During a recent House Energy and Commerce Health subcommittee meeting, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced his latest plan as part of Making America Healthy Again. And that is that in four years, he would like to see all Americans sporting a wearable. For those not in the know, a wearable is a device that tracks your health—think Apple Watch or Fitbit.
There are some medical professionals that think the use of wearables will serve as an early-warning system for potential health issues; after all, many people wear devices beyond the more well-known devices like Fitbits and Apple watches, like devices that monitor glucose levels in real time. As wearables have become more advanced, they can serve as an early-warning system for potential issues. I mean, as someone who has been wearing a Fitbit for years, it has been helpful for monitoring my resting heart rate and letting me know when things are going wonky and when I need to make tweaks daily.
However, if you think that Kennedy wanting all Americans to wear one of these devices is a good thing, well, I have some oceanfront property in Arizona to sell you. After all, this is the same man who is fervently anti-vaccine to the point of suggesting that despite an unprecedented measles outbreak this spring, people don’t really need vaccines. Let’s not even get into the fact that we don’t quite know if we will even have any flu vaccines this year, since one of his first tasks once becoming secretary of HHS was to cancel the annual meeting where decisions are made on the upcoming flu season vaccine.
There is also the pesky fact that like everything with this administration, there is someone connected who stands to make a lot of money based on decisions the administration makes. In this case, it is rather convenient that the current nominee for U.S. Surgeon General, Casey Means, is the co-founder of a company that provides continuous glucose monitors and other health trackers to clients.
Nothing these people do is about bettering the health and wellness of Americans, especially with the “big beautiful bill” that threatens to cut Medicaid insurance to millions. Not to mention that Dr. Oz, yeah, Oprah’s old sidekick who is currently serving as administrator of the Centers for Medicare and & Medicaid Services, is making statements that essentially boil down to not believing everyone is entitled to healthcare. You can best believe that any government suggested use of these technologies will be used to create harm, most likely by tracking you and using that data gathered in their policy making.
Which brings me to the larger point that I have been pondering lately, have we reached the inflection point where technology is causing more harm than good for society as a whole?
In the last couple decades give or take, the use of new technologies has changed our daily lives in fundamental ways that were once unimaginable. My mother died in 2004 and, as a member of the dead parents club, I do still think about my mom and how I wish that I could still talk to her, even after all these years. Though lately when I find myself thinking about my mom, it dawned on me that my mother would literally not recognize the world that currently exists. In the span of those 21 years, our society has made quantum leaps and the world as we once knew it doesn’t exist.
We have literally gone from pagers, portable CD players, and iPods to one device that contains our entire lives. Today’s smartphones are where we can order food, rides, furniture, dates, plan vacations, pay bills, and even store our money. But in creating ease and convenience in our daily lives, do we ever stop to consider what we lose and how much more we stand to lose if we continue to evolve at the current speed?
As these technologies that we enjoy have become embedded in our daily lives, they have also created untold wealth for a relatively small number of people, who have now crossed into wanting more and who in recent years have gotten into electoral politics. Jeff Bezos was just a guy selling books online in the 1990s with the creation of Amazon. When Amazon first started to grow into the marketplace, it seemed revolutionary. But we now know that Amazon has displaced many of the retailers that we once frequented, and his model has been devastating for small ma and pop operations. Few can afford to compete with Amazon’s model and for years they hooked us on free shipping and quick delivery but in recent years, they have branched out to offer medical care, music, and devices that literally bring convenience to our lives at home. Alexa, anyone?
We also know these devices are capable of overhearing conversations and, well, from a cautionary perspective, one has to decide if a music catalog in one device that can also answer your mundane questions and turn on the lights is worth the trade-offs in terms of privacy and safety.
Almost every tech-based company that once offered opportunity is now at odds with creating an equitable and just society and instead has played a role in creating ever-increasing levels of economic inequality.
Airbnb was once a service to pair homeowners with an unused room with travelers looking for a cheap room to stay in. Over the years, reliance on Airbnb has restructured entire communities as investors got into the Airbnb business and turned properties that once were available to local renters into de-facto hotels in residential communities, thus leading to displacement. We know that Airbnb changes communities and leaves people out in the cold.
Homelessness has risen in Portland where I reside and also across Maine—as well as across the United States. At the same time, available rentals have decreased. Back in 2021/2022 when I ran for a seat on the Portland, Maine, Charter Commission, I knocked door-to-door in my district, which includes a large swath of the Portland peninsula, and using the Democratic voter rolls in that process, I found that there were entire blocks that once had registered voters but had been turned into Airbnb rentals. Where did all those people go? Many probably relocated to other communities but how many were displaced and pushed into housing instability?
I was thinking about my hometown, Chicago, and how across the city there used to be what were called flophouses or rooming houses. Housing of last resort for those on the precipice of being unhoused. Flophouses at their worst were basic rooms, often with shared bathrooms and cooking facilities, that weren’t in great shape but for a minimal rate kept you from having to sleep on the streets. According to Wikipedia, flop houses have essentially disappeared in the United States. Meaning that if you don’t have the means to secure a more traditional rental or pay to stay in motels or hotels that allow for extended stays, once you lose traditional housing and if you can’t stay in a shelter, you end up on the street.
