Doing cheap PR moves like blacking out logos or posting Twitter "support" posts from CEO accounts or announcing the end of default branches named "master" is, as I said, cheap. The real issue is dealing with the elephants in the room, such as the aforementioned ICE contract of GitHub.
It is about time that corporations, with GitHub here as an example, noticed that backing this or that or another minority or "trying" to solve some medial issue only where it suits them PR-wise is simply abusing that minority in yet another way; it is a means of using that minority, and all the people who constitute that minority, as a tool for public relation stunts and political "but we support X, see?" newspeak that brings no actual change.
I'm genuinely curious if GitHub does support Black and Brown people enough to actually make that support noticeable for everyday lives of these folk.
While I may not totally agree with you on the politics, I do totally agree that I have a large discount for words made by corporations when it is the popular thing to do and when there are few negative consequences of them doing it. Yes, words of support matter, and I see nothing wrong with wanting to rename blacklist->blocklist and whitelist->allowlist, but I also can't help but roll my eyes a little when I see a LinkedIn post about this terminology change with 40 responses commending how great an action that was. It feels like the ultimate in slacktivism to me.
For example, at an individual level, there is a lot of good research about how housing segregation is one of the largest continuing drivers in systemic racism in the US. So if you have a bunch of BLM posters in your yard, but at the same time fight tooth-and-nail against any increased density in your neighborhood that might actually lower housing costs where you live, well you should just STFU, or at least realize the underpinnings of your blatant hypocrisy.
To be honest the whole master / slave discussion is laughable because:
1. Most humans have ancestral past as slaves, be it serfdom or thraldom.
2. Etmologically the master branch is associated with the concept of a master copy, not a whip lashing plantation owner.
3. Slavery is pretty much a thing of the past, accept from certain parts of the middle east and africa. And let us not forget, the producers of our consumer goods in asia...
Sold by the same companies that foregive to care jackshit about anything. LOL!
Actual systemic progress happens through legislative changes. Social pressure is used by the public to show which issues they care about, and what politicians should be working on. The protest are one strong signal here.
Support by major companies, while admittedly less effective, is another signal that helps. Claiming that it's useless is false and claiming it's cheap is ignorant - the OP clearly demonstrates that a good deed never goes unpunished.
To quote myself from a different comment, I did not mean to imply that the visibility of these issues hasn't changed; it's quite obvious that these issues are much closer to the surface of everyday discourse than they were earlier.
The visibility alone does nil, though, when it comes to everyday practical effects. The mere fact that this issue is visible did not change the death counts. Death statistics during police interventions can be considered one such standard. It's a good first step that needs to be followed by further steps.
The point is that the visibility is the best way to drive legislative change. Those changes will then have real-world impact. You're right that this is a slow process, but it's still the best we have in our current system.
In reality, police brutality is nothing new. Politicians should have made changes to keep police accountable years ago, but have consistently failed to do so. Now we've reached a tipping point where the public at large demands change, which needs to come from politicians, and the protests are the manifestation of this.
Does a Tweet from a CEO immediately fix the issue? Of course not. But that's like saying any individual is not going to make a difference when protesting, so they shouldn't bother. Obviously this will only lead to complacency, which will only cause the problem get worse. Democracy, in this case, means as much public pressure as possible so that politicians can no longer ignore the issue without fear of being voted out of office.
Every single bit of additional pressure helps the cause, and whether or not it's also good PR is irrelevant.
I really dislike labeling any recognition of an issue as "cheap".
It was not that long ago that any positive recognition of even gay people existing in modern media outside of farce, recognition by corporations was seen as a HUGE step forward as far as making people or concerns SEEN.
Maybe some CEO's out there are all Snidely Whiplash and putting out all their messaging for free PR, but I'm not going to assume that and I think the recognition is of value.
I understand the position, but nowadays Twitter is full of #BlackLivesMatter posts, pride flags can be seen commonly, all while, to bring the two most currently visible things that haven't changed, the sex/race pay gaps are still there, and Black folk are still much more likely to die during police interventions.
