Meanings of work for LGBTQIAPN+ and the diversity agenda on LinkedIn

Abstract:

Based on digital research on LinkedIn, we reflect on how users of the platform have impacted on the circulation of notions about diversity, equity and inclusion. Digital reputation is at the center of the psychic economy of algorithms (Bruno; Bentes; Faltay, 2019), producing "individual" and "corporate" desires in this laboratory of platforms that constitute social networks. Amid corporate discourses on diversity and accounts of self (Butler, 2015) enunciated in posts on the network, we see: (i) how people manage experiences of pain and suffering at work; (ii) what are the meanings attributed to work by LGBTQIAPN+ people; (iii) and how these accounts of self and the meanings attributed to work constitute a call to ethical responsibility for building other ways of life. Bypassing the concept of pinkwashing, the aim is to offer a queer Marxist critique.

Keywords:
LGBTQIAPN+; work; diversity; LinkedIn; pinkwashing

Resumo:

A partir de pesquisa digital no LinkedIn, reflete-se sobre como usuárias da plataforma tem incidido na circulação de noções sobre diversidade, equidade e inclusão. A reputação digital está no centro da economia psíquica dos algorítimo (BRUNO; BENTES; FALTAY, 2019), produzindo desejos “individuais” e “corporativos nesse laboratório de plataformas, que se constituem as redes sociais. Entre discursos corporativos sobre diversidade e relatos de si (BUTLER, 2015) enunciados nas postagens da rede, vemos: (i) como as pessoas manejam vivências de dor e sofrimento no trabalho; (ii) quais os sentidos atribuídos ao trabalho por parte de pessoas LGBTIQIAPN+; (iii) e de que forma esses relatos de si e os significados dados ao labor constituem-se como um chamado à responsabilidade ética para construção de outros modos de vida. Contornando o conceito pinkwashing, busca-se ofertar uma crítica queer marxista.

Palavras-chave:
LGBTQIAPN+; trabalho; diversidade; LinkedIn; pinkwashing

Resumen:

A partir de una investigación digital en LinkedIn, reflexionamos sobre cómo los usuarios de la plataforma han incidido en la circulación de nociones sobre diversidad, equidad e inclusión. La reputación digital está en el centro de la economía psíquica de los algoritmos (BRUNO; BENTES; FALTAY, 2019), produciendo deseos “individuales” y “corporativos” en este laboratorio de plataformas que constituyen las redes sociales. Entre los discursos corporativos sobre la diversidad y los relatos del yo (BUTLER, 2015) enunciados en los posts de la red, vemos: (i) cómo las personas gestionan las experiencias de dolor y sufrimiento en el trabajo; (ii) los significados atribuidos al trabajo por las personas LGBTIQIAPN+; (iii) y cómo estos relatos del yo y los significados otorgados al trabajo constituyen una llamada a la responsabilidad ética para construir otras formas de vida. Dejando de lado el concepto de pinkwashing, el objetivo es ofrecer una crítica marxista queer.

Palabras clave:
LGBTQIAPN+; trabajo; diversidad; LinkedIn; pinkwashing

The diversity, equity, and inclusion at work agenda

This article shares the results of the research “Diversity, social networks and the meanings of work: digital reputation and circulation of the ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance) agenda on LinkedIn⁵”. The project, which lasted two years, sought to: (a) analyze ESG Reports of large and medium-sized corporations, as well as “social entrepreneurship” startups; (b) identify the working conditions of workers, currently referred to as the DE&I (diversity, equity and inclusion) agenda, strategy or even sector; (c) understand the subject matter of work “with diversity” and its organizational meanings; (d) theoretically deepen the notion of fair work as an elaboration with a greater capacity to contribute to what social movements have been calling for in relation to the concept of decent work, disseminated by the International Labor Organization (ILO); and e) disseminate theoretical-political and didactic-pedagogical productions that offer a critical position on the global agenda of environmental, social and corporate governance.

