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DL 240

The Ethics of Care

Published: April 4, 2020 • 📧 Newsletter

Welcome to Digitally Literate, issue 240. Your go-to source for insightful content on education, technology, and the digital landscape.

🔖 Key Takeaways

Hi all, welcome to issue 240 of Digitally Literate.

Over the last couple of weeks, I've talked about the Online Learning Collective Facebook Group that I helped found. As of this morning, there are almost 25,000 members in the group.

This week we shifted gears as we re-branded as the Higher Ed Learning Collective to better differentiate the name of the group. You can follow us on Twitter and Instagram.

I also helped post the following this week:

📺 Watch

Dr. Jeffrey VanWingen provides guidance on how to shop safely and bring things into your house during the pandemic.

Important corrections to the video: The CDC recommends Americans wear cloth masks in public (as of April 3, 2020). Rinse fruits and vegetables with water—no soap. NIH data suggests COVID-19 lives on cardboard for 1 day. Perishable foods like meat should be brought into the home and refrigerated. Only disinfect the outside packaging.

Please also review official CDC guidance on disinfectants. This video became widely shared—demonstrating both the hunger for practical guidance and the challenges of rapidly-evolving health recommendations.

📚 Read

We've grown accustomed to living through an information war fought largely by hardened political operatives and trolls. While the coronavirus crisis is political and will continue to be politicized, its most consequential fights take place in the "fog of pandemic" where so much of our data—from health statistics to economic indicators—is flawed or evolving.

Today's propaganda could be tomorrow's truth. Or vice versa. Even the good guys are working with limited information and hoping for the best. We are not prepared for what's coming.

As this information spreads, cell phone data shows people are not social distancing, especially in certain regions of the U.S.

There's much discussion lately about how the screentime debate has ended, and screens won. I don't entirely agree with this, but I have been more thoughtful about our use of screens as we adapt to these new contexts. I reflect on this regularly in our Technopanic Podcast. Please don't let it interfere with sleep patterns.

It's important to recognize that youth are trying to make sense of these contexts and practices. The link above discusses how to talk to kids about screentime and COVID-19.

If you're looking for guidance on what to do with youth, this resource from Learning in Places is excellent.

This resource from the FemTechNet network focuses not on HOW to teach classes online, but how to do this WELL—thoughtfully and with principles, and with the support that is at hand.

FemTechNet shares how they've learned to make digital learning work well after 8 years of working together as teachers, scholars, students, artists, technologists, and feminists. Their approach centers care, flexibility, and the recognition that "good enough" teaching during crisis serves students better than perfectionism that burns out instructors.

This document from the Laboratory for the Analysis of Social-Ecological Systems in a Globalised world (LASEG) examines how academics may shape our ethos of work now and in the future.

The authors invite additional signatories to add their names and expand the views expressed, working towards a Global Manifesto on Academic Praxis during and after COVID-19. The document questions productivity expectations, competitive metrics, and the individualism that characterizes academic culture.

Zoombombing is when someone successfully invades a public or sometimes even private meeting over the videoconferencing platform to broadcast shock videos, pornography, or other disruptive content. This happened to a couple of my colleagues this week.

Prosecutors say they'll pursue charges for Zoombombing, including "disrupting a public meeting, computer intrusion, using a computer to commit a crime, hate crimes, fraud, or transmitting threatening communications." Some of the charges include fines and possible imprisonment.

If you or anyone you know becomes a victim of teleconference hacking, report it to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center.

🔨 Do

The CDC now recommends the use of cloth face coverings when you go out in public.

Research suggests that surgical face masks could prevent transmission of human coronaviruses and influenza viruses from symptomatic individuals. Perhaps we should all be wearing them.

My family has a certain amount of privilege and can shelter in place for the most part. We leave the house and our neighborhood once a week for groceries. When we do leave the house, we wear masks to show solidarity with the workers that need to be out working in the stores and markets. It is not about us. It is about the people that need to be out working.

Got a T-shirt? You can make a mask at home.

🤔 Consider

When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help.

Thich Nhat Hanh

Hanh's teaching on compassion illuminates this issue's theme of care ethics. The Zoombombers disrupting classes, the people ignoring social distancing, the politicians spreading misinformation—all are suffering in ways that spill onto others. Punishment may be necessary, but understanding suffering offers a path beyond reaction.

Current times are very surreal. Perhaps you could take a trip using Google Street View.

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