If you want to support there Are No Girls on the Internet, please check out our patreon. There you can get ad free bonus content. Just go to patreon dot com slash tangoti and thanks so much. As someone who thinks about the intersection of gender, sex and technology, where do you.
Think we are headed to hell? There are No Girls on the Internet.
As a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative, I'm brigit tad and this is there are No Girls on the Internet.
People who engage in sex work face hostility online, but they're also the ones who remain at the forefront of understanding technology, the Internet and the role that it plays in all of our lives from increased online surveillance and legislation like Cesta Fasta, it's people who engage in sex work who are often sounding the alarm about how online harms might start by targeting one community like sex workers,
but will later manifest for all of us. So in conversations about the future of the Internet and technology, it's critical that all marginalized voices, including sex workers, are included.
My name is Olivia Snow. I am a dominatrix and a research fellow at UCLA's Center for Critical Internet Inquiry.
Olivia studies sex work, technology and policy and writes about it on the Internet. She's been ducks and harassed online for it too, but that hasn't stopped her from centering sex workers in conversations about the Internet and technology.
So, something that I love.
About your work is that you really like lean into and interrogate this intersection of sex work and technology in the Internet. What has that been like, Like, why do you think it is so important for people who care about the Internet and technology to understand how sex workers show up on the Internet, how sex workers use technology, and how has that been sort of prescient about where
we're headed next. I feel like sex workers are sort of like they know what the fuck is happening on the Internet and where we're going shit that like, as they are constantly calling stuff correctly, how is that?
I remember I was on the subway home from work at like green morning, and I was going through I think Facebook and on my people you may know, all of my coworkers were on there, and like we never we didn't know each other's real names, Like I don't I don't want to know any other sex workers real names, especially for in like a double session. You know, I don't want to be like Mistress Megan or whatever, like
her name's like Emerald or something. So I was like, oh my god, Facebook is doxing me, like docxing on my cook I mean, I guess not docxing because docxing means with malicious intent, but well maybe, but still, and you know, it was obvious, like okay, like we're in close physical proximity, we're sharing the same like Wi Fi network, Like it makes sense that you know we're together twelve
hours a day. But you know, that's when I started, really I don't know noticing how harmful, just like being on the internet is, even if you're or having a cell phone even back in like the nineties and the early thousands, for getting their big accounts closed for doing sex work, which like like how did they know, you know, even like before cell phones, Like how the fuck would like Chase Bank know that the money you're depositing is from sex work and like try like okay, you know,
if you're depositing a certain amount of money and a certain uh like size of bill at a certain atm at a certain time, then like you're either selling drugs or you're selling sex.
Yeah, I've read your piece about or I've read pieces about like being today being banned from platforms like Venmore or even grub hub. Hor It's like I'm just trying to get a chicken sandwich, Like I'm just trying to get lunch. And I guess I wonder is there a lot of the people that I talked to on this show, they are marginalized people who have been raising the alarms about things on the internet, And oftentimes it's like this harm is going to impact a marginalized group, and then
it's going to impact everybody. Is there a vibe that you feel where it's like a constant kind of I told you so, or a constant kind of like I hate to be right all the time where folks engagement. Yes, we are like constantly talking about these increased levels of surveillance and digital judgment and have been kind.
Of for a while.
Oh absolutely, And like you know, I used to really love being like a too so because I'm like a kind of an asshole, but like I don't love it now, I hate it. I'm not working on an article right now where like Canary and the coal Mine is the metaphor that's usually used, but like that depends on the miner actually listening to the canary and getting the fuck out of the mind doesn't happen. It's more of a like Cassandra kind of situation where we're like god like
and you know, people figure making it up. So like I got banned from Door to Ash about a year ago, and I tweeted about it went like semi viral, and a bunch of sex in my reply is like, oh my god, this happened to me, Like what the fuck? I'm not a bunch of uh non sex workers were like, well, hi, I'll know, how are you sure? Like like maybe it was something else like did you violate terms of service
or whatever? And you know, like it was abundantly obvious to me because I've also been you know, I've been kicked off that, I've been kicked off cash up, I've been kicked off field, which is weird because that's like a kink sligh. Really, I've been kicked off, and you know it's it's TikTok, like a budget. I'm my TikTok account has been suspended like I think twice, and I've never even posted anything on TikTok ever, Like at all.
