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  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "canonicalUrl": "https://www.jacky.wtf//essays/2024/oh-aral",
  "path": "/essays/2024/oh-aral",
  "publishedAt": "2024-06-22T00:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:e2ctbutx6kya6si4if5ngjmm/site.standard.publication/3mniussyp2d2g",
  "tags": "essay",
  "textContent": "I saw [a post from Jeremy Soller regarding Aral Balkan][1] that made me raise an eyebrow. I've had prior engagements\nwith Aral and found them to be a _bit like me_, slightly abrasive but ideally with the targets in the right place.\nTaking some time to read the post and those following it, my initial response was to prevent the propagation of \na notion of virtue signaling, a concept that initially came up in right-leaning religious circles as a way \nto counter critique against conservative stances. I have to admit, there were posts that I missed before \nengaging. The point of turn for me began with [katzenberger's post][2] that I initially  agreed with. \nAs you can follow from that thread, I decided to clear up the point regarding signaling and suggest a path forward \nfor [both parties][3]. However, today, things changed. A mutual [posted a longer post][4] that I'll partially \nquote and add some emphasis here:\n\n> You have a massive platform. _Use that platform to help make a change_. You can start by helping people \n> understand what actual issues exist. \"$THING is broken\" is not actionable feedback. Help break down \n> what's missing from our accessibility stack _for the use cases that matter to you or those you know_. \n\nThis is on par with what I was hoping both sides were willing to do. My (now naive) assumption that software developers\nwho both understood the importance of extending F/LOSS's capacity to reach people, especially in our computing landscape\nwhere Apple double-downs on its violence, Microsoft's blatant pivot into spyware-by-default and the nascent\narrival of a massive advertising dragnet coming to the Fediverse via Facebook's P92, that we need to not _fight_ each\nother and instead work together. I'm starting to believe that I expect too much from people without first examining their\nactions (or acknowledging it altogether). Aral, with no irony implied, has [this pinned to his profile][5]:\n\n> The only legitimate use of privilege is to help bring about the kind of world where you would not have had it to begin with.\n\n<figure>\n<img src=\"/images/aral-small-web-2024.jpg\" alt=\"An image of Aral's video introducing the Small Web\" />\n<figcaption>\n    The words \"non-colonial\" and \"inclusive\" here seem more bait-adjacent now due to a lack of describing what makes it\n    non-colonial. It's even more so given that it's European-based (the genesis of modern colonialism, as noted in \n    <a href=\"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_Europe_Underdeveloped_Africa\">How Europe Underdeveloped Africa</a>).\n</figcaption>\n</figure>\n\nWith someone who has 44,000 accounts following them, the ability to raise money for their foundation and whose more\nprominent app outside of [their SmallWeb work][6], isn't [accessible][13], I expected a little bit more. Just to make\nmore clear, Aral's issue with GNOME is that they haven't worked enough (or at all) on accessibility and [an application he paraded for\nsome time][14] hasn't worked to deploy that _themselves_.Even with the following quote [he also has\npinned][7] by Angela Davis, a Black woman who's spent her life championing for people of all creeds, has me questioning both\nour collective understanding of liberation and those who use it as marketing slogans.\n\n> Are you simply going to ask those who have been marginalized or subjugated to come inside of the institution \n> and participate in the same process that led precisely to their marginalization? Diversity and inclusion without \n> substantive change, without radical change, accomplishes nothing.\n\nAt this time of writing, Aral and I are still mutuals. By the time this is published, that'll no longer be the case.\nWhat I expect to happen is that he'll block me as he's done to another Black queer person and the leader of the\nElementary project. The fact that he hasn't replied to anything mentioned in the thread regarding the bridge of efforts\nand has a _history_ of blocking people of color that call out his behavior, tied with [his seeming inability for self-reflection][8],\nit's a bit easy to see where this will end up.\n\nAral Balkan _is_ [the privileged white man in tech][9] that people of color warn others about. It took me _way too long_ to\nrealize this, even after learning how he disparaged another community I'm in and with his reaction to anyone that talks\nabout [his failed attempt to build the \"IndiePhone\"][11]. Going into his history, you'll see a lot more marketing - and\ncode - but more marketing on the hopes of tomorrow instead of working with people today.