In 2015 the Guardian published a story about the Confederate flags ignorantly flying in Brazil.
Many American slaveholders moved there after losing their Civil War in 1865 because… it was still legal to own slaves and land was being appropriated and granted to white settlers
Most were lured by newspaper ads placed in the wake of the war by the government of Brazil’s then emperor, Dom Pedro II, promising land grants to those who would help colonise the South American country’s vast and little-explored interior.
Brazil used the harsh “pro-life” system of slavery that turned black women into birthing machines, rather than extend life by providing humane work conditions. The brutality of white power economics meant life was extremely short and brutal for non-whites.
They worked on average from 6am to 10pm, almost without rest, and aged very quickly. At 35, they already had white hair and no teeth.
That’s why you see such huge volumes of slavery transit (nearly 40%) directed into Brazil.
Source: SlaveVoyages.org. David Eltis and David Richardson, Atlas of the Transatlantic Slave Trade (New Haven, 2010), reproduced with the permission of Yale University Press.
American slaveholders directly contributed to perpetuating these slavery practices in Brazil after losing their war at home, ensuring it would be the last country in the world to abolish officially May 13, 1888.
A BBC documentary in 2012 called this “an inconvenient history”, where historians and anthropologists explain how Confederate flags are just a tiny part of how modern Brazil isn’t addressing its slavery past:
COVID-19 contact tracing has rolled out to all Android/iOS devices this week. In other words, big tech just dropped a change to your OS without any real notice/consent.
On iOS go to Settings -> Health -> COVID-19 Exposure Logging (screenshots at the end).
On Android go to Settings and you will find a Google option:
Under Google settings, you now can select COVID-19:
There you will find that Google needs both Bluetooth and location tracking to be enabled, although they claim while location data needs to be collected, it also won’t be collected:
Confused? You should be. Bluetooth is a terrible protocol for tracing contact as it just reads everyone’s MAC addresses. It’s being used because other options are not as easy to violate for a clumsy contact tracing agenda.
There are two problems in Bluetooth, both related to privacy:
Before Bluetooth version 4.2 the MAC addresses were static, which was a major privacy issue (and exploited by law enforcement using widely systems like Bluetooth Travel Time Origin and Destination (BlueTOAD), as I’ve spoken about publicly many times). After Bluetooth version 4.2 the devices started to use rolling MAC addresses for privacy protection. Google and Apple have designed their system to overcome this privacy benefit, by issuing everyone a set of tokens that can be mapped back to the device.
Aside from the privacy of its identity getting in the way, Bluetooth also doesn’t record distance accurately. Strength of signal isn’t a reliable measure, given all kinds of interference variables. Thus Apple and Google have included location to overcome this secondary privacy benefit, by using location data to record proximity of Bluetooth signals.
It appears incredibly disingenuous for the companies to claim their framework was designed with privacy preservation in mind when it was designed to bypass some fundamental privacy protections.
Also while technology companies may lay claim that location data never will be shared, the entire point of their system is to inform some unnamed/unknown officials of spread of infections by… location.
What about who you would expect, such as qualified scientists, using the data? Apparently Apple and Google say they will not serve community members who are in the best position to make use of pandemic data.
If you’re a virologist or epidemiologist arguing that you need data to fight the spread of infection inside your country, you’re out of luck. Apple and Google have said no.
That’s what I call clumsy.
Finally, in terms of general trust, adoption of this system needs to be really high to be effective. Some estimates are at least 70% of people (not just phone owners) have to be in the contact tracing system to make it worthwhile.
And yet they pushed a significant update to the OS without any local notice/consent (just blog posts like this one), as if the U2 crash didn’t teach them a thing.
The music suddenly appeared on 500 million iTunes accounts. Shortly after came the backlash and, with it, a story of what may have been the most expensive gaffe in Apple’s history — upwards of $100 million…
This is the sort of top-down centralized approach with no real discussion of social contract that probably makes 90% want to throw their phone in the toilet. I’m also reminded of the science lessons from free trees in Detroit.
Detroiters were refusing city-sponsored “free trees.” A researcher found out the problem: She was the first person to ask them if they wanted them.
Ironically, America is so far behind on COVID-19 science and engineering, it’s rolling out mobile phone software just as Singapore (a global leader during this pandemic response) has abandoned the same.