So it's clear to me that there's some type of data sharing happening, whether it's you know that you're in the same device, whether you know other whatever details. I don't know. I'm not the kind of.
Doctor, but.
You know, an algorithmic sweep of high risk account then sex workers are going to get caught up in it, which, like I mean, also, I feel like responses, at least to my personally, losing door Dash was kind of like like, oh, well, I'll make you a new account, or like cow, could I send you a sandwich? Like no, that's not the point. The point is that like fucking door Dash is like
somehow privy to this information. It's frustrating, I guess to I mean, and I don't know if it's necessarily gaslighting because like I guess, people really do believe that I'm you know, making it up or whatever, or like this can't be true. You know, door Dash isn't. Well, actually, no, DoorDash. I remember when this went viral and the New York Post reached out to DoorDash. They were like, no, we would never So that's gaslighting. But yeah, I don't know, it's it's Yeah, it's frustrated.
It's one of those things that people really have to listen to and center marginalized people.
Sex workers are very much included.
When you're thinking about the future of the Internet, and so much of your work is like speaks to that and looks to that, and like, you know, when we're thinking about the kind of Internet that we want to have, making sure that those voices are centered. Like you know, when we have legislation like the Kids Online Safety Act that you know has so much bipartisan support. When you hear things like, oh, this is a law to legislate the Internet in order to protect.
Kids, protect kids, what comes to your mind? Like what do you think when you hear stuff like that.
I mean, you know, if you had to ask me that question six years ago, I'd be like, we should protect kids. Like literally nobody, at least nobody in Congress gives a single shit about protecting kids. And like half these people were on like the Epstein book, like they they do not care. It's clearly like a smokescreen for increased surveillance. To me, like that's all I think at
this point. I do not believe anyone. I mean, well, I mean we've seen it, you know, in other sectors like the like rising homophobia that I personally haven't seen since like two thousand and four. That's also you know, protecting kids from like groomers or whatever the fuck.
You know.
It's just I I don't even think that that people making those claims at this point are doing it. It's like I don't I don't think they're doing in good faith period. You know, this is always and you know it's not necessarily about sex workers, but yeah, this is always about increased surveillance. They do not care about kids. If they care about kids, they be working on guns. Are they working on guns? No? So like that's yeah,
it's and it keeps working. Like also, like I mean, I know, I'm like relatively quite privileged, Like I'm, oh, white woman with a PhD. Like that's pretty high up there, and I often get pushback that's like like you're a privilege. Y'm like, well, yeah exactly, and you're still not listening, Like I mean, imagine if I weren't, like then we wouldn't even be having this argument because you wouldn't like deign to bother with me.
Let's take a quick break.
At our back.
Roe versus Wad was overturned almost a year ago, and since then we've all had to navigate what online privacy really means when simply accessing information online about abortion can be used as evidence to put people behind bars. Now, this is something that sex workers know all too well. That same vast network of online surveillance and criminalization used to target sex workers, also it threatens people who need abortions. In a piece for Wired called are You Ready to
be Surveilled Like a sex worker? Olivia points out that this post row world is simply the next and a larger campaign to expand state surveillance and e roade the right to privacy, a campaign that sex workers have been fighting for decades. Do you see a connection between sex work and abortion rights as it pertains to the Internet and the way it's legislated?
Oh yeah, I mean just like the ways that they're tracked. Like, okay, so this is going to be an underground economy. You're going to have to use cash. They're also going to be monitoring how you use cash. You know, you're you're like geolocation will be weaponized, you know, like facial recognition technology and at like traffic stops might be used to identify you, Like shit, that you thought was private is it in a lot of the same ways, not like
almost all the same ways. And I mean it's all just you know, uh, trying to restrict what women do with their bodies, you know, and like regardless of if that, you know, is the actual outcome, I think that's the intent on one hand. On the other hand, I'm like, I don't. I also don't care what the intent is because like, like I don't want to waste my time being like, but why is fascism like like not the point?
But yeah, no, I see them as entirely connected. I mean, same with with the like anti trans legislation, Like it's all about restricting what people do with their own bodies.