Anchored in the legacy of the concept of corporate social responsibility, the term Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) emerged in the mid-2000s. The notion of social responsibility is connected to the debate on the social function of companies, a matter of attention of various fields of knowledge. It is in the inference of the field of Law that the first definitions on the subject will be found, which will later lead to the advancement of the terminology to the concept of corporate social responsibility.

In Brazil, the term became popular after the recruitment of the Third Sector by the State, which began to be called upon to intervene in the set of social inequalities founded by capitalism. As an example, it is worth mentioning the Solidarity Community program, which during the Fernando Henrique Cardoso government was decisive in publicizing the appeal to philanthropy. However, the partnership between the State and civil society had already been underway since the 1930s, occasionally oscillating between expansions and retractions. By transferring actions that are responsibility of the State, the private sector strengthens the discourse of government inefficiency even though its funding comes mostly from the State (Franciane MENEZES, 2010).

Formally, it is believed that the term ESG appeared for the first time in the document "Who cares wins", signed in 2004 by Kofi Annan, United Nation Secretary-General at that time, at an event with the main representatives of the world's banks. It was first publicly mentioned at a conference of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) in 2005 (Eduardo RODRIGUES; Cármen AGUSTINI, 2023).

It is also worth mentioning that the United Nations (UN) came from a build up in the same direction during the 1990s, as was the case with the formulation of the Kyoto Protocol. In the current context, the practice of ESG has been spreading throughout Brazil, with a greater concentration of actions in large centers, as for example, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, as can be seen on LinkedIn itself, the investigative locus of the research shared here. The dissemination of the ESG agenda⁶ has gained strength on social networking, not only on LinkedIn, but this platform is perhaps the one that expresses the best condition for a more "pedagogical" communicational circulation on the topic in question, as we will discuss later in this text.

Eduardo Rodrigues and Cármen Augustini (2023) use the metaphor "the new face of capitalism" to critically reflect on ESG practice and consider it in circulation in market society since the early 2000s. In their study, analyzing excerpts produced for the special issue of MIT Technology Review and the Nubank Blog section, the authors are interested in learning how capitalism is signified in and by ESG discursive formation, considering the discursive articulation between capitalism and sustainability one of its founding bases. Dedicated to textualizing ESG discursiveness, Rodrigues and Augustini (2023) indicate that it intends to (re)update the contradiction between the foundation of capitalism (the achievement of profit) and the sustainability of social and environmental life. Therefore, the debate on ESG, as well as that on Corporate Social Responsibility, is situated in this "contradiction-dissimulation game" based on the discursive articulations that are presented and that produce meaning to the ESG concept in the media, applying to it, above all, a sense of "the new face of capitalism".

In this area, it is worth noting that especially in recent years, due to the covid-19 pandemic, the use of social networks and platforms has increased. Nevertheless, this expansion of social media arises from the notorious transition from the Cultural Industry to the world wide web (Cesar BOLAÑO; Eloy VIEIRA, 2014).

With profound contextual changes, digital platforms themselves have gone from mere communicative functions to becoming a means of production (Raymond WILLIAMS, 2011). Skype, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter (X), WhatsApp and Telegram can be used to chat with a family member as well as to hold meetings, take language courses with a teacher, and sell products, services, etc. These instant messaging apps help both in the exchange of memes - apparently harmless - and in the production and circulation of information from journalistic materials that can either produce a critical pedagogy or reiterate an ecosystem of disinformation (Claire WARDLE et al., 2018).

With so many platforms to choose from, the choice of LinkedIn needs to be situated. It was created in 2002, launched in 2003 and, reaching more than 250 million users worldwide, was bought by Microsoft in 2016 for US$ 26.2 billion. This social network has sought to be interpreted as a platform of conviviality (Silvio LORUSSO, 2017), distinguishing itself from Instagram and Facebook by focusing on more reciprocal exchanges in a supposed environment of tolerance. Analyzing LinkedIn's graphical interface, André Ferreira and Gabriela Oliveira (2021) indicate that LinkedIn's proposal symbolizes a merely rhetorical turn towards conviviality, since it presents a similar model of interaction to other networks.

