Taking sides

Let’s close out August with a couple of things that have been in the news lately.

First, WaPo did a story on the data science company Palantir a week ago, focusing on employee unrest over the use of their technology to help ICE target immigrants (documented or otherwise) in its raids. Coming a week after the big Business Roundtable declaration that shareholder value shouldn’t be the only corporate consideration, the Palantir story might have blown just the whiff of proletarian cordite at C-suites around the world.

Although I don’t know that technocrats earning six figures plus equity and yoga classes exactly qualify as proles, it’s still gotta be unsettling. They don’t want their tech to be used for violating human rights. Imagine.

Well, the subject of Palantir cropped up on the Grace Hopper Celebration Facebook group; the company was a gold sponsor at this year’s conference, and some women were not happy about it. Many thousands of the 25,000 attendees either are immigrants or they come from immigrant backgrounds. The notion of AnitaB.org (which holds the women-in-computing conference) taking money from a company that profits hugely from ICE contracts did not sit well.

I posted a link to the WaPo story and commented that if technocrats shrug off as above their pay grade the fact that their products and services are being used to the detriment of the planet and its inhabitants, they’re part of the problem. I refrained from mentioning the developers of Zyklon B, but that’s my go-to example of not caring about how your cool invention is going to be used.

Well, late Wednesday, AnitaB.org announced it’s kicked Palantir out and returning their sponsorship fee ($30K in 2018; probably $40K this year). It’s a principled stand, and bravo to them.

(Yes, there are plenty of other tech companies with ICE, CBP, DHS and other government contracts—Microsoft, Google, SFDC… Palantir is particularly egregious and you gotta start someplace.)

The other thing in the news is the old union anthem, “Which Side Are You On?” It features in Amy McGrath’s latest campaign video in her run against #MoscowMitch McConnell in Kentucky.

He’s a peach, #MoscowMitch is. The instant I get a paycheck again, I’m donating to McGrath. The necrotic turtle has to go.

So here’s Natalie Merchant singing it. Crank up the volume and open your windows. We can change things for the better.