It feels like we're in a much more dire place because the last time that you know, before like in the seventies, before Roe was the law of the land, we didn't have this like vast surveillance network.
We all didn't carry GPS devices in our pockets.
And I feel like one of the ways that we're kind of worse off today is that there has been this sort of piece by piece tacit.
In like normalization of that.
But I think that we have this relationship with tech companies that like it's fine that they surveil us, and actually maybe it's good, like I have nothing to hide, I'm never gonna do anything wrong, like right where we don't even think about it anymore. Like when Ring released that show that was like Ring Nation, funny videos that you get from your ring camera.
I think that's meant to I think it's meant.
To signal to us that like this vast surveillance is actually good because it creates funny moments that you get to watch on TV.
So you shouldn't really think that critically.
About it right now. And I mean I think that's also tied up with like the way that I've been calling it, like the clout economy kind of works where I mean, thank god I didn't tweet in twenty thirteen, I think on Twitter ID but like you know, like stupid shit that like you know, whatever we've all said, stupid ship that we don't need to have on the internet, that just kind of like follows. It also makes me think of like the GDPR, like there's no right to
be forgotten. There's no grace if you, I don't know, do something stupid and you know, everything is so bad faith in a way.
I myself barely show up on social media because I don't want to.
Deal with it. Like I obviously.
There's there's like egregious cases, but like for the most part, you know, you and I are the same age. We like we have grown up online and so like we were, we were products of our age, products of our environment, products of like the social political.
Climate at the time. I don't think this is the internet landscape that we want.
I don't think it's the internet landscape that actually fosters things like good faith, disagreements, conversation, learning, you know, fucking up in public and being like, oh I'm you know, I messed up. I learned something. I don't think we have an internet climate that welcomes any of that. It's it's just an ocean of bad faith attacks that you have to like like a minefield that you have to navigate through, not something that you can actually show up to to.
You know, I learned something, and like we're living in this fascist healscape. Like of course it makes sense that you want to, you know, unleash that rage somewhere.
Some people are very committed to weaponizing anything, and you're someone who is like quite visible on social media. As we're in this like weird place with musk owning Twitter, how has it impacted how you.
Show up on Twitter? Ask someone who was so visible?
Well, you know, I recently went face out, maybe like two or three weeks ago, after like long discussions with my therapists. But like you know, there are so many for until I got dogs, I was meticulous about not even sharing my time zone, not saying anything about the weather, not saying if I was taking like a train or a bus or a car, or maybe I would like say I was taking a car because I don't own want anymore, so that people wouldn't be able to track
me down. And at a certain point, you know, it's horrifying to be dogs obviously, like I've had to move twice, but like my parents found my dogs, which is how why I haven't like spoken to them in whatever a year now, which all was kind of a blessing in
disguise because like, fuck those few people. I don't want to say like liberating because it's not it's horrible, but knowing that there's nothing you can hide like or yeah, we were saying like oh I don't need to hide anything like no, I actually do need to hide a lot of things. It's like my address and how I
make money. But having that just kind of pulled from you, I feel like it doesn't make things easier, but it's like that there's a whole level, there's a whole thought process that I would have to go through to be like, oh, did I like erase the metadata? Did I crop out the time zone? Did I you know that I don't need to do anymore? And that's weirdly, well I guess not weirdly, but that's you know, it freed up a lot of mental energy I didn't realize I was spending.
Yeah, I mean I don't share anything that is really like truly personal, like in a meaningful way with the inn way, because I I don't have it in me. I feel like I feel like there's a cost, particularly for women, particularly for women who are sex engaged in sex work. I think there's a cost that is that other people don't have to carry to being someone who's visible online.
But what's you know, what's most difficult for me, I think is that like, you know, if they want to like expose my shit, like whatever, go ahead, But the people close to me, like you know, my grandfather, for instance, or like partners, ex partners, friends, like but I mean, my partner was dosed and I still don't know how those motherfuckers figured out that I was dating period, let alone who I was dating, excuse me, And you know that too, which just fucking horrifying but also made me think,
you know, like the person I'm dating now is able to deal with that horror more than like some of my exes that I'm still friends with, And you know, having to just carry the burden of protecting other people's safety and other people's privacy with my own husband just taken is a lot.