Currently, data mining for job vacancy selections and the biographical exposure of the platform's users' resumés express the possible risks of sharing data on this social network. Speeches with "learning" or "discontent" content after a dismissal also find interactions among likes, shares and comments in the midst of newsletters, groups and offers of vacancies and courses on the platform itself aimed at improvement in the most diverse areas of interest. Terms such as ESG, DEI, social entrepreneurship and startups have been widely disseminated, producing communicational circulation on the network, in individual, private or state-owned companies profiles to qualify the digital reputation of these profiles.

Thus, articulating discussions about diversity, work and social networks, taking LinkedIn as its locus, this article examines the corporate discourses on diversity and inclusion and the self-reports (Judith BUTLER, 2015) enunciated in the posts of LGBTQIAPN+ people, especially those that express the meanings attributed to work by these political subjects. Bypassing the concepts of pinkwashing, rainbow washing and diversity washing, we seek to offer a queer Marxist critique that may call us - activists and researchers - to ethical responsibility in the construction of other ways of life.

Searching on LinkedIn

The dynamics on the internet and social platforms are constantly changing, mainly because they adopt a business model focused on attention and influence, which increasingly delineates social life. The complexity and opacity of algorithmic systems and cybernetic agency affect subjectivity and the human-machine relationship, impacting the agency capacity of political subjects, and also challenging our scientific practice (Letícia CESARINO, 2021). Although algorithmic agency does not directly control people, its ability to influence socially, economically, and politically profoundly alters the way these people interact with the world.

Cesarino (2021) shows that the studies of the internet and social media have been an ever-changing field of research, constituting a complex transdisciplinary field that is difficult to delimit exclusively as a subfield of social sciences. With the transition from web 1.0 to web 2.0, the internet has become more platformed and thus made it impossible to distinguish between online and offline, a factor that prevents any simplistic explanation for these processes in question. According to Suely Deslandes and Tiago Coutinho (2020), there was a blurring of boundaries between the real and the virtual, which culminated in a process of digitization of everyday life, which may also lead to transformations in research.

With the "digitalization of everyday life", it is observed that technology applied to social research does not work merely as an auxiliary tool for data collection. This becomes the means by which the sociality of the research subjects is put into practice. It can be said that the digital world encompasses all fields of interaction in social life, from the most intimate and private (such as affective-sexual relationships or control of body cycles such as menstruation) to those of the macro sphere, such as large transnational financial transactions. This paradigm shift in relation to the role of technology in social research has as its main practical consequence the awareness on the part of the researcher that technology has this double character: if, on the one hand, it is the privileged locus where the interlocutors develop their interactions, on the other hand, it helps in the extraction, measurement and analysis of data. Thus, all stages of the research will be mediated by the digital world, from its exploratory analysis of field recognition to the writing of the final text, and in this path there will be little distinction between offline and online (DESLANDES; COUTINHO, 2020, p.4).

Thus, based on these authors thoughts on digital research, the first approaches to LinkedIn began. At first, it was decided to use a "real" profile, in which the researcher presents her professional characteristics and interacts on the platform as someone who already has a certain digital legacy on that social network, but from a certain moment on starts to move on this network with greater interest in a specific topic, which previously may not have been her main focus of interaction on this network.

Chart 1 is entitled "Algorithmic traces in the researcher's LinkedIn profile". The term "traces" is being used because the data fed into each field on the platform involves the "marks" and "clues" that are left in the form of data to these platforms, the vast majority of which are under the domain of some Big Tech. It is worth opening a parenthesis to say that these are large technological corporations, which dominate the global digital market, exercising enormous power over the economy, politics and society. The ideopolitical misconception of technological solutionism, massive surveillance (Shoshana ZUBOFF, 2020) and digital asymmetry characterize the business model of big techs, whose raw materials are data, which allow the creation of products and services based on people's online activities, which in large volume are called Big Data (Evgeny MOROZOV, 2018).

