Challenging Technology

Slack introduces a topic in chapter thirteen that I believe many suspect but have not qualified with words in the way the writer does here. Slack approaches the topic of identity and how a person’s identity not only affects how they are placed in culture but also what possibilities are open to them, especially when it comes to technology (Slack 150). 

Though we all have our agendas on a daily basis and consider ourselves and our lives of utmost importance what we may not realize is that the process of innovation is undemocratic. The decisions about technology and how it should be dispersed are usually governed by the elite. The writer quotes Richard Sclove with his argument that a strong democracy requires that citizens have input in making decisions about technology because they should be able to decide on such a strong factor that influences their lives. True, that we as consumers have a choice and even though big companies create technologies to suit our needs, even needs we didn’t know we had, this makes some consumers feel as if they can resist this pull of innovation on their lives. The writer understands the idea that consumers may have that each consumer can buy according to their own need and budget but she argues that ‘if one group has money and another does not, whose needs will be catered to?” (Slack 153)

The writer presents a strong example of the unequal delegation of technology. In Africa there is a sleeping sickness that is becoming widespread. The current treatment of this sickness involves a drug that kills 1-5% of patients and it involves painful injections with some chemicals that even go into the creation of automobile antifreeze. There is another cure, which is a drug that costs about $600 per patient. Because this sickness affects these people in Africa who can’t afford this drug the company stopped making the it. This is an example the book offers but we can see evidence of this in our own country. Not everyone is offered the same access to certain doctors depending on their insurance type. The consequences of delegation are clearly seen in examples like these. 

Chapter 14 discusses ways that technology challenges identity. A strong point that chapter brought up is when the invention of the telephone began to affect the upper and middle classes. They were no longer able to distinguish if the person on the other side of the phone was someone they “should” be talking to. 

Identity is also challenged online, because people are allowed to be whatever “character” they chose to be. They can present their “real life” self or a fictional character they may deem more appropriate. It also challenges the notion that we are one-sided beings, that instead just as we are able to have multiple screens open on different topics on our laptops, we also have interests and ideas on innumerable topics. We can see in this aspect how technology has challenged even what it means to just be.