But I mean that's like, like that's how it works. It's never just that the woman.
It's her partner, it's her mom, it's her community. Like that's part of the way that this kind of harassment functions. It's like, I'm not going to just come after you. I'm going to make everybody I'm going to get make there be a cost for anybody associating with you in your community.
Right, or like when I've done like panels or you'll probably get this when you upload this and like how are many weeks or whatever, people will be like huh. So I just wanted to let you know that doctor Olivia Snow is actually a fascist, and I'll probably like send you some deranged Twitter friends like about how I'm I don't know, like drinking baby's blood because that's not yeah, I.
Mean don't like I have gotten I hope this doesn't sound weird. I have gotten only once a DM from somebody I didn't know. Just so you know, you're following this person who was like, kicks puppies, kills babies, and I didn't reply because I.
Have a blanket rule. I don't engage with that.
If you're going to tell me that someone was violent toward you or something, that totally different story, right, I don't engage with this attitude of how could I cut this person down by making them lose followers on Twitter.
I'm not going to engage with it. Not interested.
You know, years ago, I might have been like, oh, that's fucked up, I won't follow them or whatever. But you know, now having had these well, I mean, you know, years ago, I guess I didn't have the visibility on Twitter that I have now, So I guess it's kind of a mood point. But like, you know, unless you're telling me that, yeah, like you said, like that someone was violent to you specifically, or you can give me some like concrete shit that I can look at and
be like, oh wow, Jesus Christ. Right, and yeah, and even then, you know, if it's something from like a tweet that's taking out of context from ten years ago, like that's I just this is what you're spending your time on.
Really exactly, Like, I am not in the business of like legislating people's online grievances. It's just like I'm I'm and I think it makes the Internet worse for everyone when that's how people like perceive it, when that's how people engage with it, you know what I mean.
Yeah, I find that people tend to reach out to other marginalized people specifically to try to, you know, warn them that I'm you know, sexss, a homophobic, of transfer whatever the fuck in a way like knowing that I am a part of a lot of these communities that they're trying to just sever me from.
More after a quick break, let's get right back into it. Last month, Elon Musk overhauled Twitter's verification system and ramped up Twitter Blue. The eight dollars a month subscription service that gives users access to perks like being able to post longer tweets and videos and giving the tweets of subscribers increased visibility, thinking that anybody who spends money on Twitter Blue is financially supporting Elon Musk. In response, there was a short lived campaign to block anyone with a
blue check mark. Now, Twitter is pretty much the only mainstream social media platform that will sort of allow sex
workers to show up there. Adult content is not explicitly banned on Twitter like it is on Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, and since some of the perks of Twitter Blue, like being able to post longer videos, could be good marketing for sex workers, it kind of makes sense that many of them would choose to stick around on the platform and pay for Twitter Blue, even if it's not an endorsement of Elon Musk or the way he runs the platform.
So a campaign to block anyone with a blue check mark on site is hostile to a community of people who already face digital hostility all over the internet. Thinking about Twitter and your relationship to it. When they rolled out the like Twitter Blue subscription, there was a whole campaign of like block people with blue check marks.
But then it was like, you know, there's Twitter.
It seems to be a platform where a lot of sex workers do show up for their businesses to make money, and so yeah, if you're blocking all of them, like you're not really you feel like maybe you're getting one over on Elon Musk, But who you're actually harming is sex workers who need, you know, to make livings.
And people are like, oh, you're giving eight dollars to a fascist, Like do you know how much money this motherfucker has? Eight dollars is a drop in the book, really ridiculous. One of the reasons I'm so active on Twitter is it's the only platform that tolerates sex workers. Instagram that hates us. I mean, I'm not on Facebook period. I think I deactivated when I noticed that, Like all my coworkers really foxed TikTok obviously, like I don't even
use it and I'm not allowed on it. So yeah, no, Twitter is the one platform where we can exist as sex workers and not have to worry about getting booted
at the drop of a hat. I mean, we still have to worry about getting booted kind of at the drop, but it's like slightly less bad, but yeah, no, And I mean, like it turns out I think that the Twitter blue subscription that like a lot of sex workers were getting didn't end up being that profitable, probably in large part because of the mass blocking, which, of course,
like algorithmically each block deboosts your visibility by you know. However, many points I've had people reach out to me to be like, oh, so and so is dangerous or whatever, And in almost every case it's been uh, trans women, wow, and like are they dangerous? Or do y'all really hate trans women? Because there's a pattern here and the pattern is not that's dangerous. Like so you know with the block the blue thing, you know, like are you really
worried that people are giving money to a fascist? Like what is he like the second rigist person on the planet?
