Everything Old is New Again
I’m traveling this week. Here are updates on previous stories . . .
It’s Not the Robots—It’s the Rip-off. (June 13, 2023)
There’s a front-runner in the race to control artificial intelligence. It’s the European Union.
From the WaPo:
European Union lawmakers on Wednesday took a key step toward passing landmark restrictions on the use of artificial intelligence, putting Brussels on a collision course with American tech giants funneling billions of dollars into the burgeoning technology.
The European Parliament overwhelmingly approved the E.U. AI Act, a sweeping package that aims to protect consumers from potentially dangerous applications of artificial intelligence. Government officials made the move amidconcerns that recent advances in the technology could be used to nefarious ends, ushering in surveillance, algorithmically driven discrimination and prolific misinformation that could upend democracy. E.U. officials are moving much faster than their U.S. counterparts, where discussions about AI have dragged on in Congress despite apocalyptic warnings from even some industry officials.
Washington is paralyzed while the EU acts. How is that possible? Lawmaking should be easier for an established democracy like the US, with only two major political parties, than for a parliamentary body representing twenty-seven countries and dozens of political parties. (I have some thoughts on the subject but they are not brief. Another time, then.)
Considering we have no idea of how AI applications will affect humanity, it’s good that some political body is trying to do something.
My Dad was a Family Doctor (November 8, 2022)
This is personal. It hurts my heart to witness the ongoing corporatization of medicine, whereby an ancient profession is downgraded to “healthcare” and physicians to “providers.” Over the last five decades, conglomerates have turned medicine from a practice—and a discipline—into a profit center. The outcomes are sadly predictable: more expensive medical services, more inequality in healthcare access and outcomes, and the demoralization of doctors, nurses, and other medical professionals.
In a 2018 essay, two medical researchers argued that doctors and nurses were not experiencing "burn-out,” they were suffering “moral injury.” In the New York Times, Eyal Press wrote:
Military psychiatrists use the term to describe an emotional wound sustained when, in the course of fulfilling their duties, soldiers witnessed or committed acts . . . that transgressed their core values. Doctors on the front lines of America’s profit-driven health care system were also susceptible to such wounds, Dean and Talbot submitted, as the demands of administrators, hospital executives and insurers forced them to stray from the ethical principles that were supposed to govern their profession. The pull of these forces left many doctors anguished and distraught, caught between the Hippocratic oath and “the realities of making a profit from people at their sickest and most vulnerable.”
The corporatization of healthcare requires the deprofessionalization of medical practitioners. This is an ongoing process. (My prediction regarding healthcare trends is the same as one I made years ago regarding a thorny international relations issue. Someone asked me, “You’re a political sociologist—what do you think about the situation in Israel?” My response: “Things will get worse before they get better—and I’m not optimistic.”)
What is deprofessionalization? Policy expert Don Moynihan explains:
By deprofessionalization, I mean a loss of the capacity of health providers to have autonomy over their actions, relying on professional medical norms and training. In more prosaic terms, this means the freedom of doctors and nurses to act according to the wishes and best interests of their patients.
[In the post-Dobbs era], we are seeing the state intervene in the doctor-patient relationship, restricting what doctors can say and do even when it clearly increases the health risks of patients.
My father is long gone but he will not be remembered as a stressed-out employee of a corporate healthcare network. His legacy is this:
In thirty-one years of practicing medicine, my Dad cared for three generations in many families. People knew him. Dr. Osa didn’t always get paid but he always got respect.
Can I state a plain fact? For-profit healthcare sucks. When corporations become rich and powerful by squeezing money out of sick people—we all suffer.
Love-Hating Social Media (December 6, 2022)
Writers want to write. Thinkers want to think. Most creative types are bad at business and hate marketing. That’s why Substack has become so popular: it provides—for free!—a platform that eliminates the need to purchase a domain, set up a website, and figure out SEO and marketing.