I guess I'm glad that the recognition and posts from CEOs is there, but posting rainbow flags and "Black Lives Matter" on Twitter has simply become fashionable now. It's possible to do that and do nothing else in order to announce a success and go, "hey, we support minorities" while ignoring problems that have people mispaid, misjudged, locked up for statistically longer, or just plain outright killed.
That's the elephant in the room I've mentioned, and unless these Twitter statistics and CEO or corporate recognition you mention translate into daily reality of these minority groups, they're not of much actual and practical use. They're not the goal, they're the means.
EDIT: in other words, if one of your Black friends gets shot "by accident" during a random police intervention - oh goodness, it's really sad, Alexa play some jazz music. But hey, #BlackLivesMatter is trending in social media, that must means that things are good for the Black folk, right?
/s
EDIT2: The word "cheap" is there because such a stunt is very far from being "expensive". It costs little to nothing, it can be done without other actions or at minimal costs, it does not require changes of management or company course or internal rules. It is, therefore, by definition, cheap.
I don't buy into the theory that "things haven't changed" and thus discounting visibility.
Protests happened in the past too? Do we discount that?
It's all cynicism and divisiveness these days about how someone isn't doing enough, even among folks who share values ... in favor of I don't know what standard ...
OK, that's correct; I might not have expressed myself clearly. Slightly edited my post up there. Thanks.
I did not mean to imply that the visibility of these issues hasn't changed; it's quite obvious that these issues are much closer to the surface of everyday discourse than they were earlier.
The visibility alone does nil, though, when it comes to everyday practical effects. The mere fact that this issue is visible did not change the death counts. Death statistics during police interventions can be considered one such standard. It's a good first step that needs to be followed by further steps.
Yeah, I'm pretty sure the stats say the opposite is true, but it really depends who's using the statistics to paint _their_ picture.
In this study run by Harvard professor Roland Fryer, it was found that African-Americans are 20% less likely to be shot and proportionally more likely to see use-of-force against them.
From Significance, right at the top: "(...) Black women and men and American Indian and Alaska Native women and men are significantly more likely than white women and men to be killed by police. Latino men are also more likely to be killed by police than are white men."
The fact is that police shootings of unarmed African-Americans are still only 0.1% of all African-Americans killed. There are studies that find that no racial differences in lethal uses of force: https://www.nber.org/papers/w22399.pdf
I try to do my best to assume good faith, but sometimes comments like this make it really hard.
In any case, here's two links. One's from Drexel University, the other is a meta-composition of resources by an organization connected to the Kennedy School at Harvard. Educate yourself.
The reason why this is contentious is because it relies on how you are defining 'a police intervention.' Very few people I see debating this issue dispute that blacks are killed at 2.5x the right whites are by the police. What they dispute is that this disparity exists because of police officer bias, and they point to differing crime and geographic factors that cause the disparity. In that case, blacks and whites might be shot at the same right within the context of a given police interaction, but what that specific context is and the frequency of that context between black and white populations differs.
The 2.5x number isn't really disputed, it is the reason for it & the policy that is proposed because of it that is contentious.
I don't know if it's one of the studies you linked to, but I read a study a week ago that showed that black men were 2.5 times more likely to be killed by a cop, but 2.1 more likely to kill a cop (compared to whites).
ICE does support Black and Brown people by keeping illegal immigrants from flooding the market. Wages in many restaurants/building sites in NYC, LA, Florida, Texas are lower than other parts of the country because illegal labor gives an alternative to hiring black employees that rightfully require at least a minimum wage.
It is about time that corporations, with GitHub here as an example, noticed that backing this or that or another minority or "trying" to solve some medial issue only where it suits them PR-wise is simply abusing that minority in yet another way; it is a means of using that minority, and all the people who constitute that minority, as a tool for public relation stunts and political "but we support X, see?" newspeak that brings no actual change.
I'm genuinely curious if GitHub does support Black and Brown people enough to actually make that support noticeable for everyday lives of these folk.