In many cities, including my hometown, the areas that housed spaces of last resort have been upscaled, gentrified, and often offer short-term housing in the form of Airbnb units. The ultimate irony? Rates for such units have been increasing steadily and have become so expensive that in recent years, people have started to return to traditional hotels for more affordability.
Almost all the technology and convenience that we have come to depend in recent years has come at a societal cost, but we accept it—at the same time lamenting that we want a better world, while never questioning our participation in why we are not getting a better world.
Until recently though—while I knew this—like most people, I was willing to play along because what choice do we have?
The rapid rollout of generative AI such as ChatGPT has stopped me in my tracks of complicity.
AI has been part of our lives for years but it was seemingly helpful and for a long time stayed mostly in areas like scientific research. But the AI of today is being rolled out with the intention of restructuring society and, well, once it is fully unleashed we may find that the good no longer outweighs the bad. Today’s AI is about creating a leaner workforce and making its owners even wealthier and while it is being sold to us as ease and convenience, what happens when it replaces us?
Recent reports are that AI may be usurping the entry-level types of jobs that college graduates used to depend on to start their careers. Which begs the question: How long before AI takes the midlevel and above jobs? What do all these displaced from the job market do for work? I mean are we all going into physical trade work and how long before their robots take over those jobs? As it is, there is a rise in AI offering services such as therapy that once in a saner time we would have considered unthinkable to hand off to non-humans. Creative folks already know that AI has come for their jobs. No one wants to hire skilled writers and editors when they can use AI, which is playing a huge role in the rise of the independent creative. But how long before people can’t afford to pay $5 a pop to support their independent creative of choice because AI took their job?
People keep telling me that I need to accept progress and embrace AI, but our rapid acceptance of technology has already altered our world to a level of inequity that is unsustainable, and AI might be the final straw. A large class of unemployed and underemployed people whom the government refuses to care for and probably has nefarious plans for exploiting. Oh, they do, that’s right. For those of us who have been following the tech bros guru, Curtis Yarvin, he once “jokingly” said unproductive people can be turned into biodiesel.
More and more, that is how society flows. We have been indoctrinated to want more even though most of get less actually; it is why the average CEO’s wages shot up 1,085% between 1978 and 2023, but the average workers wages only grew by 24%. It’s why shareholders want more returns while leaving the actual workers in the dust. Insurance companies deny coverage as policy to give shareholders bigger returns at the same time your premiums grow and you get less.
More and bigger is not serving us as a society. The technology we were guided to get hooked on now watches us. The suite of Google products started off as convenient and mostly free, but who is looking at all that shit in the cloud? How much of Google’s AI was fed from your work? The TOS in most tech tells us what’s going on, but who reads through it or even understands half of it if they do?
For more than two decades now, technology was about making connections and making our lives easier, often at no cost. But it turns out technology was sitting back and studying us and is increasingly ready to replace us or be used to deny our humanity.
As much as we want our elected leaders and others to work for the greater good, we may have to start asking ourselves what we are willing to give up. Sure, we can order everything we need on Amazon but at what cost? The demise of our own local communities, for one. Have you been to a local shopping mall recently? Most are becoming ghost towns. It is increasingly hard to not buy clothing online because the local options have no longer become viable because we wanted to save a few bucks or have the convenience of not leaving home. Interesting enough, the same free shipping and speedy delivery that got us hooked on these services is becoming a thing of the past.
Uber was great until it put the local cab companies out of business and the cars and drivers got shadier and the surge pricing and the delayed waits became the norm. Or the local restaurants that must be on food delivery apps that make less money than they did with their own delivery drivers because they must pay the apps fees at the same time the apps gouge the end user. But people prefer the convenience of one-stop shopping on food apps to order food versus pulling out the phone book to place an order which would save them and the restaurant money. Oh, that’s right. We don’t really have phone books anymore. Instead, we have to Google.
Listen, I have spent 20 years using technology and social media to earn a large part of my income. Ten years ago, when my marriage ended, I structured my life to live the dream of living on a barrier island and not owning a car. For a decade, I have owned no parts of a car, instead using apps and technology to order things and get them delivered to my door.
But it is now clear that there is a price for this living convenience, and it is paid by all of us while the people creating this ease get richer than anyone should be allowed to be but give very little back to society. These new tech bros are not Bill Gates; most of the people creating the technology that we depend on for ease and comfort now seem to do little in the way of true sustained philanthropy. The robber barons of yesterday pretended to care. Instead, our world is increasingly shaped by the most awkward people who hit a home run in life and instead of giving back want more at our expense.
While we may be sitting comfortably today, in their version of the world there will be less of us. Which is why between elected officials who have stated they care very little for the masses and tech bros who only seem to want more, we would be wise to consider how we use technology and start to question everything and not be afraid to accept that there is more to life than the obtaining of more.
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Note: I am very aware that for some people, these technological advances and devices are needed to live. I am aware that for some people, they might not be able to leave the house to shop or may need food apps to eat. Or need to wear a wearable for health reasons. I understand that. However, my words and thoughts are for those of us who would be merely inconvenienced if we decreased our dependence on these technologies. If all of us do what we can with intention, we can make a difference and send a message to these tech oligarchs.
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