels like gaslighting.
This excellent and, when it dropped, particularly well-timed thread on thinking through the meaning and role of the imperial boomerang today is also relevant context for the panel discussion:
Some relevant readings that are not directly focused on Canada or a Canadian connection, but provide important background context and knowledge, especially for anyone working or speaking/writing on "tech/AI and human rights":
Article by @rachelgilmore.bsky.social (which Toronto Star ripped off and tried to pass off as their own original reporting w/o any hint whatsoever): "A list of Canadian companies profiting off of ICE and Trump's violent mass deportation regime" rachelgilmore.substack.com/p/a-list-of-...
