Some thoughts on increasing diversity re: Amira

Hello All,

The time in which we are building technology standards has changed over the
past years. There is an increasing demand for inclusivity as part of the
baseline of all activities.

This responsibility is all our responsibility. We can not ask for people to
volunteer - we must make an active effort to seek out, invite and encourage
diverse views. Those of us in privileged positions must restrain ourselves,
our opinions, make room for others AND listen to them.

I unfortunately witnessed the missteps on the Amira work. I think is
important work and can have an impact. There is an opportunity for it to
move beyond this small community. I've heard Christopher speak to this. In
order to increase the probability of this work having a positive impact
beyond here - it needs to include reviews and feedback from people who are
similar to the character it's based on.

I speak for myself, while I share the same gender as Amira, I can not truly
conceive what it may be like to be in her shoes. Additionally, I have not
done significant research in this space to be able to intelligently, and
authentically speak for someone based on that character. I think the
majority of the people who worked on Amira are in the same position. We can
do better with a little effort.

How to resolve this? First, it is the responsibility of the project leader
to take this seriously and address it. How does one go about expanding
one's biases to find people that are different from you if your story/use
case/product is based on/for someone different from you? I've had similar
problems in my own previous research, and the TL, DR answer is that you
have to put in some hours, and you have to proactively reach out and invite
them to participate. Then you have to listen to them. (If you want to read
more:
https://medium.com/@heathervescent/finding-the-women-in-cybersecurity-800fc51ecb7a
)

In the Amira case, I thought for 1 minute and two names came to mind as the
first people I would, if I was leading this project, reach out to - and
humbly ask for their review/assistance in identifying others:
- Adam Cooper of ID2020
- Tykn (https://twitter.com/Tykn_tech)
- I would also circle back with women who are experience dealing with
Trolling and attacks online, as that was one fear Amira had for being
anonymous. Shireen who was involved in some of the Amira work has deep
experience in this space.

I would work as hard as possible to get multiple diverse views and not
accept one person to speak for a race or gender or whatever bucket you want
to use.

This is how I solve the problem of diversity in my research. It takes time
and effort - but not that much. Certainly a lot less than we spend on many
of the issues on this list. And that effort pays off. But you have to DO
it. You can't wait/ask for someone to do it for you. And believe me, it's
gonna be hard and you might hear things you don't like. That means your
biases are being popped like popcorn and that's a good thing.

The way we built technology/standards in the past is not enough. Technology
that is developed without diversity in mind is exclusionary. The world has
changed, and with it, the demands to build inclusive technology standards.

Respectfully,

-Heather

-- 
Heather Vescent <http://www.heathervescent.com/>
President, The Purple Tornado, Inc <https://thepurpletornado.com/>
Author, A Comprehensive Guide to Self Sovereign Identity
<https://ssiscoop.com/>
Author, The Cyber Attack Survival Manual <http://amzn.to/2i2Jz5K>

@heathervescent <https://twitter.com/heathervescent> | Film Futures
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