Singapore’s Bluetooth-based contact tracing app TraceTogether was the first of its kind, intended to log potential exposure events without violating the privacy of participants. As with all of the efforts of this nature, voluntary adoption by the public was key to success. TraceTogether struggled in this area due in no small part to technical issues that hampered the usability of phones. The government has gone back to the drawing board and come up with a new answer: a contact tracing wearable that remains offline as it logs close contacts, only making that data available when a medical professional makes a coronavirus diagnosis and requests access to the device.
The wearable does leverage Bluetooth, to be fair, but it’s a whole different model with dedicated hardware for medical professionals to access.
It didn’t have to be this way. Engineers at the largest tech firms in the world, paid the highest salaries in the world, could have started at the point Singapore has just now reached — a personal/decentralized system that works directly with medical professionals only.
Instead Apple and Google have built a thing nobody should want: a forced update in their OS to serve mostly an Apple and Google agenda that has apparently little or no accountability to them when it’s misused or even abused. Compare and contrast these two stories, for example:
Or consider that, while Apple and Google insist they aren’t writing the apps that will use their “framework”, early studies already indicate a lot of room for abuse:
…50 apps available in the Google Play Store that have been developed specifically for COVID-19…researchers classified nearly half as informational tools, roughly a third as tracking tools, 10% as assessment tools and 8% as scientific research apps…
Amazon basically operates like the mob by seeking markets where regulation or justice is too weak to stop it from taking payments for unethical business practices.
It allegedly will muscle into markets as an engine of exploitation, which measures margin in the amount of harms it can get away with. Some say this is “natural” in the sense that it fits a pattern of American history:
Inequality in America was not born of the market’s invisible hand. It was not some unavoidable destiny. It was created by the hands and sustained effort of people who engineered benefits for themselves, to the detriment of everyone else.
Thus it somewhat predictably has been accused of building “successful growth” on fake and unsafe services and products that damage or kill, with no accountability to itself for the widespread harms carried by others.
Moreover, such ill-gotten profits seem intentional as they are concentrated into the hands of one man who spends a very small percentage on attempts to fix harms. Just a few examples:
“Amazon’s Enforcement Failures Leave Open a Back Door to Banned Goods… Sold and Shipped by Amazon Itself“
“Amazon gives extremists and neo-Nazis banned from other platforms unprecedented access to a mainstream audience — and even promotes [dangerous and violent hate].”
“Amazon’s gigantic, decentralized, next-day delivery network brought chaos, exploitation, and danger to communities across America.”
“While the scale and severity may vary, a single theme often unites each newsworthy incident: An unsecured Amazon…”
“Amazon executive Joy Covey was killed [while riding her bike by a] van delivering Amazon packages….”
Here’s a deeper look into one case (pun not intended) that has been going on for a while now, where we can see flagrant violation of health for profits.
Consumer Reports in 2020 has called out Amazon’s “Starkey” brand water bottled in Idaho because it violates safe standards that limit contaminants in water.
The bottled water, sold in most Whole Foods stores and on Amazon.com, was the only brand of the 45 tested by Consumer Reports scientists between February and May of this year that exceeded 3 parts per billion (ppb)…. Last year, CR tests found Starkey Spring Water exceeded the federal level…
Amazon was the ONLY brand of 45 tested to fail the arsenic test. Many had untraceable amounts, which is great when you look at how dangerous arsenic is to human health. Arsenic means “disaster for almost every part of the human body”
Note that the report points out it also failed last year.
FDA told Whole Foods that tests had found levels as high as 12 ppb, which resulted in recalls of the water in 2016 and 2017… legal to sell in a bottle across the U.S., but it would be illegal if it came out of the tap…
Recalled in 2016 and 2017, failed tests in 2019 and 2020. Why is this water, which would be illegal to sell if it came from a tap, still being bottled and sold by Amazon?
Amazon explains on their Starkey information site in 2020 that trying to make this water safer would impact Amazon profits, so they’re not doing it.
Arsenic levels above 5 ppb and up to 10 ppb are present… it does contain low levels of arsenic. The standard balances the current understanding of arsenic’s possible health effects against the costs of removing arsenic from drinking water.
Possible health effects “balanced” is how they refer to not making their water safe for consumption.
Possible health effects?
