Archbishop Tutu and the People Left in the Dust

Christine M. Venter is a Teaching Professor at Notre Dame Law School and Affiliated Faculty in Gender Studies at the University of Notre Dame

Nobel laureate, first black Anglican Archbishop, leader of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, prominent anti-apartheid activist, husband and father, Desmond Mpilo Tutu was all of those things and more, but to the people of South Africa he was simply “Arch” or “the Arch.” Looking back at his life and accomplishments, one might suppose that he was an unapproachable, iconic, historic figure but it was in his outsize sense of humor, humility, passion for justice, and affinity for those at the margins of society that people will remember him for.

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Today’s Technologies’ Apparent Neutrality and Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion

Yulia Razmetaeva is the Head of the Center for Law, Ethics, and Digital Technologies at Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University (Ukraine)

We used to separate social life and face-to-face communications, as well as the country’s political life from what’s going on inside our gadgets. We appear to somehow separate the “people’s world” from the digital one. The truth of the matter, however, is that technologies have become so advanced they’ve embraced every aspect of the “people’s world.” Technologies’ influence is immense.

Having spread far beyond the limits of the digital world, technologies can literally define our lives, and not only in terms of everyday habits and preferences but also concerning issues important to society as democracy, rule of law, and human rights. The Cambridge Analytica case showed how dangerous it is to underestimate the impact of profiling and artificial contradictions in social media on elections. New technologies contribute to the fact that people find themselves in filter bubbles and spend more and more time with people who have similar views, rather than those who have different ones, which leads to narrow-mindedness, tunnel vision, and, therefore, intolerance.

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