Mastodawn

Cat Hicks Apr 17, 2025

That piece of writing I was talking about finishing that I was equally proud of and scared to post because I love it? Here it is.

I am starting a new project, it is A Newsletter, and it is About Tech, but it is a very different tech newsletter.

Welcome to Fight for the Human. Sign up to start setting your compass toward rehumanization.

https://www.fightforthehuman.com/why-i-cannot-be-technical/

Why I Cannot Be Technical

With some regularity, kind-hearted Technical people tell me that I Can Be Technical, Too. This usually happens when I’m asking us to define what we’re calling technical in a software environment. I understand why it happens. I am a psychologist of software environments and that is something of

Fight for the Human

Show thread

Sasha Akhavi Apr 18, 2025

@grimalkina So thought-provoking (as usual); thank you. Provoked thought 1: How can a culture sustain both a) a totalizing idea of the entire universe as a technical problem to be solved and b) a dividing line between what/who gets to be technical and what/who don't? (It's ok; I know it's bc the catalysts of this culture are driven by a human need to be good-enough-via-better-than, shhdon'ttell)

Show thread

Sasha Akhavi

@grimalkina Provoked thought 2: If I’m really Technical, I will be able to navigate outward in the current system that represents my view of the situation described here, to a vantage point where the identified conflict (Technical vs. non-Technical) can be reconciled — because that kind of navigation is a fundamental technical skill. In this case, I will be able to reframe Technical as continuous with non-Technical if for no other reason than psychic mechanisms are also mechanisms.

Show thread

Sasha Akhavi Apr 18, 2025

@grimalkina Provoked thought 3: in that light, what is Technical isn't the property or determination of any subset of actors, but a universal birthright. Which is different from saying that we can all hope to attain the property / determination thing if we do x, y, or z.