Nick Srnicek (2016) indicates that the economic exploitation of data is at the heart of this new business model. Thus, digital platforms act as intermediaries in this data collection, accounting for numerous information about people's behaviors and habits. The way companies collect, store, and use this data is rarely evidenced, raising doubts about security and privacy. For Srnicek (2016), the current moment represents a new phase of capitalism, which he calls platform capitalism, that has as particular characteristics the centrality of the digital platform economy, the exploitation of data and the deepening of the flexibilization of work.

The investment in these technologies for capturing, analyzing, and using data has been observed by Fernanda Bruno (2018) and defined as a psychic economy of algorithms, since the focus on the datafication of our emotional and psychological states from the online activities we perform becomes evident. The researcher also states that more than tracking down what we do online, this economy intends to understand how we feel when performing these actions, in order to make it a commodity. The way in which these large corporations have manipulated information, especially during election periods, shows that there are evident risks to global democracy. Such problems need to be widely debated by society. Even so, in this research, the risks of datafication of the researcher's own life were assumed, since LinkedIn is part of this ecosystem of platforms, which is owned by a big tech, in this case, Microsoft.

Returning to Chart 1, we find the fields that are arranged to fill in the user's profile on LinkedIn, from three columns, where: (i) the first is the name of the filling field itself; (ii) the second presents what this field is about based on what was verified in the profiles; (iii) and the third points out how the researcher who writes this article presents herself in each of these fields filled in the user profile.

Chart 1
Algorithmic traces on the researcher's LinkedIn profile

Analyzing the production of identities on Facebook and LinkedIn, José Van Dijck (2013) argues that platforms have developed as spaces where people enact their identities, projecting a particular image of themselves. The researcher also points out that the design of each of these platforms, based on profile pictures, status updates, videos or, in the case of LinkedIn, a career-oriented image, influences the way users will project this image of themselves. On these platforms, public and private life have their boundaries completely tensioned between the desire for self-expression and the need to preserve the professional image. Van Dijck (2013) Snircek (2016) and Morozov (2018) present criticism that indicates their concerns about the impact of algorithms on people's online experience, determining the content to be seen and influencing self-perception and social relationships with other people.

Considering the above, in a second moment of data collection, more precisely fourteen months after the beginning of the study, in an attempt to capture the dynamics of LinkedIn's algorithms and their possible biases, we invested in the use of a completely reseted smartphone device and in the creation of an incomplete profile, seeking not to print personal traces that could allow the algorithm to identify the researcher during use of the device, a procedure done with the intention of observing how the application would lead a reseted user to certain profiles and posts, in addition to checking how other platforms would also react to searches for content on diversity, equity, inclusion and ESG on LinkedIn.

To face the challenge of searching under the influence of the algorithms, the following steps were taken: (1) we cleaned the device storage, reinstalling all applications without connecting to any personal email account, YouTube or any network; (2) we removed geolocation tracking from the device; (3) a LinkedIn profile was created from scratch; (4) we started by following 10 Top Voice profiles in DE&I, human resources and ESG (Top Voices are people with a verification badge and recognized as creators and influencers by the platform itself on certain topics); (5) from there, we started to receive referrals from the platform; (6) we followed, with the support of our Field Diary, the profiles that were indicated more frequently and under which intersections of social markers these profiles were evident; (7) regarding corporate profiles, we also observed incidences of recommendation of profiles to follow and posts to react/interact.

In a brief and partial way, since this is not the central focus of the article, it is worth sharing some findings taken in a comparative manner between the moments of data collection with: (A) the researcher's accounts, logged in profiles, and everyday smartphones; versus (B) reseted smartphone, not logged in accounts, and profile from scratch.

