How digital beauty filters perpetuate colorism

Kabul is in chaos 

Sponsored by Salesforce The Download Your daily dose of what's up in emerging technology Perpetuating prejudice 08.16.21 Good morning! Today we lead with an important investigation into how beauty filters are perpetuating prejudice towards darker-skinner women. And an awful lot happened around the world over the weekend, so check out the links to get the latest. Get your friends to sign up here to get The Download every day. How digital beauty filters perpetuate colorism   When Lise was a young teenager in Georgia, her classmates bullied her relentlessly. Most often, they would attack her with remarks about her dark complexion. Sometimes teachers would send her home from school because she couldn’t stop crying. And it wasn’t just white classmates. Black students harassed her too. She remembers them asking, “Why is she so dark?”  Just when she thought it couldn’t get worse, the phone in her palm became an endless stream of pictures of beautiful, lighter-skinned women getting dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of likes and affirming comments. The prejudice Lise experienced—colorism—has a long history, driven by European ideals of beauty that associate lighter skin with purity and wealth, darker tones with sin and poverty.  These prejudices have been part of the social and media landscape for a long time but today, thanks to the prevalence of selfies and face filters, digital colorism has spread. With Snapchat, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook a part of billions of people’s everyday lives, many of us find that people see far more pictures of us than ever before. But there are biases built into these systems, and they could be particularly catastrophic for women with darker complexions. Read the full story. —Tate Ryan-Mosley  If you found this piece interesting, please read more of Tate's excellent reporting on this topic. In one article, she asked an AI to rate how attractive she is as part of an investigation into how computer-generated "beauty scores" are influencing the things we do, the posts we see, and the way we think. In another, she explained how beauty filters are changing the way young girls see themselves. We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction in these weird times. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or tweet 'em at me.)   + Wally the tiny lamb is one of the cutest animals I have ever seen.   + Yet more evidence that Mark Hamill is generally a great guy.   + We've all seen how this movie ends.   + Why is Stonehenge so damn durable? Quartz.   + Mmm, peach pie.   + Sure, this plant looks nice, but did you know it's a carnivore?!    + This amazing app, which lets you zoom from the smallest to the largest objects in the universe, will help you to get a sense of perspective. Sponsor Message Evolving to a more equitable AI AI can be a powerful tool in ushering in a post-pandemic normal—but it must be deployed and used in a way that’s fair to all. Learn more. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 Kabul airport is in chaos The Taliban is now in charge in Afghanistan, prompting many to try to flee. (Reuters $)   + It represents a swift and shocking end to US involvement in the country. (NYT $)   + The Taliban's advance, mapped. (Al Jazeera)   + How America failed in Afghanistan. (New Yorker $)   + How did the Afghan military collapse so quickly? (NYT $)  2 Rescuers are hunting for survivors after Haiti's earthquake killed 1,297 The disaster further compounds the huge problems facing the impoverished nation. (BBC)   + Social media posts are helping to convey the scale of the damage. (NYT $)  3 Why your efforts to convince anti-vaxxers are failing Basically, people find it incredibly hard to admit when they're wrong. (The Guardian)   + In fact, many anti-vaxxers are doubling down on their beliefs. (BBC)   + Unvaccinated Americans are "sitting ducks" as the Delta variant sweeps across the country. (The Guardian)  4 The case for scrapping travel bans International travel rules are currently ineffective, illiberal and often useless. (The Economist $)   + Europe is open for Americans. Why hasn't the US reciprocated? (NYT $)  5 Scammers managed to steal up to $400 billion of covid benefits Experts say it's the biggest fraud ever perpetrated against the US. (NBC)   6 The professor who foresaw the dark side of the internet Unfortunately, no one listened to Philip Agre's eerily prescient predictions in the 1990s. (WP $)   7 The latest hot new trend? Meeting online friends IRL 🤝 As we've all discovered this past year or so, there's something indefinably great about human interaction. (NYT $)   8 Some remote workers have a secret: they do two jobs The money is incredible. But so is the stress. (WSJ $)   + Workers are bringing their weird at-home habits with them when they return to offices. (Wired UK)  9 How data science helped to identify the creepiest word in Macbeth 🔎 You won't be able to guess it. (OneZero $)   10 The crazy logistics of Istanbul grand canal project 🚢 There is a LOT that could go wrong here. (Wired UK) Are you intellectually curious? Tech-obsessed? We are too.   Get an insightful look into the technology of the future without getting bogged down by the jargon. Subscribe to MIT Technology Review today (subscriptions start at just $50 per year). Quote of the day "Now it looks like I have to burn everything I achieved in 24 years of my life." —A university student in Kabul writes for The Guardian that she has had to hide her IDs, diplomas, and certificates in expectation that the Taliban will once again deprive women and girls of their hard-won freedoms. Top image credit: Joan Wong Please send peach pie to hi@technologyreview.com. Follow me on Twitter at @charlottejee. Thanks for reading! —Charlotte Was this newsletter forwarded to you, and you'd like to see more? Sign up today Leading with Innovation. Join us virtually September 28-30. Register now Follow us: MIT Technology Review One Main Street Cambridge, MA 02142   *Manage Your Email Preferences or *Unsubscribe  Subscription Information This email was sent to Webmaster220 Bible Study Blog  *the blog owner has deleted the hyperlink intentionally