Month: December 2019

John Torpey wrote a piece in Forbes (Nov 8, 2019)

John Torpey (Faculty)

Wrote a piece in Forbes titled “From Surveillance Communism To Surveillance Capitalism And Beyond

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Thirty years ago this Saturday, the Berlin Wall “fell” unexpectedly when East Germany’s communist government lost control over its citizens’ freedom to travel.  Soon after the East Germans gained the liberty to leave and the opportunity to criticize their government without fear of reprisals, the government was pushed to hold free elections. All this presaged the unraveling of the German Democratic Republic and, within a few more years, of Soviet Communism itself.

Having acquired the freedom to protest openly, one of the first things the East Germans did was to descend upon the headquarters of the Ministry for State Security, universally known by its German acronym, the Stasi.  The Stasi was the “sword and shield of the party,” as its motto had it, and was widely hated for its frightening control over people’s lives. Everyone knew, or at least thought, that the Stasi was spying on ordinary East Germans all the time, and that they had to constantly be on their guard about what they could say and where.  To many people, the secret police were the essence of Communist rule.

 

Read more here.

Alexandrea Ravenelle wrote a piece in the New York Times Opinion section (Dec. 8, 2019)

Alexandrea Ravenelle (Alum 2018)

Wrote a piece in the New York Times Opinion section titled “The Gig Economy’s Sexual Misconduct Problem, and How to Fix It.”

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Credit…Claire Merchlinsky

Uber has released its long-awaited safety report, detailing sexual assaults, fatal physical assaults and motor vehicle fatalities in the United States. The results on sexual assault are disturbing: nearly 6,000 incidents in 2017 and 2018 combined, ranging from “nonconsensual touching” to rape.

Though most of the reported rape victims were riders, Uber drivers were victims of other types of sexual assaults at roughly equal rates as riders. And Uber has finally acknowledged the risks its drivers face, saying in its report that they “have a right to have their experiences told, and we have a responsibility to stand with them so that we can create the safest possible environment for drivers and their passengers.”

Read more here.