
Bad algorithms are making racist decisions - denzil_correa
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/spark/412-1.4887497/bad-algorithms-are-making-racist-decisions-1.4887504
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CryptoPunk
This is only example provided:

>>In 2016, an investigation by Bloomberg found that Amazon tended to withhold
their same-day-delivery service from minority neighbourhoods. Gilliard pointed
to the example of Roxbury, a majority black neighbourhood in Boston. In
Bloomberg's reporting, Roxbury was the lone area where same-day-delivery
wasn't available, completely surrounded by areas Amazon would deliver to.

In other words, Gilliard expects companies to not target their services to
neighbourhoods where they are profitable if the unprofitable neighbourhoods
where the services aren't provided are disproportionately populated by
minorities.

That's not reasonable, and calling the refusal to do so racial discrimination
is absolutely irresponsible. The activists are asking for special treatment
for minority groups, so that rather everyone and every neighbourhood being
judged by a color-blind algorithm, the algorithm takes the individual's race
or the neighbourhood's racial composition into account and reduces the
penalization people of certain races receive for being low income.

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candiodari
I actually think anti-racism is one of the great _positives_ of letting
algorithms decide. Because, well, people are racist, often, and

1) algorithms, by themselves, are not

2) if they are, that's written down somewhere (and can therefore be
conclusively proven and legal recourse can be sought)

None of this works with humans.

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gspetr
This is the article I link to when I see people making statements about racist
algorithms: [https://blog.chewxy.com/2015/08/04/algorithms-are-chaotic-
ne...](https://blog.chewxy.com/2015/08/04/algorithms-are-chaotic-neutral/)

Basically, algorithms are the wrong layer to work in if you want to fix this
problem.

