#reduce bias

[learningdevelopment12]

Discover how to reduce bias effectively in your organization. Read these 10 actionable strategies to build a fair, inclusive workplace: https://www.infoprolearning.com/blog/10-ways-you-can-reduce-bias-in-the-workplace/

[krakenguard]

The only thing Ansbach ever really said was "Mohg deserved better." And this is the thing that everyone rags on about when it comes to Ansbach being biased?

There's only really one instance where someone has any concern toward Miquella(a ghost in the Consecrated Snowfields), but other than that, Malenia? Leda? They have absolute faith in Miquella. He has everything under control.

"He possesses the wisdom, the allure, of a god – he is the most fearsome Empyrean of all.”

From my perspective: There is a lot -- and I mean a lot -- of bias when it comes to Miquella vs. Mohg. Like, people have latched onto the idea that Miquella truly is this pure and radiant figure, where's Mohg is condemned as this pure evil monster that deserved what happened.

I'm not saying that Miquella is evil at heart. But I do feel like what he did to Mohg was awful.

It is a double standard because there are way more people out there that will excuse Miquella over that. Because Mohg lacks the pure radiance that Miquella carries. They can't tolerate the idea that, maybe Mohg truly WAS the victim in the story after all?

Like, I think there's a pretty solid reason as to why Ansbach ends up being our biggest ally in the DLC, compared to Leda -- and later Miquella himself -- who ends up as our adversaries.

And hell, you can side with Leda and kill Ansbach. But the end result remains the same. Leda turns her sword on you. And hell, you gain Sanguine Noble Nataan as an ally if you somehow screwed up Ansbach's quest, whether by killing him or not delivering the Sacred Rite Scroll!

Miquella will have his Age of Compassion. But there's no room for you there. Just as there was no room for Mohg.

"Those who put faith in an absolute good also believe in the existence of true evil. But to others, the distinction between the two can be quite unclear."

[theramblingvoid]

[ID: two screenshots from the game Fallen London. Both show an option called "Endure", greyed out and unavailable. The caption beside the Dangerous quality simply says "No" where a required skill level should be. In the second screenshot, the caption beside the Wounds quality says "Not even you."]

Hands down my favourite little detail of this event so far. In a game like Fallen London, where the player is so continuously referred to as important or skilled to the exclusion of nearly every common challenge, the uniform unavoidability of a giant falling wall of rock is...so nicely chilling. No. Not even you.

[fairyhaos]

look at him my lovely gorgeous prince ✨

[crabussy]

reblog for a larger sample size and to reduce sample bias!!

[wheatweetwheat]

to focus on a positive in this fuck ass drama, it’s awesome seeing tubbo recognized for how intelligent and succinct he is. over the years, he’s kind of been reduced to just “tommy’s friend”, so to see him very kindly, individually recognized for his mature response is awesome.

aside from his friendship with tommy, i can’t help but feel like the fandom’s perception of him has been motivated by ableism regarding his dyslexia. im very happy to see that bias being put aside.

[sayruq]

Dear Mark Zuckerberg and Leadership, This letter is a follow-up to the letter that was circulated internally on Dec 19, 2023 and deleted and dismissed due to our Community Engagement Expectations (CEE) on what can be discussed internally. Hence, we are sharing our concerns externally. We, Meta employees, wish to express our disappointment and astonishment at the lack of acknowledgement and care the leaders of this company have shown toward the Palestinian community and its allies. In private conversations, we hear from our Palestinian colleagues about family members they have lost in Gaza and family they are working tirelessly to find safety for. However, any open support for our Palestinian colleagues or the millions facing a humanitarian crisis in Palestine is met with internal censorship of employee concerns, biased leadership statements showing one-sided support, and external censorship that is raising public alarm and distrust of our platforms. Internally, we have called out the months of silencing within our workplace forums. While we loudly display “Your voice is valued”, CEE is used as a guise to delete dissenting opinions and silence employees that may simply be seeking solace from their coworkers or raising awareness about building safer products. While in other companies, employees within Employee Resource Groups (ERG) are allowed to connect and speak freely with each other, ERG’s such as Muslims@ and Palestinians@ have faced so much censorship that an employee proposed just deleting the ERG altogether instead of giving the illusion that we can freely build community at Meta. CEE claims to reduce disruptions in our workplace, yet censorship from CEE has caused many of us at Meta to feel disrupted, unheard, and unsafe to the point that several of our Metamates have decided to resign. In the words of our former colleague, any mention of Palestine is taken down - Even when the post was from a colleague expressing their grief. Even when the post was to celebrate the UN International day of support to the Palestinian people. Even when the post is a link to a fundraiser to help the Gazans. Even when asking questions about product bugs that affect Palestinian voices.

One of the original core values of Facebook was to “Be Open” and our current values claim that “We create a culture where we are straightforward and willing to have hard conversations with each other.” Employees have always been first responders to surface issues raised externally to those internally with the power and knowledge to fix them. However when over 450 colleagues came together to sign a letter similar to this one in December, CEE was used to delete the letter and restrict one of the writers from their work devices for over two months while the workplace, product, and policy concerns brought forth were completely ignored. Employees have attempted to raise product concerns related to the conflict only to have their posts and comments censored or dismissed throughout internal channels. Most recently, questions about investigative reports indicating the possibility of governments, ISPs, and coordinated bad actors using Whatsapp data for military targeting have been met with dismissive and insufficient responses or outright deleted throughout internal forums. Meta leaders have posted numerous strong statements of support for our Israeli colleagues along with condemnation of the attack on Israel on October 7th that took the lives of ~1,200 civilians, both on internal and external platforms. Mark stated on his public Facebook - “The terrorist attacks by Hamas are pure evil. There is never any justification for carrying out acts of terrorism against innocent people. The widespread suffering that has resulted is devastating. My focus remains on the safety of our employees and their families in Israel and the region.”

