If you have never heard of it, you should have – the Lesbians Who Tech summit is a conference for the LGBTQ+ community and allies, with the focus on those who work in tech, and in all honesty, this is a poor description for a brilliant event with a brilliant agenda.
I first heard about it accidentally, when looking up information on someone who turned out to be a previous speaker. And while I may be plenty qualified for it in some departments, my work as an anthropologist, whose brush with technology is that I consult on human behaviour where tech is concerned, left me somewhat doubtful that I could attend.
I couldn’t have been more wrong, and, while I only grabbed a free ticket this time, the last week, though harrowing due to time zone differences (and my currently still somewhat crippled health), turned out to be one of the best things I have ever done.
(And yes – I qualified fine.)
LWT are not exclusivist. The atmosphere is welcoming, as are those answering your potentially worried emails. It breathes inclusivity and diversity, because, while originally organised for and by (lesbian and queer) women in tech jobs, it is incredibly open to others and to allies of all kinds. It is, in fact, a model of what inclusivity at an event should look like. I have previously avoided getting too close to women(-only) events because creating an “only” event tends to come not only with a lot of bias as to what that only looks like, but also with a threat of further prejudice; if we begin to curate by a trait, such as gender, the event (or office, or society) quickly starts to connect Otherness to other traits… in short, we open ourselves to prejudice that we are, allegedly, trying hard to work against.
I felt none of that at LWT summit.
The keynotes reflected this, with a delightful twist. While the concern over where we are going as a society has been a matter of debate for most of the year (and, for many, much longer), while diversity and inclusion was the hot topic of the Forbes JUST 100 summit and we can probably expect it reflected in the upcoming Forbes Women summit, the LWT is, while being an inclusivity summit, also a tech summit, and therefore, it centred around two key topics –
the problematic of implementing inclusivity and diversity as a steady part of our society and the ways tech can either aid or harm this process.
For me, because my work revolves around how humans and tech work (or do not work) together, the approach was all I could have asked for.
And more than just answering questions, it gave me further questions to pursue, either by consulting with others or by exploring them myself (or a mixture of both).
From the perspective of society, technology is here to stay, and it would be ridiculous to consider it free from bias. Bias is a matter of social behaviour, and as such, we can expect to work it in everywhere – in our physical interactions, in how we perceive the world, in social rules we create, in things we use around us. Like ableism assumes that everyone is of a certain height, certain physical strength and with all limbs attached and functioning in a pre-supposed manner, so too are our products, projections and behaviours a matter of thinking that tends to be tribal in some way. We can see this tribalism sometimes – in dealings with extremist groups who desire to remove all Other from view (and sometimes existence), in dealings with those whose jobs put them into an opposed position to someone else, which, I would like to point out, can be almost anyone. In current sphere, this tribalism has been noted strongly within the US police (link), but in reality, tribalism can be present anywhere, at any point, and it tends to be present at least to some extent.
Building bias into tech products, therefore, isn’t a matter of active prejudice, but of passive prejudice – prejudice of perception, which is far more insidious and difficult to see, because it has, at some point, become a part of the aura of factuality*, i.e. of what we think and teach each other our world looks like. It runs on automatic, and the only hope we have of dismantling it is to consider it from all angles and discuss it openly.
This is not merely a gender or race prejudice; prejudice can and does apply to everyone, at any point. The worst part is that it may not seem problematic, as problematic as something else or even noted as extant. Tabooising discussion, as well, becomes an additional problem as the only possible discussion comes when something has already gone wrong, and may be exceptionally polarised.
In technology, this bias may be overtly or mutely present – ranging from bad representation of diversity in studies and certain jobs to AI having difficulties with black faces, with different levels of disastrousness as a consequence.
This is why it is of utmost importance that technology isn’t just a part of the debate, but part of the solution. Whether it is by discussing thinking inclusivity and understanding what bias might look like (which is a subject I am proud to say I can and have and continue to do my best to contribute to; it was lovely to see so many reflect my own concerns and thinking, especially at a high level) or offering real solutions such as the VR for police training, if technology is a part of the debate and solution, then we are looking at a safer, better society all around.
The LWT summit addressed this head on. The awareness of debating thinking bias is, perhaps, more present in groups that have experienced being Othered in some way, or have a greater potential of being Othered. But what makes the LWT almost unique is that, instead of limiting this discussion to the specific group only, it tries to create a wide outreach.
It is through this outreach that we can truly hope to create a difference. This is an approach we, as a society, and within business, sorely need; it is also one that is very rarely implemented, or implemented well. For me, the willingness to have a discussion, be open to each other and to consider rational solutions to societal problems within one’s own subject sphere, along with working cross disciplines and cross groups, lights a hope that we can, and we will, ultimately create a society where bias is gone, or at least much diminished.
What bias looks like differs greatly. It is a job of people like myself to work with others, including those who work in tech, to build an understanding of what it looks like, why it looks like that and how we may work to dismantle it. The road is long. But one only needs to get together with some truly amazing people to realise that it is not hopeless, nor do we have to walk alone.
* aura of factuality – Geertz 1973, p. 90