Edward Minor had a paper due for his English class on income inequality
at Wayne County Community College in Detroit. He’d completed all the
research and knew what he wanted to write. The main issue was time—he
only had a few hours.
But countless, frustrating obstacles delayed his progress, from the
laborious pace at which 62-year-old Minor types to figuring out how to
save his document. The final step, however, was really tripping him up.
Since he was using a computer at the library, he needed to email the
file to himself so he could edit it later on a different computer.
“Do I just put my email address up here?” Minor asked, pointing to
the bar at the top of the web browser. Eventually he got some help from a
computer technician, but he wasn’t confident he’d be able to find the
document later.
“They’re
doing it so fast and I’m trying to follow,” he says. “They don’t see
that there’s a baby right here in front of them. I’m a baby out here!”
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Ed Minor types at the Detroit Public Library, wearing a pin with a photo of Angela Davis.Photo: Nick Hagen |
Indeed, Minor’s relationship to the world isn’t so different from
that of an infant. That’s because, in October 2017, Minor was released
from prison after being incarcerated for more than 40 years. A
modern-day Rip Van Winkle (who left society for a mere two decades),
Minor is adrift in a society that left him behind.
The
hunt-and-peck typing method he employs, which itself is slower than
usual, is just the beginning of his technological difficulties. The
computers, wireless internet, and touch screens that many take for
granted are alien to him. Even looking at a computer screen—with all its
strange icons, commands, and windows—is like deciphering the Rosetta
Stone.
While Minor may be an extreme case, he squarely fits the
description of Americans who suffer most from the digital divide, a
phenomenon that describes how technology can contribute to inequality:
He’s elderly, he’s poor, and he’s a person of color.
Resolving the
divide’s underlying issues will be anything but simple, but the
negative effects are pretty straightforward. If you don’t have access to
the internet or the skills to use it, you also won’t have access to
countless jobs and resources. As Tom Wheeler, former chair of the FCC, said in 2015,
“The bottom line is this: If you are not connected to the internet…you
cannot participate fully in our economy and our democracy.”
As of 2015, Detroit was the least connected city in America. Forty percent of Detroit’s households have no broadband connection and 70 percent of its school-age kids have no internet access at home (excluding smartphones).
For its size, Detroit is woefully under-connected. But rural areas and small metropolises often have it worse. According to a Brookings Institute report,
almost one in four people in the United States lived in low
subscription neighborhoods in 2015. Fewer than 40 percent of households
subscribed to broadband internet.
Price is often an inhibiting factor. Detroit’s two main broadband
providers, Comcast and AT&T, respectively, offer plans for their
slowest connections at $25 for 12 months (and $50 afterwards) and $40
per month with a $99 installation fee.
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Ed MinorPhoto: Nick Hagen |
Federal programs can lower the cost of these plans, but a study by the National Digital Inclusion Alliance
(NDIA) showed that in Cleveland and Detroit, AT&T didn’t built out
the infrastructure sufficiently to provide residents with high enough
connection speeds to meet program guidelines. In other words, there’s a
major correlation between plan availability and poverty.
The NDIA
has described this as “digital redlining,” a reference to the practice
that denied people of color access to housing, and which ran rampant in
Detroit in the mid-1900s.
That’s in line with what Diana Nucera,
director of the Detroit Community Technology Project, has witnessed.
“Whether it’s artificial intelligence or internet access or healthcare,”
she says, “the problems of the digital divide all stem from the same
place: racism.”
I described Minor’s situation to Nucera and asked what she thought.
“If he’s a victim of the digital divide, he’s also a victim of several
other things before that,” she says. “It’s much more complicated than
giving this gentleman a computer.”
Before Minor ever went to prison, understanding modern-day technology was the least of his concerns.
He
came from a challenging home life. “My family were alcoholics,” he
says. “I never met my mother’s side of the family. My father’s side was
just drunks, dope fiends, dealing in corn liquor. My father was always
jumping on my mother; my uncles were always jumping on their
girlfriends.”
That contributed to his feeling aimless as a youth
growing up on Detroit’s west side. “I didn’t know what to do with my
life,” he says. “Didn’t want to do anything with my life.”
As for technology, his family didn’t even own a color TV.
