Elon Musk’s Starlink service has finally made its way through the deep Amazon jungle to serve the Maluvo people. Access to the Internet The development, which came to light earlier this month, also appears to raise serious questions.
Tribal elders say while the technology may mean improvements to their way of life, it’s also creating problems that didn’t exist before, such as addiction to pornography and social media.
A Brazilian tribe of about 2,000 people who live around the Itui River is divided on whether advanced technology can truly benefit their community.
Tsaiinama Malbo (73 years old) The New York Times When the technology first came out, “everyone was happy. But now things are getting worse. Young people are becoming lazy because of the Internet, and they’re learning the ways of white people.”
Tsainama’s observation may be saying something. Unlike painting or playing an instrument, the internet is often a passive medium, where users simply sit back and consume the media with little effort. This is especially true for pornography and social media, two of the main issues the tribe has been grappling with since acquiring the technology.
“We need to abandon the naive notion that the Internet will magically liberate society.”
Moreover, the Malbo are different from most developed cultures around the world. They are a chaste tribe, and kissing in public is often frowned upon. Alfredo Malbo (all members of the tribe share the same last name) said that providing the Internet and all it contains to a developing tribe could wipe out civility.
Malbo and porn
Alfredo said access to pornography through technology has led young tribal men to exhibit “aggressive sexual behavior,” some of whom share pornographic videos in group chats.
“I’m worried that young people will want to try it,” he added, noting that men have been exposed to sexual proclivities and fetishes.
“Everybody’s so connected, sometimes I don’t even talk to my own family.”
The Blaze News reached out to Michael Toscano, executive director of the Family Studies Institute, who said, “We must remember that technology should be designed to serve individuals, communities, families and our nation, not to destroy them. Today, many families and organizations in America are beginning to recognize that it is their right and responsibility to reject technologies that threaten them and their way of life.”
Questions have been raised about the ethics of introducing the Internet to people in remote areas whose tribes may be adversely affected by the Internet.
“This is not easy because technologies tend to become pervasive, culturally and politically dominant, and organize social life and human activity around them,” Toscano added.
“This is the story of social media, smartphones, the internet in general, and even cars and so many other things. So it takes a certain heroism to say no to the latest technological product.”
If Malbo elders have expressed that pornography is harmful to their way of life, it is worth asking whether they should be given access to the material in the first place.
Family Research Institute Report in 2022 Pornography is not a harmless act. Pornographic material is widespread across the United States, but it is associated with several negative social outcomes and personal experiences. Moreover, these problems occur more often in men than women. This is consistent with what Malbo elders have reported since accessing such material.
“This is just the latest evidence of the addictive nature of the Internet,” said Terry Schilling, executive director of the American Principles Project. “It shouldn’t be a surprise to us by now.”
“We know, for example, that social media was intentionally developed to be addictive because these companies benefit from keeping people on their platforms for as long as possible,” Schilling continued, “and there are many areas of the internet, such as video games, that have a similarly addictive effect.”
The plight of this tribe reminds us that we cannot ignore the drawbacks of the Internet: although this technology offers many benefits, it can also be dangerous if not used with care.
The institute also reported that people who reported watching pornography were more likely to report feeling lonely. Pornography appears to distort people’s perceptions of their appearance, which is also more prevalent among men than women.
Additionally, men who reported regularly viewing pornography noted they were more likely to experience anxiety.[Seventy-four] Of men who said they had viewed pornography in the past 24 hours, 45% said it had made them feel self-conscious or anxious in the past week. Only 45% of men who said they had never viewed pornography said the same thing.
“Starlink appears to have sparked a sudden revolution that could have real consequences,” Nathan Reimer, executive director of the Digital First Project, told Blaze News.
Reimer likened what happened to the Malvos to “giving a 10-year-old the keys to a new car. I don’t know if it’s an addiction, but the challenge for this Amazon community is clearly to find a way to balance the benefits of this transformative power with the recognition that there are downsides, like the prevalence of pornography, the prevalence of distractions.”
The Internet and the Culture of Distraction
When the Internet was first introduced to the Malbo tribe, it was hailed as a positive development: tribal members could quickly contact authorities for help in emergencies such as deadly snakebites.
Enoc Malbo, 40, said the technology has already “saved lives.” Tribal members have also found ways to share educational information with neighboring tribes in the Amazon, allowing them to stay in touch with family members who have relocated far away.
The Internet not only gave the tribes the ability to solve practical problems, it also gave tribal youth the ability to imagine things outside of their everyday experience: they could observe places and cultures completely different from their own.
One teenager wanted to travel the world, another dreamed of becoming a dentist in São Paulo. Despite these advantages, the disadvantages cannot be ignored.
Enoch said technology has made daily life more difficult: “In our villages, we have to hunt, fish and grow crops to eat.”
Tamasei Marbo, 42, said, “Some young people are keeping the traditions,” but ” [who] I just want to be on my phone all afternoon.”
“At this point, kids are probably the only group of people who haven’t experienced the internet yet,” Schilling said.
“The new generation of children must be re-advised on this technology, and given the mental health problems young people are suffering from as a result of social media use, it is clear that we must dramatically change our approach,” he added.
“At the very least, we should institute age verification protections against all addictive and harmful aspects of the internet, starting with pornography, and ultimately establishing minimum ages for use of social media,” Schilling concluded.
Some of these trends are already being observed in developed countries around the world. Reported in 2020 “In the United States, the proportion of 13- to 17-year-olds who own a smartphone has more than doubled in six years, to 89 percent. Moreover, the proportion of young people who use social media multiple times a day has increased from one-third of teens in 2012 to 70 percent now.”
Statista In the 2023 survey“97% of U.S. youth ages 15-17 have access to a smartphone at home. Smartphone ownership is lower among younger respondents at 92%. Overall, 94% of youth surveyed reported owning a smartphone device.”
The Malbo people fear that their history and culture will be lost if this trend continues, and as a result, they are reportedly restricting internet access to two hours each morning, five hours each evening, and all day on Sundays.
Apart from the addictive element of pornography and technology, tribal people are also falling victim to online fraud due to lack of digital literacy, while some youths are also chatting with strangers online.
“We need to get rid of this naive idea that the internet is going to magically liberate society,” software engineer Mike Wacker told Blaze News.
The Malbos appear to lack the ability to regulate the internet in a way that benefits their community.
Toscano said the desire to put guardrails around certain elements of the internet is why many people “turn to legislators to regulate technology, because it turns out that the most effective solutions to the problems that technology poses are collective solutions.”
“Only laws and state regulations can address this issue, which is why the impact of the internet on tribal people is so dire,” he added.
“They have been given powerful systems that can only be developed under conditions of advanced national capability, and control of these systems requires precisely that advanced national capability. By transmitting Starlink, they have completely exposed the tribesmen to forces they are not prepared to counter.”
But Flora Dutra, a Brazilian activist who works with indigenous peoples, doesn’t think so, suggesting that concerns and fears around the technology are overblown, and that indigenous peoples “want and deserve” access to the internet.
It still seems relevant to equip a culture with powerful tools that don’t yet have the language or knowledge to navigate them in a safe and productive way.
“We are finally waking up to the power the internet has over us,” Toscano said. [the Marubo tribe] It would be better if that didn’t happen. Machines are made for humans, not humans for machines.”
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