Discrimination

In January the Florida Select Committee on Health Innovation approved House Bill 1639 (HB 1639), which dramatically restricts treatment for transgender individuals. If the bill becomes law, it will make it easier for insurers to refuse to cover gender-affirming care, will require those that cover gender transition to also offer policies that do not and will bar transgender people from updating their driver’s license. It also mandates that insurers provide detransition care to those who want to revert to the sex they were…

February 12, 20244 min readOur research finds that language is often a barrier for people dealing with cybercrime issues and that it’s important to close this security gapBy Fawn Ngo & The Conversation USPeople in the U.S. with limited English proficiency are particularly vulnerable to cybercrime. The following essay is reprinted with permission from The Conversation, an online publication covering the latest research.In the United States, the Internet Crime Complaint Center serves as a critical component in the FBI’s…

Recently, Facebook’s parent company, Meta, along with IBM and over 50 other founding members, announced an AI Alliance to “advance open, safe, responsible AI.” The group would be committed to “open science and open technologies,” promoting standards and benchmarks to reduce the risk of harm that advanced models might cause.These are critically important goals, as many tech companies, driven by the breakneck AI arms race, have come out with products that could upend the lives and livelihoods of many, and pose an…

An oversight panel has recommended that former Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva be deemed ineligible for rehire after officials found he discriminated against Inspector General Max Huntsman, according to records obtained by The Times.In the initial complaint filed in March 2022, Huntsman accused Villanueva of “dog whistling to the extremists he caters to” when he repeatedly referred to the inspector general by his foreign-sounding birth name, Max-Gustaf. In an interview with The Times editorial board a few…

Credit: CC0 Public Domain Calling out discriminatory behavior is an effective way for white students to help combat racism against Black and Latino science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) students, according to new research from Rice University. The study, "(Absent) Allyship in STEM: Can Psychological Standing Increase Prejudice…

Credit: CC0 Public Domain As Canadians share more and more genetic data with service providers such as insurance companies or databases like Ancestry.com, the potential for discrimination based on this data is growing. Known as genetic discrimination (GD), this practice is broadly defined as the differential treatment of an individual compared to the rest of the population based on actual or presumed genetic information.…

Out of town, on Broadway and on the road, the recent revival of “1776” was strategically cast in a nontraditional manner, with actors of diverse gender identities and racial backgrounds portraying the historically white, male Founding Fathers as they finalized the Declaration of Independence. “Putting history in the hands of the humans who were left out the first time around,” read the show’s marketing material.But a complaint, filed earlier this week by actor Zuri Washington, alleges racial discrimination and…

Diddy has withdrawn his racial discrimination lawsuit against Diageo after accusing the spirits company of marginalizing his Cîroc vodka and DeLeón tequila brands. The embattled music mogul, whose once-celebrated career has hit rocky shoals since allegations of sexual assault were leveled against him last year, has resolved his ongoing dispute with the British beverage company.“Sean Combs and Diageo have now agreed to resolve all disputes between them,” Diddy and Diageo said Tuesday in a joint statement to The…

A Denver man found himself indicted on federal fraud charges in an $8.5 million vacation rental scam on Airbnb and Vrbo that not only allegedly defrauded thousands, but also racially discriminated against guests, in 10 states over several years. Shaunik Raheja, 34, was indicted by a federal grand jury on Thursday, alongside Miami resident Shray Goel, 35, on claims that the pair ran “a double-booking, bait-and-switch scam” through online marketplaces Airbnb and Vrbo. Deceptive vacation rental listings and phony…

January 4, 20243min readAstronomy is beautiful and elegant. The language we use to describe its processes is anything butBy Juan P. Madrid This summer, a team of students and I were enjoying breathtaking views of the night sky while we collected data using telescopes at the McDonald Observatory in West Texas. One night, when we were outside on a telescope catwalk between the screams of a mountain lion, one of my students amazed me with her interpretation of the fate of Andromeda, the galaxy closest to our Milky Way. In…