Let’s Teach Computer Science Majors to Be Good Citizens. The Whole World Depends on It.
Digital technology has become increasingly important in the lives of all Americans, particularly during the coronavirus pandemic, which has made many of us even more reliant on computing devices to execute our daily responsibilities.
For example, in 2020, the first known wrongful arrest through misidentification via facial recognition software occurred when police mistakenly accused a Black man of committing a crime. To address concerns about this kind of excessive citizen surveillance, city governments in some locales have restricted the use of facial recognition software, and a bill has been proposed to ban federal law enforcement agencies from using it. Meanwhile, in the political arena, evidence has emerged that data analytics were applied to deter Black voters from voting in the 2016 election and that similar technology has been applied to affect other countries’ elections as well.
To mitigate the perpetuation of these and related inequities, observers have called for increased diversification of the technology workforce. However, as books like “Brotopia” by Emily Chang and “Race after Technology” by Ruha Benjamin indicate, the culture of tech companies can be misogynistic and racist and therefore unwelcoming to many people. Google’s firing of a well-regarded Black scientist for her research on algorithmic bias in December 2020 suggests that there may be limited capacity within the industry to challenge this culture.