Chart 2
Comparison between data collection on a logged in versus reset device

Considering this, it is important to think about algorithmic biases and their risks of impact on the research itself, since the goal of investigative immersion would also involve the challenge of an analytical enterprise with the ability to capture the multiple nuances of social dynamics that connect LGBTQIAPN+ bodies and experiences at the intersection with race, social class, gender, and sexuality. In the case of technologies and minority groups, it should be ratified that:

the way in which the disposition of technologies and sociotechnical imaginaries in a world shaped by white supremacy accomplishes the racialized algorithmic ordering of social classification, resources, and violence to the detriment of minority groups. Such an ordering can be seen as an additional layer of structural racism, which, moreover, shapes the future and the horizons of power relations, adding more opacity on the global exploitation and oppression that had already been taking place since the colonial project of the sixteenth century (Tarcízio SILVA, 2022, p. 69).

The issue of algorithmic biases and the reproduction of digital violence is deeply connected with the circulation of communication and the construction of digital reputation. Rafael Grohmann (2020) points out that thinking about the "circulation" of data, goods, and discourses also involves reflecting on "non-circulation", especially on interdicts and silences. The researcher leads us to conclude that there are struggles for circulation, and, specifically on digital platforms, this involves algorithmic logics of these platforms circumscribed in the "traces of circulation".

Between the struggles for circulation and the search for digital reputation

If circulation is an epistemological locus from which communication is looked at (GROHMANN, 2020), it is possible to say that the traces of communication circulation are particularized in the specific logics of each social media and, obviously, are not restricted to journalistic circulation, for example. Deslandes and Pinheiro (2020) state that each digital platform calls for a discursive production, indicating its own style and more or less preponderant thematic repertoire. In other words, each platform involves its own pedagogy about what is or is not appropriate to be communicated and enunciated in it. Algorithmic grammaticality, which conforms to the norms and values inscribed in these media, is marked by social dimensions imbued in the particularity of these communicational processes (GROHMANN, 2020).

Grohmann (2020) argues that circulation can be understood through the circulation of goods, in the sense applied by Karl Marx, but also in the circulation of spaces and people, as David Harvey (2018) expands the concept. Talking about "communicational circulation" entails attributing cultural, discursive or capital "meanings" - which circulate in the dynamics of communication, whether mediatized or not (GROHMANN, 2020; 2019). In dialogue with Muniz Sodré (2014), Grohmann (2020, p. 76) states that communication needs to be understood "in its circular facet - with displacements, edges, ruptures, continuities and conflicts". At the same time, circulation presents traces and marks from "spatial and temporal dimensions and their social contexts, including ideological ones" (GROHMANN, 2020, p.78). Strictly speaking, it is noted that, with the platformization of society (VAN DIJCK; POELL; DE WAAL, 2018), the communicational circulation of goods gains specific characteristics and meanings of the modus operandi of this platform capitalism (SRNICEK, 2016).

As mentioned, it is nothing new that communication plays a decisive role in the circulation of goods and in the acceleration of the circuit of capital, acting as a catalyst for ways of life and imposing forms and "meanings" on this mercantile circulation. Therefore, the means of communication are circulation technologies, which shorten the time of circulation of capital, impacting, for example, the dissemination of data (HARVEY, 2018; GROHMANN, 2020). Thus, the processes of production and consumption, especially digital ones, are dynamic and adapt according to the meanings attributed to them and shared. Consequently, the " meanings " are modes of signification that we construct to interpret the world and "attribute meaning" to the things of life. In short, capturing the articulation between "circulation of meanings" and "circulation of capital", distinct and complementary dimensions as they are, presents theoretical-methodological potential to correlate disputes of meanings and struggles for circulation (GROHMANN, 2019) of the diversity and inclusion agenda on LinkedIn.