Now?
Like really, yeah, like this is where you're going after and you're not trying to get i don't know, like the irs to collect some of them, Like really this is your priority? And like it are you fighting fashism or workers?
I mean it sounds like even if it's not based in hating sex workers, which it likely a lot of it is, I think it's also about like not thinking about sex workers not not not like being able to see sex workers as people whose perspectives matter who you want to like have a right to show up on an online space.
Right, or like who are you okay with me? In collateral damage?
That's exactly That's such a good way to put it. I think that's exactly it that like, well they don't really matter.
You know, right, or like, well we can't just you know, stop fighting fascism so that sex workers can live second place, but deside the point, you know, like you're just undermining your own point number one, But like I don't.
When Olivia is asked how we build a safer Internet, she bristles, how can we have a truly safer internet when it's worn from a society that is often not safe? As doctor Sophia Noble, author of Algorithms of Oppression, a groundbreaking work that confirmed that search engines are built with the same old race and gender biases baked into their algorithms, has noted technology is not neutral. It reflects the same dynamics that exist in society and the biases of people
who create them. And this is pretty clear when it comes to AI. Back when the AI image generator Lensa was taking over everyone's social media feed. Olivia found that the program generated non consensual sexualized images of her, even from images of her as a child, and she sees the way that this will be used to harass, especially harassed people who are already marginalized online, like women of color, children,
queer folks, and sex workers. She writes, this horror story that I just narrated sounds too dystopian to be a real threat. But as I have also learned through my own endlessly revolving door of cyberstalkers, no amount of exonerating evidence is sufficient to qual a harassment campaign. Coordinated harassment is already unfathomably effective in silencing marginalized voices, especially those of sex workers, queer.
People, and black women.
Without AI generated revenge porn, And while the technology may not be sophisticated enough to produce convincing deep things now, it will be soon. Your photos will be used to train the AI that will create magic avatars for you, and for only three ninety nine a pop.
You talked about.
How LENSA like like non consensually sexualizes people, even like images of them as children, and so I guess my question is like, what do you think about this time that we're in where everybody's talking about AI. It seems like if you scroll Apple podcasts the tech charts, every podcast.
Is about AI.
We're having so many conversations about how quickly it is developing and how it's going to change everything, blah blah blah. Do you like, like, as someone who thinks about the intersection of gender, sex and technology, where do you think we are headed to hell directly?
Now?
Like you know, with that LENSA piece. I didn't reach out to Lensa because I didn't even know. I'm not trained as a journalist, so I'm just kind of like, I don't know, I don't have a transcript of the interview. Sorry, but I didn't. I didn't reach out to them, but I think Jezebel did and they were like, hey, what do you what do you think of this as like it's creating you know, child sexual exploitation material, And Lensa's response with something like, well, that person should look into
the laws in their jurisdiction. And they're always like kind of degendering me, like that person by them, and I'm like, I I have a name and whatever. Anyway, and you know, because they might be like subject to certain penalties for creating this, uh like the problem.
They create, like you didn't create.
It, right, yeah, And they're like, well, we have a policy that says no photos of kids, and I'm like,
uh like, even even if I wasn't. So the reason I even thought to put in those childhood photos is because I was just like doing experiments like digging around and I so I first ran it with like just random pictures of myself and I thought that the results were like kind of like I was like, oh, these are pretty neat, and you know, knowing that my face has been like circulated without my consent, I'm like, I
don't get what they're gonna have my face? Oh no. Then I ran it a second time using like pictures where I thought I looked hot, and that was where it was creating nudes not consentually, and you know, nudes being another thing that you weren't supposed to submit to it. So I ran it again and did you did you run it or did you for money? I was like that, I tweeted. I was like, someone sent me three So there were three different gender options. Was I think female male?