I reluctantly followed Substack’s advice to use Twitter as a promotional tool when Grounded got off the ground. Twitter was where editors, librarians, reviewers, and agents were on the lookout for new talent and new ideas. Substack made it easy to cross-post and publicize Grounded (at least in theory). Unfortunately, my Twitter account hadn’t reached its first birthday when Elon Musk bought the company and fired the good people. We all know what happened then.
It wasn’t hard for me to delete my account because I didn’t have much of a presence on Twitter. I came late to the party.
Clearly, latecomers to the bird site are . . . latecomers. I didn’t really understand the significance of Twitter celebrity until I waded through the recent deluge of “Why I’m leaving Twitter” and “Why I’m not leaving Twitter” articles. Media and entertainment figures, in particular, have been agonizing publicly over whether to stay/go. (See, for example, here, here, here, and here.) Losing Twitter followers equates to losing status and relevance in the world, for some people.
As the Twittersphere has degenerated into a noxious swamp of misinformation, denigration, racism, and misogyny . . . a lot of people are saying* that Twitter is now the Nazi bar.
What is the Nazi bar, you ask? (You must not be an overly online person. Congratulations! you have led a classy life.)
Ironically, “the Nazi bar” came into general online parlance because of a Twitter thread. But it wasn’t until after Elon Musk’s takeover that a three-year-old post by user @iamragesparkle went viral.
Is it a true story? Or a parable?
I was at a shitty crustpunk bar once getting an after-work beer. One of those shitholes where the bartenders clearly hate you. So the bartender and I were ignoring one another when someone sits next to me and he immediately says, "no. get out."
And the dude next to me says, "hey i'm not doing anything, i'm a paying customer." and the bartender reaches under the counter for a bat or something and says, "out. now." and the dude leaves, kind of yelling. And he was dressed in a punk uniform, I noticed
Anyway, I asked what that was about and the bartender was like, "you didn't see his vest but it was all nazi shit. Iron crosses and stuff. You get to recognize them."
And i was like, ohok and he continues.
"you have to nip it in the bud immediately. These guys come in and it's always a nice, polite one. And you serve them because you don't want to cause a scene. And then they become a regular and after awhile they bring a friend. And that dude is cool too.
And then THEY bring friends and the friends bring friends and they stop being cool and then you realize, oh shit, this is a Nazi bar now. And it's too late because they're entrenched and if you try to kick them out, they cause a PROBLEM. So you have to shut them down.
And i was like, 'oh damn.' and he said "yeah, you have to ignore their reasonable arguments because their end goal is to be terrible, awful people."
And then he went back to ignoring me. But I haven't forgotten that at all.
Twitter is in the latter stage of becoming a full-fledged Nazi bar.
Elon Musk invited in the Nazis, and they got served, so they bring friends, and now they have all the seats at the bar. Their friends bring friends and they are not cool. They are yelling and breaking things, spilling beer, throwing food, and getting into fights.
There are still a couple of semi-secluded booths in the back of the pub where long-time regulars hang out, from habit. The old-timers are trying to have conversations but the drunken Nazis are getting closer; it’s only a matter of time before one of the Hitler youth careens into the booth and throws up on the table.
I left a while ago. Found a local tavern with nice, creative folks who like to sing, converse, imbibe, and shoot the breeze. You’ll find me at Post.News.
*A lot of people are saying is a fatuous trope. I am using it here for effect.
Keep scrolling down (below Notes) to reach the comments, share, and like buttons.
Notes:
Don Moynihan, Don’t look away: the post-Dobbs attack on women's health
Eyal Press, The Moral Crisis of America’s Doctors (unlocked NYT article)
Ben Sisario and Byron Mac, Music Publishers Sue Twitter for Copyright Infringement
Simon G. Talbot and Wendy Dean, Physicians aren’t ‘burning out.’ They’re suffering from moral injury.
Cat Zakrzewski and Cristiano Lima, Europe Moves Ahead on AI Regulation, Challenging Tech Giants’ Power