Alexa, Where Have All The Non-Cowboys Gone?

On my Instagram feed, I was using the Explore feature to see photos it thought I would like. Occasionally, I share these public photos I find via Explore to my story. Nearly all of the photos were of attractive men. Guys working out, in Speedos, doing silly stuff. I liked a lot of the photos, followed a few accounts. But at a point, I notice the absence of nearly any other content besides guys, and saw only one type of guy represented.

Scrolls of White Muscle Daddy Bears

It seems Men in Skimpy Athleisure was the topic du jour, and White Muscle Bears was the day’s lesson plan. Wanting to include more diversity of guys, I scrolled. I scrolled again. I scrolled, and scrolled, and scrolled again and again until I had as many digital scrolls of white muscle bears as Karen had rolls of toilet paper after raiding Costcos in 8 counties at the beginning of the coronavirus lockdown. I’d find a Latino guy every once in a while, but always lighter skinned Latino guys, and not many visibly Afro-Latino guys. Or Afro-anything guys. Or Asian guys. Or fat guys. Or skinny guys. Or disabled guys. Or Pacific Islander guys. Or Maori guys.

Iced Coffee Gays: Full of Daddy’s Cream

Nevermind the fact that Instagram assumes I’m only there for guys (which, fair), but there’s only a very specific kind of guy it shows me or assumes I’ll like. Do I like hairy, bearded white muscle daddies? Fuck yes, I do! But that’s only one kind of guy I like. When the gerbils in my phone sent a message to the robots at Instagram HQ, ordering them to toss my profile into the user category Thirsty & Basic in the database of Iced Coffee Gays, what data did they use to conclude that’s the only kind of guy I like?

But … my preference is yes, fats, femmes, Asians, Blacks, and white muscle bears too!

There were no occasions of starting in Explore where I picked the white guys over Black or Asian guys. Those guys weren’t in the feed to begin with. I wasn’t shown fat guys and muscle guys and started clicking on the muscle guys. The fat guys weren’t in my feed to begin with. I certainly don’t expect a company owned by Facebook to be a beacon of equity, but the lack of diversity was strangely troubling. I find myself asking … myself … a set of questions.

Where does the algorithm end and where do I begin?

Is it actually somehow about my taste in men? Because… that would be strange. As a Black man dating racially diverse men, that is a lot to think about. Is it really the representation of my preferences? As I try to unpack that, more comes about. Is it how the algorithm is designed somehow? How do these suggestions come about? Are there categories of photos that they assign (e.g., Baby Pictures, House Porn, Bougie Foodies, Duck Face Drunkenness) to pair it with photos with similar characteristics? Do they have the A.I. to do that? Or is it about the accounts having similar social connections? Where are they drawing the connection that leads to this lack of diversity in social media? Is racial & body diversity in representation of images curated by algorithms even possible? If not, is it because of the users on Instagram, the programmers in the lab, both? Neither? Does it even matter?

I thought social media was supposed to be democratic.

Anybody who has a gadget can make an account. You just need Internet access, not to know the right people. Here I am, searching content to explore curated by an algorithm, instead of by executives thinking of what “America” wants to see on television. There was a time I believed that data is impartial, that data is pure, and that science can really advance us to a better world. I do still believe that science (in this case a data-driven approach) is better, more self-correcting, more likely to improve, than alternative systems (network executives). But it seems like this process of self-correcting limited too; who’s the person who wrote that algorithm? What users do they test this with?

Where Do I Go From Here? To Bed.

I follow accounts that specifically work to represent more diversity and feature folx outside the mainstream “norms” of beauty. I understand this advocacy work for the mainstream media, but today I realize social media has this problem, too. By posting and liking all those guys, I reinforce a circular loop — it presents content and I like it, so it looks for more similar content. It doesn’t try to broaden my horizons. Too risky — go with what’s safe. Or maybe… this is still way better than what mainstream media would be. I think about how some people have managed to go really far because they used social media wisely. Gentle reader, I’m leaving this more confused than I was when I started because I’m finding so many questions that just make me want to curl up with an E. Lynn Harris novel (rest in power). All I know is that my social media feed has a major diversity problem, and it’s weird to think about alongside the mainstream media’s.