And I want to say others, right, So I ran it through the female ones like twice. I ran it through the male one and thinking like, well, it give me like a beard or something, and it did maybe on like two pictures, but the rest it was just still like hyper sexual, just in like slightly different ways. And then I ran it on the like other gender option, and it made me look like a child. You know. I was like uploading pictures of like me, no, like in my mid thirties, and it spit out pictures where
I looked like a teenager. And I think it was because the algorithm, which I just like hate saying like as of like that sounds the Illuminati, but like the algorithm it's way of understanding like not male not female is just like totally desexualized and like infantilized, which is you know why I suspect that it, you know, made my adult face and body and look like that of a not body but face look like that of a child's.
I think of like like uh sofia nobles algorithms of oppression, right that, like the Internet reflects back like our absolute worst tendencies and not just because people are bigger dickheads on the Internet than they are in real life though that you know, certainly doesn't help the but that like, uh, you know what's getting like the input to the Internet is like what are like the biases that our culture actually has and our culture, like our society, our societies
are disgusting. We are racists, we're sexist or homophobic, which are like we're awful like as just a as a a species. And the Internet you know, it doesn't it
doesn't you know, make value judgments. It just recognizes patterns and what it's going to spit back out at us, especially with machine learning algorithms that are trying to you know, tell us what they think we want to hear is going to be like the absolute worst stereotypes, so you know lensa like sexualizing women like well, yeah, of course it did, because we are a disgusting society that sexualizes women and children.
Yeah.
And it's sad for me because I think there is definitely a time where like AI is so powerful that I would imagine that it can reimagine worlds where those kinds of harmful like stereotypes and racism, sexism, that phobia, transphobia or for all of that.
It I would imagine a world.
I would like to imagine a world where it is not just simply recreating these things.
And re establishing these things.
But I feel like it's so clear that that's not, that's not It'd be a nice fantasy, but that's not what we're.
Getting right well, And like, you know, there are some like some systems or features, like some content moderation in place that you know, prevents like just straight up slurs popping up and something like chat GBT, but that I mean that that's obviously a band aid that's not going to uh like just like all the microaggressions inherent in
all of this shit. And you know, I'm thinking I was asked a few months ago to give a talk on like how to have a safer Internet, and I remember being clicked with that is a ridiculous question, because you cannot have a safer Internet until we have a safer society, because Internet is just a reflection of that then intensified. So like, sure, you can create some kind of AI to identify and take down like child sexual
exploitation material, but is that going to keep kids safe? No, like not at all, you know, Like I yeah, And.
It's funny because you know, your experience with Lensa, with them saying well, you could be facing you know, some sort.
Of punishment for it.
And it's like, even if Lensa the app, even if the tool has a rule against uploading pictures of children, if there's no safeguard, if you're allowed, if you're able to do it, in what way is it really a rule?
Right?
If you can do it and still get those images? How is it a rule if there's no safeguards.
Right, And with them, I was like, I'm not you know, writing this to like embarrass you. It's not like a gotcha. It's like, hey, this is violent, maybe you should work on making it less violent. And of course the response is like, let's be more violent. Like I'm not trying to, you know, like ruin your business model. I'm trying to be like, hey guys, this is actually really dangerous. This is really dangerous. Maybe we should work I'm making it
less dangerous. And just you know, I get being defensive, you know, like I've certainly been accused of being like, you know, a trafficker or whatever on Twitter because everyone's a fucking idiot, Like no one likes likes getting that, you know, pointed out to them, especially in a public forum, but like you're like missing the forest of the trees here.
Yeah, are you concerned about things like AI generated deep fakes and like a marketplace fan?
Oh yeah, oh yeah. The only thing that makes me, that gives me some fain horrifying glimmer of hope is that that technology is just becoming more and more widely available. And I wonder if like deep fake revenge porn will just become so ubiquitous that the like first response will be like, oh, that's you pake for revenge porn instead of like, oh that's real, right, yeah, it's oh absolutely,
And I mean it's already become a problem. Yeah. I remember in that once a piece, I wrote something like like, you know, with like four to six months deep pake revenge port, it's gonna be everywhere, and then like low and behold. Four months later they're like streamers and shit just getting harassed with this and you know it's revenge one is interesting too, and I think this goes back to like why people like fucking with sex workers and just like marginalized people in general, is that like it's
not necessity, it's not physically violent. You're not like punching someone in the face. You're you're you know, but you are I mean, and even beyond like damaging the reputation and damaging their career, the like psychological warfare of some of this shit, where it's just a constant environment of fear, not even of what you're actually doing, but not even what like you could be perceived as doing. I mean, I see very little benefit to AI, if any, considering it's potential for harm.
