“Is it true that technology or internet access and use in and of itself will perform the great task of ‘equalizing’ power structures?”
(16)
Rosi Braidotti, a feminist theorist and philosopher, offers the concept in her lecture, “The Body as a Metaphor”, that it’s a mixture of realness in the Third World and desires of the First World that comprise the system of Capitalism (21). This realness consists of the gritty process of soldering microchips, welding parts, and making the hardware that comprises computers while supporting the products which the First World desires. The physical internet and its waste is held within and outside of the United States in places like Death Alley, Louisiana where a deadly petrochemical corridor overlaps heavily with historic Black cemeteries and properties, as well as the homes of current Black families (22). Risks such as air pollution related diseases and cancer are a major factor for people and workers in these areas. William Glaberson and Julia Campbell investigate former computer chip workers at I.B.M., linking cancer directly to “chemicals used by the semiconductor industry” (23). The simulation was never an option for people in these conditions; reality presses in constantly and contamination of the flesh threatens constantly.