Let it sink in how incredibly vague and misleading Amazon is being on a scientific topic of arsenic in order to say they won’t protect consumers from known harms. They should not be allowed to just casually blow off the harms as “possible health effects”.
Again, Amazon is the only brand of 45 to fail this test. Other brands have untraceable amounts. Nearly 50 competing brands are able to “balance” the correct way by investing in controls for their products to be safe. Why doesn’t Amazon?
Starkey clearly states in their safety report they have decided not to invest in removing arsenic to safe levels, because they believe they can get away with it.
Amazon also clearly promotes this unsafe product with “bottled in Idaho” as if that’s a helpful reference, yet does not include anywhere Idaho Department of Environmental Quality water contamination warnings:
Arsenic is a problem in some parts of Idaho.
“Some parts” is a reference to the area of Idaho (southwestern corner) where Starkey water is sourced.
Map of Idaho arsenic detected in water. Scientists put anything above green (0-5 ug/l) as unsafe. Red is the most dangerous level.
In fact, that red area that shows up on the Idaho contaminant map stands out as being worst levels in the entire US.
US map of arsenic concentrations reveals Idaho as one of the most contaminated.
In summary, Amazon is selling water from the most arsenic contaminated region of the US, putting it into harmful single-use plastic bottles, and continues to sell it despite years of public safety test failures.
When I visited Lyft HQ when it first opened, they had a large mural timeline of their origin story that went something like this:
In 2006 Logan Green went to Zimbabwe and observed a system of crowd-sourced carpool networks. He came back to America and made a copy he called Zimride (Zimbabwe Ride).
I’ll never forget being in the office (for meetings) and having staff relate this mural story to me, because they said their founder vacationed in Africa after college and marveled at the “safety” of private drivers; white parents having a method of ride-sharing their kids to school (called the “lift system” in South Africa).
The Lyft staff didn’t say the exact word apartheid, of course, because they were blandly relating Rhodesian transportation history as if it were like any other system. It was based on white families driving their children to elitist schools, but that’s not how they framed it.
Anyway this Lyft story telling of their “safe” transport system origins from Africa raised alarms for me, given context of Zimbabwean history.
I also noticed the company seems to tell a very different story to the press, claiming their founder was just an admirer of taxis.
Zimride, in fact, is not a derivation of Zimmer’s name but a riff on Zimbabwe, where Green, now CEO, had observed the local propensity for ridesharing in minivan taxis.
This press brief makes no sense at all when you think about it even a little.
First, Lyft never attempted to work with taxis in America. From the start the company was billed as a whole alternative to taxis systems, so why would they say they liked African taxis?
More to the point who comes back from a vacation to an African country with the idea for a wealthy white person alternative to taxis in America? Does that really sound like observing Zimbabwean minivan taxis?
This kind of narrative disconnect between internal and external statements was highlighted in 2017 when Lyft eventually came around to launching a private “bus” service. I mean why didn’t they start with minivan taxis if that’s what they observed?
The Lyft Shuttle is pretty much a glorified city bus — with fewer poor people. The ride-sharing company’s much-hyped shuttle service seems designed to segregate transit customers by class.
A privilege bus.
Second, ride-sharing in minivan taxis (even pickups beds) has been a global phenomenon of efficient transport, not a concept unique to Zimbabwean culture. There must have been something unique to Zimbabwe being the origin story, aside from minivan taxis.
I’ve traveled all over the world in the minivan/microbus/kombi taxi and similar. From Poland to Indonesia, Zimbabwe to Philippines … you can find vehicles carrying 8-12 people running regular routes. When I was at EMC in 2012 I even worked with security systems to help make Pakistan’s “pink bus” safer (women only, with women guards riding and cameras) .
This is because a modern private micro bus naturally evolved by community-led transit planners to be an optimal solution on a development path towards achieving higher-volume buses or trains (a step on the way moving people further away from cars).
Lyft doesn’t fit that model, not at all. They started with cars where drivers were “safe” as if your friend or on your “side”, pandering openly to wealthy young white professionals and kids in school. That’s the apartheid white parents car-sharing story.
Due to congestion Zimbabwe in 2020 banned the private commuter omnibuses (kombis) that Lyft originally claimed to have been based upon. The gov only allows them to operate under a regulated national United Passenger Company (Zupco) franchise.