Yeah, I personally have a little bit of trouble wrapping my head around all the different conversations of that AI.
What is pr what is true? What is like doomism? What is marketing?
Where do you think how do you think AI is going to shape the experience of marginalized people ten years down the line?
I mean, I think that like there are some things AI is like actually good at, and it's like stupid mundane office shit, Like I need to come up with a course description for a class I've just and I've been meaning to just get on chat GPT and be like, hi, Chat GBT, you give me a course description for blah blah blah, and then you know, like tweak it or whatever.
But like you know, writing like mundane emails and shit like I can't even imagine the number of hours I spent in grad school thinking like should I sign it with best or sincerely? Like that kind of shit? You know, AI I think is good for But you know, I cannot imagine without without restriction, what will like I I maybe I could, but I like don't want to, you know, Like, you know, I don't think that AI. I know, AI
is not sentient. I think that's a ridiculous argument. But the way that some of this gets coded gives AI not the agency, but like doesn't restrict it from doing like wildly harmful shit. And you know, I really can't see a functioning society if AI continues at the pace that it is. I mean, and of course that like rests on the assumption that we're currently in a functioning society is questionable, But I know, I really can't think of how that could possibly be a reality that anyone could live in.
I mean, we're in this very weird moment in technology right now.
Platforms feel weird, the future of platforms feel weird.
All this a musk forever? What that fuck?
I know it is bad.
I mean, just like the people I know personally who worked at Twitter, who had like their entire lives up ended and like lots or livelihoods. I mean, you know, which is such a like minor piece in the puzzle of like how he has fucked up the entire fucking Internet.
Yeah yeah, I mean when we're thinking about going forward, like why do you feel it's so important to like, why is it so important to make sure that the voices of sex workers are like really at the forefront when we're thinking about.
The future of the Internet and the future of tech.
Well, I mean, so sex workers a have to be on top of tech because we're like one of the first things in any term of terms of service is you know, no sex adjacent anything like thanks fass Sessa. Uh, you know, we're going to fight prostitution or whatever by making sure that like, you know, dominatrix can't get a burrito, right, yeah, good job. Yeah, so we already have to, you know, like sex workers on the whole are a lot moreamiliar with like Internet privacy and like how to use VPN
and how to use like cryptocurrencies and shit. So like I mean that that's the one, but the other b being like sex workers are consistently the most loathed and dehumanized people, like period, Like I think of like like no humans involved. What that has referred to it's been what what was it? How did Sylvia Winter put it? I think it was like black boys without jobs on doc human and people, I want to say, and and sex workers we are are we're so consistently dehumanized, We're
not seen as people. If we are seen as people, that it's only for like stadistic purposes that we are seen as such. And we are you know, concept we're perceived as a safety threat. So to keep ourselves safe, we have to you know, be take these I want to say, like seep almost bizarre measures to like stay safe in an environment that perceives our existence as a threat.
And you know, I think what I think is unique to sex workers in that respect is having to be like a step ahead of the curve and that like or like actually being specifically prohibited by policy because you know, there are all kinds of demographics that are fully dehumanized, but you know, sex workers aren't seen as like I guess like a demographic. You know, I've been trying to like theorize this where like the internet kind of makes sex work like a fixed identity, Like even if you're
not doing sex work, you're still a sex worker. And you know, especially with the way that that like search engines and shit go are, you know, I don't know if I would still be in sex work if I hadn't been Docks by my full name, which is ethnic as shit. I mean, only one on the planet with this goofy ass polish name. I don't know if I'd still be doing it. But at this point, I'm like,
it's kind of a waste. If you know, why would I be applying for academic jobs in fucking literature when they're going to google me and find out that, you know, I was a dominatrix in twenty nineteen. I might as well be making money off of that, I guess, because you know, now I'm always going to be a dominatrix,
Like that is always going to be online. The way that like sex workers work too, has been kind of like misunderstood and misapplied, which you know, sex workers work means that or should mean that sex workers deserve labor protections like any other worker, or workplace safety protections, or like sex workers should you know he experienced violence, should be able to you know, report them, to be protected for it or from it, but instead this like I feel like the popular view is like sex work is
just another job, like working at like the mall, which means I can treat sex workers as terribly as I treat other or low wage workers.