It should be noted that there are deep connections between the circulation of languages and meanings with the current context of financialization of capital, commoditization of identities, mediatization, and datafication of life (DEAN, 2021; GROHMMAN, 2019b). These connections are part of the discursive-narrative dimensions of these circulation technologies, added to the fetishized perspectives on technological innovations (GROHMMAN, 2019b), currently expressed by the Silicon Valley ideology in myths sustained by the gig economy perspective, such as the overvaluation of the culture of entrepreneurship and startups, and the ode to the flexibilization of labor laws embedded in the discourse of "autonomy" for workers. (WOODCOCK, Jamie; GRAHAM, Mark, 2021). Another factor to be considered is the excess of datafied digital content on platforms, a fundamental component of "communicative capitalism" (Jodi DEAN, 2021). The effect that is produced from this excessive circulation is to put circulation at the expense of meanings, making circulation the meaning itself in this communicative capitalism (GROHMANN, 2020; 2019).

Therefore, recognizing these paradoxical and dorsal elements, this work presents an explicit interest in capturing the constraints, but also the gaps and fissures in the communicational circulation of capital, as "circuits of accumulation and resistance", which sway between coercions and attempts to circulate the common (GROHMANN, 2020; 2019). Therefore, it becomes central to understand the disputes for meanings in the dynamics of LinkedIn, which, therefore, is a locus of constructive power of the linking of the "ways of being and appearing" (Judith BUTLER, 2017) of the subjects, but above all, of capital. To the same extent that capital itself produces and sediments meanings about what life should be like in neoliberal rationality (Wendy BROWN, 2021), producing and reiterating the circulation of neoliberal subjects; there is also another face, politicized and capable of circulating subjects critical of neoliberal reason - and perhaps anti-capitalist - even if today it is easier to consider the destiny of the world than the end of capitalism (Mark FISHER, 2020).

Thus, it is in the capture of these contradictions that the challenge of the reflections undertaken in this study lies. It seems assertive to seek these challenges when the topic involves social media, based on analyses of the online construction of image and authority. The so-called digital reputation is part of a continuous negotiation process, in which we are under the influence of norms and values, distorted by interactions in the architecture of the algorithms of each digital platform. To think about reputation, it is necessary to distinguish between the strategies of building a personal image (personal reputation) and a corporate image (corporate reputation). Numerical indices of followers, likes, comments and shares inform about someone's popularity and authority, but they are easily manipulated quantifications (Adriana AMARAL; Pedro Henrique MOSCHETTA, 2014) with the purchase of clicks in the market of fake profiles.

Bolaño (2018) provides elements to understand that platforms are not neutral, and that especially technology companies benefit from the logic of fictitious capital, whose speculative assets are the numerous data and users, used to segment the market and sell advertising. The logic of attention established by the networks in the competition for engagement is intrinsically related to the production of fictitious capital, that is, the longer the time on the platforms, the more data will be generated and, consequently, the more value will be created. Digital reputation, corporate or individual, is a type of social capital (AMARAL; MOSCHETTA, 2014) which in the first case affects its market value and, in the second, compromises its social value, which are trust, authority and recognition. In summary, the higher the reputation, the greater the competitive edge in the digital platform market.

Fictitious capital, attention logic, digital reputation and communicational circulation are notions that correlate and help understand how corporations and people, in the Digital Age, are increasingly similar in vocabulary and grammaticality. And, from this, they develop strategies that feed back and capture neoliberalizing values, norms and ways of being, in which individuals seek to become entrepreneurs and companies intend to be humanized, both requiring competitive edge on the closest screen of any smartphone. On LinkedIn, the diversity agenda becomes a strategic resource for companies seeking an inclusive image, as identified in the excerpts offered below, extracted from the researcher's Field Diary⁷.