Again, a micro bus taxi service is not even close to what Lyft initially was planning, so the more likley Zimbabwean root is the Rhodesian/South African “lift system”.
After observing the micro bus taxis on predictable routes, CEO Green did the opposite and put passengers in the front seat of small cars on unrestricted paths. It sounds more like a trip to Zimbabwe left the founder thinking “how can I setup a service so white people like me can avoid crowded public transit such as the Zimbabwean taxi bus system”.
Anyway 2013 the founder decided to rename his original creation “Lyft”, the same as the apartheid “lift system” white parents used to shuttle their racist families and avoid the black taxis. The renaming meant a complete jettison of the Zimbabwe reference as the original name was sold to Enterprise.
The African root reference only lived on with that painted mural in the office, which I only happened to see because they invited me inside and told me a wild yet inconsistent story of appropriation. They’ve since moved their HQ and evidence of the mural is surely long gone.
You might be thinking the link to apartheid’s “lift system” is uncanny, yet insufficient on its own as just a coincidental name.
Let me now also poke here at the issue of a pink “carstache” wired to the front of original Lyft vehicles.
Lyft drivers reported overheating issues and car damage from blocking the radiator.
They were explained to me as highly distinguishable “safety” marketing for ride shares. It supposedly was meant to give riders obvious physical safety signaling. And yet anyone could buy one and celebrities promoted owning them.
A person who would dare to put a big pink thing on their car (remember the “pink bus” in 2012 Pakistan?) was advertised as someone who wouldn’t be physically dangerous to Lyft’s target population (white women).
…little-known fact: The bright pink color was inspired not only by the founders’ desire to seem friendly and bold, but also to make their branding a bit less masculine than competitors, and nod to their very welcome view toward female passengers and drivers, as well as emphasis on safety for women.
“Funny” big pink facial features when you meet your driver may instead read to some as two white guys’ doing some really insensitive appropriation of imagery in black culture. Look at the top lip in this iconic anti-black image:
Lyft adapted historic anti-black imagery as their signal for white women to feel welcome and safe
And notice how even Uber tried to portray Lyft’s requirement that riders must fist-bump drivers.
What’s so weird about requiring Lyft riders to do a fist-bump?
…the pound is “a gesture of solidarity and comradeship… also used in a celebratory sense and sometimes as a nuanced greeting among intimates and/or those with a shared social history”. They trace that history in mainstream black culture to the Sixties, when African-American soldiers fighting in Vietnam used the dap… fists meet vertically, one above the other.
I wonder if Lyft had anyone black in executive management on board with the big pink mustache/lip and forced fist-bump concepts. I found their 2018 diversity report illuminating, given they were on a massive hiring spree doubling the size of the company and yet had 0% black staff in technical leadership.
Speaking of which, did you know a whopping “75% of white Americans have no friends of color at all.”
Even worse, as you might guess from a company started by a white college grad unwittingly claiming inspiration from apartheid who partnered with a Wall Street banker, Lyft has been widely implicated in systemic victimization of women.
A single SF driver repeatedly attacked women over five years before police managed to track him down. That’s just one of literally thousands of their unsafe ride-share cases highlighted by 20 women suing the company.
“Lyft has been aware of the staggering number of assaults and rapes that occur in their vehicles for years. They continue to conceal those numbers from the public and Lyft customers,” Bomberger said in a statement. “That is not a commitment to safety. It is a commitment to profits.”
Obviously Lyft has totally obliterated their origin story now. You won’t find them speaking of Africa or the white woman “safety” angle in the same way. They now downplay the big pink face features, quit the fist-bump, and strut about like ride-sharing was just something they invented while bored and traveling around California.
It may be important to revisit the whole origin story again, however, as researchers have been looking more deeply at the decision algorithms and continue to reveal racism in ride-sharing platforms.
…fares tended to be higher for drop-offs in Chicago neighborhoods with high non-white populations…an earlier report published in October 2016 by the National Bureau of Economic Research that found in the cities of Boston and Seattle male riders with African American names were 3 times more likely to have rides canceled and wait as much as 35% longer for rides.
a blog about the poetry of information security, since 1995
Amazon basically operates like the mob by seeking markets where regulation or justice is too weak to stop it from taking payments for unethical business practices. 