No, that is not it, Like no, yeah, and.
Like well why didn't you just get another job? And like no, that's not what you know it, And I get like, I think it's hard to communicate that, you know, like horphobia is kind of like an amalgamation of all these other like biases or like matrices of oppression and not, like the stigma is so bad that in almost every scenario, you're not going to turn to sex work unless you have exhausted every other option, which is why you know, sex workers are usually like working class or poor or
women of color or trans. People think that sex work or like hor phobia is something you can like opt out of, or like you could just quit being a sex worker, versus like I can't quit being like a Jewish woman, but like, no, you can't actually, like even if I wanted to, no one will let me. And I don't know, I think that that kind of nebulousness of sex worker as an identity also makes us such like uh ripe population, I guess for this kind of shit.
I saw this headline maybe like a week or so ago, and it was like the FBI or the you know, secret service or whatever misused some surveillance technology that was supposed to identify January sixth Writers, which sign note was my worst birthday.
No six no Olivia.
But it was like, uh, surveillance technology meant to identify January six writers was used against Black Lives Matter organizers and like I think it said like misuse. I'm like it wasn't misuse because I think that's why it was made.
I think that was the point of the tech exactly. Yeah, so you know these few demographics, I think Black Lives Matter gets is more visible than sex workers, like obviously maybe obviously, I don't know, and no one's gonna argue like you could just opt out of being black, like right, yeah, But I don't know as far as voices that are like a threat to I don't want to say social order,
but or hegemony. I don't even know what word I'm trying to think of, but I know what you Yeah, yeah, that these voices that kind of threaten the status quo are intentionally the most marginalized, and they or for need to be amplified all that more. You know, I was thinking I was in this workshop, maybe like two weeks ago, and everyone's talking about center marginalized vices, center marginalized voices.
I'm like, okay, but the thing about marginalized voices is that they are marginalized, right, which means no one wants to believe them, and no one's going to listen. Like you could say, center marginalized voices all you want, but like, does that mean that people are actually going to listen to those voices you're centering? No? Like, so you know, I like, I don't know how to push back on that exactly, other than yelling on the internet, which I do a lot of.
Well, I always end my interviews as asking when it comes to the state of the internet and technology, are you hopeful?
Do you have any hope? And if so, what is it that gives you hope? Is it a hard no?
Yes? Like shit? You know, I okay, So one thing that does kind of give me hope, and this may be sounds like just don't give a shit? Is that like so I was on this I was in this workshop that was just the marginalized worsh I was just describing, like I was invited to this workshop to work, uh, to work on AI policy and you know, figure out what to do going forward. And it was a sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation, and right, like uh like right,
nice hotel for free. But the fact that they're inviting a sex worker at all to something like that, and
it wasn't there with me. And then I mean as far as like people you wouldn't expect to see at these kind of events, and I think there were too, like a formally incarcerated person and another organizer who was my But like the fact that some voices, like the most privileged of the marginalized are getting listened to a little but makes me think that's a step in maybe the right direction, because you know, I don't think that's something that was happening ten years ago.
Yeah, take the hope where you can get it.
Yeah, that's you know, my one faint glimmer And like, of course I don't. And I like always try to emphasize like when I'm when I say like, well, it gives me hope that I specifically, am being listened to? Like No, it's not about like me specifically or about sex workers specifically, because you know, at the end of
the day, this is all going to affect everyone. So you know the fact that somehow these uh like more vulnerable silence voices are getting heard just a little bit, I think is hopefully right.
Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or just want to say hi? You can read us at Hello at tangody dot com. You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tengody dot com. There Are No Girls on the Internet was created by me Bridget Todd. It's a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed creative. Jonathan Stricklet is our executive producer. Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer. Michael Almado is our contributing producer. I'm your host,
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