The Philosophy of the
Indigenous Server
Explaining the whys of what we're doing
Explaining the whys of what we're doing
“
In the dominant moral theories of the ethics of justice, the values of equality, impartiality, fair distribution, and noninterference have priority; in practices of justice, individual rights are protected, impartial judgments are arrived at, punishments are deserved, and equal treatment is sought. In contrast, in the ethics of care, the values of trust, solidarity, mutual concern, and empathetic responsiveness have priority; in practices of care, relationships are cultivated, needs are responded to, and sensitivity is demonstrated.
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Dr. Virginia Held. The Ethics of Care. Oxford University Press, 2005
It should be noted that the Indigenous Server was started by people of non-indigenous descent, so in order to best serve Indigenous communities who have historically experienced colonization and marginalization, we seek to be grounded in strong, ethical principles that centers building trustful, respectful, and compassionate relationships between Indigenous and non-indigenous people.
To do this, we ground our approach in compassion and the Ethics of Care, a philosophy developed by Carol Gilligan that has roots in feminist ethics, which emphasizes the value of meaningful and rich relationships as the foundation for doing good. A critical mistake we could make is to build a simple question and answer technical help forum, since an online forum like this neglects the important steps of building relationships between technical people and the Indigenous People they hope to serve.
Instead, our approach for the Indigenous Server will be to set up weekly 1:1, long-form video calls that forms a knowledge exchange steeped in mutual respect and love for knowledge. We will strive to make sure that equal time is spent debugging technical problems and discussing Indigenous philosophies, tradition and culture, because both forms of knowledge are important and valued.
The technical people who join the effort will be well-vetted and well-trained in the Ethics of Care and will seek to build caring, compassionate relationships in the process of providing technical help. They will be cognizant of Indigenous struggles and show genuine curiosity to learn more about your Indigenous traditions and ask questions in order to learn how to better their relationship with nature (this is an environmental project after all!). We often hear from Indigenous People that technical people and researchers drop in to start a project with them for a few months and then up and leave when it's convenient for them. We believe this violates the core tenets of the Ethics of Care and we hope to avoid this. At the same time, technical people will be volunteering their weekend time and may not be able to provide more help outside of the allotted scheduled time, as we don't want anyone to get burned out. Therefore, while we may not be able to commit to full technical support on your project, we are committed to providing regularly scheduled, weekly calls to crack your toughest problems!
Indigenous People are not a monolith, instead a rich tapestry of tribes and nations each with unique traditions, culture, and philosophies, including their own struggles and solutions. It would be unfair to try to generalize an "Indigenous Philosophy" for this section (and I'm still learning myself!), so instead we hope to use the Indigenous Server as an opportunity to learn from each and every one of the Indigenous partners that we work with.
Bear with us, as this effort is currently in its infancy, but in the future, we hope to integrate more Indigeneity into the philosophy of the Indigenous Server as we grow, establishing best practices grounded in Indigenous philosophies for how we conduct the operations of the Indigenous Server, and fill out this section as we talk to more Indigenous People. Thank you!