Lucasfilm Research Library

Yesterday I stumbled upon an article entitled The Web is not a post-racial utopia, which concerns a videogame called Rust. It explains that when player enters the world of the game, they are “born” naked and alone. The game consists of surviving the wilderness. I’m guessing it’s like a grown-up version of Minecraft in some sense.

In the initial version of the game, all the players were born bald and white. In a later version, race was handed out randomly. And as you can guess, the complaints came pouring in after the change, as well as a marked increase in racially hostile language.

This is all while blacks and Hispanics play more videogames than whites. They were not complaining about being cast as a white man in the initial version, because it’s so common. Videogame designers are almost all white guys.

I’ll paraphrase from a great interview with one of the newest Star Wars heros here John Boyegawhen I say, I’m pretty sure there wouldn’t have been any complaints if everybody were born a randomly colored alien. White people are okay with being cast as a green alien avatar, but no way they’re going to be cast as a black man. WTF, white people?

Of course, not everyone’s complaining. In fact the reactions are interesting although extreme. They’re thinking of setting up analytics to track the reactions. They’re also thinking of assigning gender and other differences randomly to avatars. And by the way, it looks like they’ve recently been attacked by hackers.

For what it’s worth, I’d love to see men in video games dealing with getting their period. Actually, that’s a great idea. Why not have that as part of the 7th grade ‘Health and Sexuality’ curriculum for both boys and girls? Those who advance to the next level can experience being pregnant and suffering sciatica. Or maybe even hot flashes and menopause, why not?

Yesterday at my Occupy meeting we watched a recent Rachel Maddow piece on the suspension of democracy in Michigan:

If it’s too long, the short version is that instead of having elected officials, some specially chosen towns have instead ‘Emergency Managers,’ who do things like save money by pumping in poisonous water.

So, as usual, my group had a bunch of questions, among them: what is the racial make-up of the towns who are in receivership?

Well first, here’s a list of towns currently under receivership, which I mapped on Google Maps:

And next I looked at a census map of where black people live in Michigan:

I also wanted to zoom into the Detroit area:

and compared that to the municipalities under receivership in the area:

Just in case you’re wondering, that teal spot on the left is exactly where the Inkster is. And Wayne County’s government is also in receivership, but it’s a county, not a town.
two towns, Inkster and Wayne County, are.

Astronomer Aomawa Shields searches for clues that life might exist elsewhere in the universe by examining the atmospheres of distant exoplanets. When she isn't exploring the heavens, the classically trained actor (and TED Fellow) looks for ways to engage young women in the sciences using theater, writing and visual art. "Maybe one day they'll join the ranks of astronomers who are full of contradictions," she says, "and use their backgrounds to discover, once and for all, that we are truly not alone in the universe."

Download video: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TEDTalks_video/~5/8pauLTRmD6Q/AomawaShields_2015U.mp4

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