Publicly identifiable knowledge can enhance past pre-existing social hierarchies that empower privileged groups yet discriminate against minority groups. Publicly identifiable knowledge is anything that can be known by just looking at a person, which most often includes race and gender. For example, publicly identifiable knowledge can create/enhance racist social hierarchies, demonstrated in a puzzle present in “Nosedive,” an episode from the show Black Mirror. The episode, directed by Joe Wright, shows the audience a modern “utopian” society run by a rating system that allows anyone to rate anyone based on their own discretion. Everyone’s ratings are constantly displayed, meaning the ratings are public knowledge. Throughout the episode, …show more content…
The puzzle presents a problem dealing with racial biases in the rating system, which can be explained by Benjamin’s argument about racism in technology. Specifically, Benjamin argues how “tech fixes often hide, speed up, and even deepen discrimination,” which can be applied to the puzzle in “Nosedive” (Benjamin 4). In “Nosedive,” society's rating system is powered by technology and phones, which facilitate rating. Rather than addressing the problem of racism in the episode, the puzzle is never mentioned, although it seems like the inclusion of many people of color as service workers is intentional. This can be supported by Benjamin's argument that racism becomes “magnified” when tech designers do not own up to their mistakes (Benjamin 6). The rating system has no rubric therefore, people are free to rate people on anything. Thus, of course, this promotes rating based on personal biases, which in turn allows for a society where racism exists, especially since there is no consequence for rating someone low other than that person reciprocating the low rating. This demonstrates the power public knowledge has to enhance racial hierarchies. Since race and ratings are publicly identifiable knowledge, racial biases can easily influence ratings and enhance pre-existing social hierarchies, especially since there are no measures to prevent racism or call it