“The problems of the digital divide all stem from the same place: racism.”
Minor was imprisoned once for seven months for breaking and entering.
When he was released, he wanted to pay back a favor for a friend that
helped him out while in prison. But the only way he knew how to get the
money was to steal it. Planning to mug someone outside a nightclub, he
says he brought an unloaded BB gun whereas his co-defendant, without
telling him, brought a real gun.
According to Minor, his accomplice shot the person they were mugging,
and after they were arrested, made a statement saying Minor committed
the murder. Minor says he was pressured by his lawyer and the judge to
plead guilty to second degree murder.
The sentence: life with parole.
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Ed Minor checks the bus schedule on his phone.Photo: Nick Hagen |
Since getting out of prison, Minor has lived with his cousin in
Southfield, an adjacent suburb of Detroit about 15 miles from downtown.
On a normal day, Minor wakes up at around 11am, eats breakfast, and
takes an hour and a half-long, two-bus transfer journey—with an
undersized bicycle in tow—to either the WCCC campus or Detroit Public
Library’s main branch. There he’ll do school work and develop his
computer skills for several hours before heading to his job as a
dishwasher at a nearby restaurant.
He often closes out, which
means leaving work at around midnight and catching one of the last rapid
buses heading north. At that time of night, the bus no longer runs for
the last four-mile leg home, so he either bikes or walks depending on
the weather. Once, the bus never came and his co-worker paid for a
rideshare. He rarely gets into bed before 3am.
While at the downtown library, the person assisting him is often
Keronce Sims, a computer technician. He teaches classes on computing
basics, but his main job is helping patrons and employees troubleshoot
computer issues. That means he’s often running from one request to the
next all day long.
“What aren’t I responsible for?” Sims says with
a laugh. “I’m one of three in the building…I’m putting out some
matches, some candles, some fires.”
Local libraries are common destinations
for people without computers or internet access. Detroit’s main branch
has about 80 computers and there’s no time limit on how long someone can
use one or, aside from games and X-rated content, what they can use
them for.
In his 30 years at the library, Sims has seen all types of people use
the computers for every conceivable reason: to apply for assistance,
look for work, write a thesis, sue someone, or just to watch videos and
go on Facebook.
Sometimes, according to Sims, people have panic attacks when trying
to take care of a stressful matter using a machine they don’t
understand. “I see it all the time,” he says. “I see a lot of
impairments. Some are dyslexic, some are recovering from a physical
injury or a stroke. Some are visually impaired. I’ve seen people with
missing digits.”
Sims has been working with Minor since the summer
and is encouraged by his effort. “Some people inquire about our
services but don’t show up,” he says. “But [Minor] showed up. He knew
nothing at first—the whole digital world was foreign to him.”
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Keronce Sims helps Ed Minor navigate a computer at the Detroit Public Library.Photo: Nick Hagen |
In addition to having a felony on his record, little free time in his
daily life, bad eyesight, hyperthyroidism, and no car, Minor also has
very little money, and few people he can rely on besides his cousin.
He’s also battling the type of culture shock that has nothing to do with
the digital world. Simply going to the supermarket is a stressful
experience that results in decision paralysis. “I stick to chocolate or
vanilla ice cream and white socks,” he says.
As director of DCTP,
Nucera oversees programs that foster use of technology based on
community need. One of those programs is the Equitable Internet Initiative,
which will provide 150 Detroit households with high-speed internet
access. The program also involved training 25 local “digital stewards,”
two of whom were in their late seventies, in hardware installation and
WiFi setup. Age matters, but it’s not the primary barrier.
Minor has a passion for housing. After he’s done taking his
prerequisites at WCCC, he’s planning to take classes on real estate.
Despite everything he’s been through, he’s remarkably optimistic.
“Oh, it’s gonna get done,” he says. “Keep doing what I’m doing, don’t cry about it, move with it. I feel I’m on a mission.”
Sims and Nucera both think he has the capacity to overcome his technological difficulties.
“Clearly
he’s extremely resilient,” Nucera says. “You don’t come out of prison
after 40 years as an optimistic man without having a sense of self and
being very intelligent. It’s not about his ability to learn. It’s about
whether or not society can accept someone who’s been in prison for that
long.”
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Eric Mayo
