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Update Our Points of Unity

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Jiajun Xu
2026-01-18 20:33:54 -08:00
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@ -13,39 +13,66 @@ import "../styles/globals.css";
<h1 class="text-3xl font-semibold">Points of Unity</h1>
<p class="mb-4">
We situate ourselves in our context - as Seattle residents and as
users and creators of the technologies we aim to resist. We are seeing
a long-spanning rise of fascism within all levels of governance, from
Seattle city council to national governments here and abroad.
Our community agreements and decision-making process describe <em>how</em> we work together. The points of unity are the broader philosophies that we're working towards as a group. Perhaps people aren't 100% aligned individually, but this is what the group as a whole believes in when showing up to the work.
</p>
<h2 class="text-2xl font-semibold mt-10 mb-2">Grounding</h2>
<p class="mb-4">
We situate ourselves in our context - as Seattle residents and as users and creators of the technologies we aim to resist. We are seeing a long-spanning rise of fascism within national governments here and abroad. In parallel is the increasing power of tech companies over our lives through surveillance and the provisioning of everyday needs, from employment to how we get our internet utilities in the first place. There are rising income disparities across the nation, but also more specifically across everyone who can be considered a "tech worker": from a CEO, to a software engineer to a tech campus cafeteria worker to a child enslaved to mine cobalt in the Congo.
</p>
<p class="mb-4">
In parallel is the increasing power of tech companies over our lives
through surveillance and the provisioning of everyday needs, from
employment to how we get our internet utilities in the first place.
There are rising income disparities across the nation, but also more
specifically across everyone who can be considered a "tech worker":
from a CEO to a software engineer to a contractor to a child slave
mining cobalt in the Congo.
We know that technology intersects with and amplifies systems of oppression, from anti-Black racism to classism, ableism, cisheteropatriarchy, etc. Big tech permeates all aspects of life in Seattle, but to name a few ways:
</p>
<ul class="list-disc pl-8 mb-4 space-y-2">
<li>The rise of a <a href="https://stopsurveillancecity.wordpress.com/" class="font-bold underline hover:text-gray-600">Surveillance City</a> in Seattle facilitates the tracking of out-of-state people seeking abortions, the kidnapping of migrants, and the increased surveillance and criminalization of sex workers, the visibly unhoused, and poor and racialized communities.</li>
<li>The <strong>environmental racism</strong> and community impacts of <strong>data centers</strong>, both from the AI bubble and the demand for more data processing that comes with surveillance capitalism.</li>
<li><strong>The AI genocide</strong> in Palestine abetted by Google, Amazon, Boeing and Microsoft, all local Seattle employers.</li>
<li>Rising <strong>gentrification</strong> and <strong>income inequality</strong> that comes from financialization of real estate and the gentrifying waves of tech workers moving into the city.</li>
</ul>
<p class="mb-4">
Some of us are employed by Big Tech companies, and we are all living on stolen Coast Salish land covered by the broken Treaty of Point Elliot of 1855; we understand that we are contributing - directly or indirectly - to these oppressions, and seek to use our skills towards more liberatory ends.
</p>
<h2 class="text-2xl font-semibold mt-10 mb-2">Theory of Change</h2>
<p class="mb-4">
We are committed to fostering our collective understanding of resisting tech monopolies and building a constellation of alternative technologies that exist outside of exploitative, oppressive systems. We seek out radical possibilities by building connections across our communities with others struggling to resist tech monopolies and reject work that expands the reach of these monopolies.
</p>
<p class="mb-4">
Technology contributes to gentrification both through the tech-enabled
financialization of real estate as well as the gentrifying waves of
tech workers moving into cities. Increased technical sophisication of
militaries and carceral systems have created the first "AI genocide"
in Palestine; increased militarization of borders such as the
US-Mexico and the surveillance of migrants; increased police brutality
worldwide, all disparately impacting people of the global majority.
We don't need to passively wait around for somebody to come implement these solutions. Making improvements to our lives and our communities paves the way for collective liberation. Dismantling smaller elements of a system is practice for uprooting the whole and replacing it with a constellation of liberatory alternatives.
</p>
<h2 class="text-2xl font-semibold mt-10 mb-2">Role of Technology</h2>
<p class="mb-4">
"We believe our communities and organizing efforts can and should harness the possibilities of new technology." (<a href="https://mijente.net/our-dna/" class="underline hover:text-gray-600">Mijente</a>) However, we don't innovate for the sake of innovation, but aim to create with intention, listen to the perspectives of those we hope to serve (including ourselves), and hold each other accountable in this work.
</p>
<h2 class="text-2xl font-semibold mt-10 mb-2">Our Position in the Movement</h2>
<p class="mb-4">
We don't see ourselves as a vanguard organization - that is, we make no claims to being the sole authority on resisting tech monopolies and we will never tell a front-line community or group of tech users what they actually need. Everyone benefits from the work of resisting tech monopolies, and for that reason we do the work for ourselves as much as we do it for anybody we are in solidarity with.
</p>
<p class="mb-4">
All of these crises are enabled and worsened by technology companies.
As tech workers of various kinds living in the imperial core, on
stolen Coast Salish land covered by the broken Treaty of Point Elliot
of 1855, we understand how our labor is contributing - directly or
indirectly - to these oppressions, and seek to use our skills towards
more liberatory ends. &lt;3
However we also recognize our own privilege in being highly-skilled tech workers: because of this we center the voices of the people most vulnerable to various tech monopolies, and aim to share our expertise so that others can also become agents in co-creating technologies of liberation and resistance.
</p>
<h2 class="text-2xl font-semibold mt-10 mb-2">Friendly Vibes</h2>
<p class="mb-4">
Holding all of the above, we're also a group of friends here for the scrappy, hacky vibes. We don't take our work too seriously and we're here to work joyfully. This is first and foremost a community.
</p>
<h2 class="text-2xl font-semibold mt-10 mb-2">Acknowledgments</h2>
<p class="mb-4">
These points of unity were inspired by the Prison Library Solidarity Network, the Coalition of Anti-Racist Whites, Ruha Benjamin's work on Abolitionist Tech, and Mijente.
</p>
</div>
</div>