Mastodawn

Audre Lorde's "master's tools" speech was not about tech platforms. So why does tech discourse keep citing it as if it were? I write about what happens when a Black feminist theorist's words get borrowed, stripped of context, and made to do work they were never meant to do.

https://tarakiyee.com/on-the-enshittification-of-audre-lorde-the-masters-tools-in-tech-discourse/ #enshittification #AudreLorde #techpolicy

On The Enshittification of Audre Lorde: "The Master's Tools" in Tech Discourse

🖼️Cover Photo: Train at the Nairobi terminus of the Mombasa–Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway. It runs parallel to the Uganda Railway that was completed in 1901. The first fare-paying passengers boarded the "Madaraka Express" on Madaraka Day (1 June 2017), the 54th anniversary of Kenya's attainment of self-rule from Great

Do Flamingos Know They're Pink

@tarakiyee This is a great analysis and post.

Thank you for writing it.

@tarakiyee 🎬🎬🎬🎬🎬🎬

Aline Blankertz 19h ago

@tarakiyee
Excellent! Thanks for providing such a thoughtful critique + contextualisation. Literally the other day I went to look up the meaning of her quote and decided against using it in a specific context...

Evan Prodromou 18h ago

@tarakiyee this is a really interesting point and something I'd like to approach more thoughtfully when we talk about the Fediverse.

endolexi 18h ago

@tarakiyee shorthand is always tempting. But I have to say I do agree that it would feel utterly wrong to me to collaborate on Gdocs for a text about floss strategy. It would be like discussing zero carbon while sitting around a coalfire. And any and all big commercial tech platforms are by now surveillance platforms - using them in any way to plan for countermovement feels self-defeating indeed, like announcing to the powers you want to dismantle exactly what you're up to. And I don't think antitrust law or whatever is going to change anything about that. The best thing anyone and everyone can do is to not use any of their crap, whenever and whereever possible.

Tara Tarakiyee 17h ago

@endolexi I don't totally disagree with you, I'm actively trying to move away from big tech for all the reasons. However we both have technical capital, we can make choices other people can't. When the tool choice becomes the politics then we can't see that anymore. We need to understand the conditions behind tool choice or lack thereof, make those visible and political, and then change those conditions. Its hard and some of that work can happen on Google docs, they can't do shit about it.

endolexi 15h ago

@tarakiyee I understand, of course. It's just this perception of the machine eating up anything you serve it like that. And I sometimes think the barriers of the mind and the convenience of the conventional are the hardest to overcome. Like, the alternatives are there, and I happily support anyone who's interested. For me the tools just can't be separated from the politics, not when the toolmaker you want to oppose sees everything you do with their tools. Unless of course I'm on some 'poison the algorithm' kind of track, it's just never a good idea to me.

@tarakiyee That is very well written. I could follow the argument and it makes a lot of sense to me, without knowing much of the background. Thanks!

@tarakiyee outstanding post!

@tarakiyee I love how the text doesn't aim to tear down an imperfect argument, but add to and improve it!

A discursive world with more principledness, but less tearing down would be nice 😃

bituur esztreym 15h ago

@tarakiyee
thanks for this post i saw already boosted here, it tells bare and perfectly what's about.
when i first read the quote of Cory i was feeling exactly this, and was "woa"..
thanks again.

tools for commensality 🧿14h ago

great piece! cc @jeremiah if you've not seen

jeremiah 9h ago

@inquiline @tarakiyee

This is excellent! Thank you @inquiline for sharing.

foundseed 13h ago

@tarakiyee fuck, imagine having a take so bad about such a beloved figure, that the word you are most famous for is used to deride that very take.
I would simply delete everything and move to the woods if that were me.

Oskar im Keller 11h ago

@tante might be interested in this as well.

I AM BANKSY ☕ / 🗑‍🔥4h ago

@tarakiyee
Sometimes I think Doctorow is leading the enshitification by example.