In my daily entry on LinkedIn, strolling through the hashtag diversity, I find the post of a large national corporation, the corporate profile itself indicates the size of the company. It is a giant in the fashion industry, with solidity in the market, which does not prevent it from appearing in the ranking of corporations that are far from meeting the ILO's roll of indicators for decent work. In an internet search, it is possible to identify numerous labor lawsuits against the company. In the LinkedIn post, made in celebration of a date alluding to the human rights agenda, the use of rainbow colors in the background is noticed, as well as symbolic elements of diversity. In the written body of the post, the communication expresses: "In our company, diversity is the spirit that stimulates success. We are committed to boosting underrepresented minorities by including them in the labor market. We believe that the black population, youth from the peripheries, LGBTQIAPN+ people, women in situations of social vulnerability and people with disabilities are the driving force of our corporate recognition. In addition, we have strengthened civil society organizations and instigated our employees to be leaders in their communities, through social projects". The post ends with emojis that reinforce signs of strength and commitment alongside the hashtags diversity and inclusion. The number of reactions and interactions to the publication is higher than normal, most of the comments are from workers who say they are "proud" of "collaborating" with the company, others dedicate themselves to narrating professional experiences that dialogue with the post and a very small number indirectly and subtly question whether discourse and practice are concrete in this corporation (Diário de Campo, November 20, 2023, emphasis added).

It is inferred that, as Dean (2021) highlights, the use of the diversity agenda matters for symbolic effectiveness, which on the one hand impacts the construction of corporate digital reputation, but on the other enables the dissemination of messages that can constitute hegemony. In the underlined extract above, which refers to the LinkedIn post, three issues are pressing: (1) the discourse recognizes the relationship between diversity and social inequality, appearing to be a discourse of rupture with the current social order; (2) the discourse reiterates the commoditization of identities, when it links corporate success to inclusion in the labor market; (3) the discourse reproduces the logic of corporate neo-philanthropism⁸ - the fundamental basis of neoliberal rationality (BROWN, 2021) - when it articulates the notions of leadership and community to the marketing of the development of social projects financed by the company itself.

Therefore, discourses can legitimize the status quo, or they can challenge it, and by contesting this status quo they can also divert attention from deeper demands, reiterating rationalities that further exacerbate social inequalities. In the same way, identities can be mobilized both to provoke and to strengthen established power relations (DEAN, 2021). This artifice impairs the construction of collective identities and movements, favoring processes of neoliberal subjectivation due to atomization and the flattening of the individual into a mere representational simulacrum.

In this area, it is important to mention that it is not only for the construction of corporate reputation that identity and the diversity agenda are used as tactical resources. People who seek a progressive professional image or who intend to build digital authority by managing their markers of difference also reproduce this. In the latter case, the human need for belonging must be considered, while at the same time it must be recognized as part of the commoditization of identities produced by communicative capitalism in times of surveillance and platformization (BOLAÑO, 2018; DEAN, 2021; VAN DJICK, 2013).

Meanings of work and ethical violence in self-reports

The construction of an individual online reputation is permeated by the process of self-representation in the digital environment, which is always partial, followig what the person chooses to show and hide. This concealment or visibility is always guided by what is valued or devalued in the social groups with which the person identifies in this network of contacts. Therefore, these profiles offer simulacra of the "true" self, as a kind of narcissistic creation of the self, based on what one wishes to promote (AMARAL; MOSCHETTA, 2014).

This dynamic exposes how much digital platforms encourage a logic of individualization and competition among people. Identities are transformed into commodities to be consumed and exhibited (DEAN, 2021) and, therefore, the neoliberal subject is led - between symbolic profits and losses - to politically handle this identity under the limits of fragmenting and individualizing virtuality.

One issue for reflection is the importance of evaluating how the concern with digital reputation correlates with people's self-esteem (AMARAL; MOSCHETTA, 2014) or with the desire for social prestige when living an experience of vulnerability. Grohmann (2019a) confirms that markers of class, race, gender, generation, and territory impact the circulation of meanings and also become quantifiable cognitive marks by the sophisticated metrics that underlie the psychic economy of algorithms (BRUNO; BENTES; FALTAY, 2019). Given this contradiction between traces and edges of circulation on LinkedIn when it comes to diversity and inclusion, the challenge is to identify when disputes are about meanings or merely attention.