However, bias and inequity is painfully apparent when those same leaders do not similarly share support for our Palestinian colleagues and allies nor condemnation of the attacks on Palestine, which have now taken ~35,000 civilian lives and created a humanitarian crisis of displacement and starvation for ~2 million Palestinians. This has created a hostile and unsafe work environment for hundreds of our Palestinian, Arab, Muslim, anti-Zionist Jew, and anti-genocide colleagues at the company, who have felt consistently alienated and uncomfortable at work. Many have tried to articulate this through posts on Workplace only to be censored, rebuffed, and/or penalized. Feedback shared directly with leadership on Workplace Chat has been met with dismissiveness. Bias and inequity for the human rights and humanitarian crisis in Gaza is also apparent when compared to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, after which there was an outpouring of leadership support on all fronts, including additional resourcing and investment through various social impact initiatives. The lights in the Dublin office were even painted with the colors of the Ukraine flag. Leadership must do better to achieve true equity and inclusion. Externally, when it comes to Palestine, the dismissive tone and lack of investment by Meta is not new and the company has consistently failed to thoroughly take action on years of evidence of suppression of Palestinian voices on our platforms worldwide. In 2024 the company is still slowly addressing the findings of an independent audit influenced by Human Rights Watch’s (HRW) 2021 letter to Meta on the Palestinian conflict 3 years ago. In the wake of October 7th, Meta has ignored reasonable requests for transparency on our content policies from Senator Elizabeth Warren and other lawmakers around the globe. Numerous civil rights organizations, some of whom are Meta partners, have been met with dismissal on the censorship concerns brought forth - leading to external petitions such as one against Meta’s proposed policy of treating “Zionist” as a proxy for "Jewish”, which collected over 52,000 signatures. While Meta denies any Palestinian censorship or bias to the public, internally groups of employee volunteers have found numerous product and policy issues with disparate impacts to Palestinian, Muslim, and Arab communities since October 7th. The few improvements that have been made were achieved only by appealing to isolated product teams, with minimal senior leadership support or resources. Furthermore, in the wake of global criticism of censorship and moderation, leading into the biggest year for democracy in history, Meta has updated its policy to no longer recommend ‘political content’ by default across Instagram and Threads without clear guidelines of how this would impact content originating from global conflict zones. Meta has continued to fail the Palestinian community through its policies and lack of investment.

“Meta.Metamate.Me.” We believe we are all Meta and are committed to respectfully working together to address the issues internally and externally, while holding firmly to the demands we have been echoing for months: We demand an end to censorship - stop deleting employee’s words internally in order to foster an inclusive environment where all communities feel seen, heard, and safe We demand acknowledgment - share internal acknowledgments of support for Palestinian colleagues and acknowledge the lives lost in the ongoing humanitarian crisis in Gaza to recognize our shared humanity We demand transparency and accountability - allocate dedicated resources to investigate issues of censorship and biases on our platforms and openly disclose findings to build trust among employees and the public We implore you to end the silence - issue a public statement urging for an immediate, permanent ceasefire in Gaza As tech workers, we have a tremendous privilege to work on products that serve the world, and with that comes tremendous responsibility. We have been proud to work at Meta – and want to continue believing in its mission to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together.

If you're a current or former Meta worker please sign the letter here

[probablyasocialecologist]

Meta has engaged in a “systemic and global” censorship of pro-Palestinian content since the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza war on 7 October, according to a new report from Human Rights Watch (HRW). In a scathing 51-page report, the organization documented and reviewed more than a thousand reported instances of Meta removing content and suspending or permanently banning accounts on Facebook and Instagram. The company exhibited “six key patterns of undue censorship” of content in support of Palestine and Palestinians, including the taking down of posts, stories and comments; disabling accounts; restricting users’ ability to interact with others’ posts; and “shadow banning”, where the visibility and reach of a person’s material is significantly reduced, according to HRW. Examples it cites include content originating from more than 60 countries, mostly in English, and all in “peaceful support of Palestine, expressed in diverse ways”. Even HRW’s own posts seeking examples of online censorship were flagged as spam, the report said. “Censorship of content related to Palestine on Instagram and Facebook is systemic and global [and] Meta’s inconsistent enforcement of its own policies led to the erroneous removal of content about Palestine,” the group said in the report, citing “erroneous implementation, overreliance on automated tools to moderate content, and undue government influence over content removals” as the roots of the problem.

[...]

Users of Meta’s products have documented what they say is technological bias in favor of pro-Israel content and against pro-Palestinian posts. Instagram’s translation software replaced “Palestinian” followed by the Arabic phrase “Praise be to Allah” to “Palestinian terrorists” in English. WhatsApp’s AI, when asked to generate images of Palestinian boys and girls, created cartoon children with guns, whereas its images Israeli children did not include firearms.

[sidewalk-scrawls]

(To reduce bias, please avoid putting your answer / the most popular answer in the tags. Thanks!)