\n\nWhat really sucks that Aral's only one of the loudest (so far). There's plenty of others who people have clamored around\nand this fuels the distance that people of color have towards the Fediverse. It's disappointing because at the end of\nthe day, Aral _still_ will have a loyal following that'll see this as a smear campaign. That means he'll suck up\nvaluable resources and attention that we need to focus on things like:\n\n Supporting the efforts on improving accessibility on libre systems: these communities do not have the funding, labor,\n  marketing or time of multinational organizations like Apple, Microsoft, Google and the ilk. If you can donate to the\n  AccessKit project (or even [give them a follow][10]), that'd make a difference.\n Reading the works of the people we quote: In immediate recoil of name dropping, I can't imagine folks like Davis\n  being comfortable with how Aral's used her name as a banner.\n* Avoid centering white cishet able-bodied men: This could have been avoided. Folks have noted online that this\n  has been endemic of Aral and should have been clocked sooner. We, as a community, need to do better about this.\n\nIf I can leave you with anything, it's to not put people beyond reproach, focus on actually helping people and to read (beyond the\nheadline). There's a book, [Elite Capture][12], that talks about how public resources are absorbed by a few based on their\nstatus. It's not too far off to see that playing out here. Folks might dismiss it because the amount of fiscal capital\nis small but ignoring the role that _social capital_ has in either amplifying or even _getting_ fiscal capital is risky\n(and an excellent shield folks like Aral unintentionally hide behind, regardless of _what_ capital comes in).\nI apologize to those who I've now mistakenly retorted in hopes that clarity could be found, most \nnotably Michael A. Murphy for implicitly defending Aral in this situation. In fact, \nI suggest people take time to both see what folks at System76 are tangibly doing to bring open computing to the masses in\na tangible way as well as Elementary to bring an approachable desktop to folks.\n\nAn Addendum\nAral's mentioned to me that the accessibility concerns with the application he's worked on is more of an upstream\nissue. Though this shows progression, this doesn't negate the fact _this_ was a more viable path of focusing on\naccessibility in a way that can be done through experience-based advocacy. Had more effort been focused here to help upstream\nthese changes from their tool into Elementary (and perhaps into GNOME mainline), people might have had more of a belief\nthat Aral's intent here as pure as it comes off to be. Going from this to [making the slapstick stance][15] that both Fedora\nand GNOME are in this anti-accessibility cabal doesn't help (and could even prevent _other groups_ from considering\ntheir support of funding GNOME accessibility as a whole).\n\nStepping back a bit, as a developer, being met with \"patches welcome\" isn't the end of the world. At worst, I can close\nthe tab and go about my day. The aforementioned reaction Aral kept with the GNOME developer (who he's since blocked)\nthat highlighted that, at any time, he can _help_, as Aral's done with getting his tab switching tool mainlined into\nGala, the windowing system for Elementary, is what sticks with me. Instead of doing what we're hoping to get more\nfunding for, the retort (and the inability frankly to _acknowledge that he still optimized blocks for people who prove\nhim wrong_) makes me distrust any further thought without concrete action.\n\nIn short, do better.\n\nAnother Addendum\nI've been asked to cite sources regarding evidence of Aral blocking people of color routinely. Since ActivityPub doesn't\noperate like BlueSky, there's no public log of block transactions that one can observe. My noting of the history is from\nindependent reports of the such. However, this is _a trap_ for me to link to a bunch of people in lieu of providing\ncanon fodder for harassment. I can list the explicit call-out at <https://crab.garden/@brainblasted/112661075882415170>\nas well as <https://mastodon.social/@nekohayo/112661113080091608>. I'm not a journalist so I can't just post screenshots \nof DMs or any other private messaging without the consent of those folks.\n\n[1]: https://fosstodon.org/@soller/112646375569571307\n[2]: https://mastodon.de/@katzenberger/112647813289704322\n[3]: https://todon.eu/@jalcine/112655773711139107\n[4]: https://crab.garden/@brainblasted/112660892581080961\n[5]: https://mastodon.ar.al/@aral/111051738097034988\n[6]: https://ar.al/2020/08/07/what-is-the-small-web/\n[7]: https://mastodon.ar.al/@aral/111005500018921660\n[8]: https://mastodon.ar.al/@aral/112661017677561994\n[9]: https://mastodon.ar.al/@aral/112659666102582447\n[10]: https://fosstodon.org/@accesskit\n[11]: https://medium.com/@indie_rem/it-s-the-end-of-the-indie-as-we-know-it-b7f049ca5cdd\n[12]: https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books/1867-elite-capture\n[13]: https://mastodon.online/@danirabbit/112661045153783251\n[14]: https://github.com/small-tech/comet\n[15]: https://mastodon.ar.al/@aral/112661127510102913",
  "title": "When People with Privilege Don't Use It"
}