Race and the Digital: Racial Formation and 21st Century Technologies

The race to end racism

I think within today’s cyber world, it can be rather easy to determine one’s race, especially on social media websites where that kind of information could be released/seen. Even if someone looks at another’s profile picture, they could roughly guess the race of that person. Unfortunately, racism still does exist, and I can honestly not see that issue going away anytime soon. We can see racism today in the cyber world, such as on videos posted on Facebook that have to do with Donald Trump’s election campaign. Some people that comment on there (whether for Trump or not) are not afraid to show their racism towards specific races. Those comments are public most of the time and anyone logged onto Facebook can see them and even reply back. Even though I believe, and others believe that race cannot be changed does not mean that it should be ignored. Although, many do ignore the issue because they perhaps believe it is a “sensitive” topic to discuss. Also, as I stated before I don’t see the issue of race going away anytime soon because no one could really come up with a relevant solution. People are entitled to what they think and believe, even on issues of race, but I think it’s a matter of how people display those thoughts and beliefs via in the cyber world. Those types of comments should be closely monitored and taken down immediately when posted. As this class has taught us, race plays a major role in our digital world and our reality, but it is ultimately up to the general population (us) if we want race to be utilized in a positive or negative manner.

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