During the month of June, when LGBTQIAPN+ pride is celebrated, LinkedIn expands the circulation of content on sexual and gender diversity, I noticed this in the increase in the number of reactions to posts from Top Voice influencers, but also from people with few followers. The public position of companies on "tolerance" and "respect" for LGBTQIAPN+ people also gains significant repercussion. Among several publications, I come across one that insistently reverberated on my screen with each update. Made by a user of the social network who presented himself in his profile as a transmasculine person, of peripheral origin, young and black, it said: "More than a business, trans entrepreneurship involves an act of hacking the systems of oppression, because it demands equality and workspace for everyone without discrimination". When visiting the user's profile, I find that in their experiences, consulting on diversity, equity and inclusion, as well as specialized work on the same topic, has been developed in small, medium and large companies in a recent period. Courses and training bring characteristics of an investment in training offered by LinkedIn itself, with a focus on social entrepreneurship, ESG, communication and digital marketing. Among the interactions in the publication, applause emoji and reactions on the "support" button stand out with greater evidence. I choose to interact by making a comment where I thank for the reflection and the content produced (because I am a follower of his profile), I ponder my place of speech as a cis, white person who has risen to the middle classes through higher education and via public tender. I conclude by asking if it would not be risky to credit entrepreneurship, so dorsal in the neoliberal narrative, with the potential to hack the system. As a response, I receive a kind interaction that at the same time puts me on the spot by questioning the "comfortable" place of criticism of capitalism, when making a career in the academic world (Diário de Campo, June 29, 2023, emphasis added).

As Grohmann (2020; 2019a; 2019b) points out, on digital platforms there are regimes of visibility and invisibility sustained by algorithmic circuits and orders. Four elements for analysis can be observed in the annotation above: (1) the repercussion of this same post, transcribed with underlining , consistently at various times during LGBTQIAPN+ pride week, shows that in social media the circulation of meanings is crossed by the designs of the communication media and the technologies themselves, which certainly imposes barriers to circulation and may also come to privilege certain content in strategic contexts; (2) work in capitalism, marked by alienation and precariousness, makes its ontological meaning unfeasible (Ricardo ANTUNES, 2019); with the reconfigurations of current capitalism it can be perceived the worsening of what Butler (2015) calls ethical violence. Therefore, narrating oneself challenging norms and producing new forms of subjectivity becomes a way of facing this violence; (3) although nebulous for minds captured by Silicon Valley ideologies, there is a strong distinction between a meaning attributed to work via the grammar of social rights and a meaning applied to work via inclusion instrumentalized by "rainbow washing" (Dean SPADE, 2021) and "Brazilian pinkwashing" (Bruna IRINEU, 2019). Both concepts define a form of ethical violence driven by the business practice of objectifying the LGBTQIAPN+ community, offering recognition and representativeness exclusively through consumption; (4) discrimination on the basis of gender identity and/or sexual orientation in the labor market especially subjects transvestites and transgender people to precariousness, as illustrated by the study by Kamila Teischmann and Bruna Irineu (2024). Therefore, whatever the initiative to transpose this reality, it will cause interpretations that evaluate it as significant; however, it is worth following the argument of Spade (2021) who warns about the need for real inclusion, which goes beyond mere representativeness and advances in the radical transformation of social relations and institutions, in a broader movement of struggle for social justice.

Given the paradoxes exposed, it is worth asking: Would it be possible to identify traces of resistance on LinkedIn? As a place of hope, solidarity and community?

Among the communication possibilities that LinkedIn offers to its user is the formation of groups, a kind of community, where the information exchanged is restricted exclusively to that space, which can be open for membership or with restricted entry permission. During the year 2023, I remained in a LinkedIn community exclusively for LGBTQIAPN+ professionals; there I found people I already followed and others I started to follow, interacting more frequently. In January 2024, I joined the WhatsApp group promoted by this same community on LinkedIn. My decision to extrapolate LinkedIn was justified in the search for a type of communication less focused on the objective of "resumé sales" that was established in it. When I joined the WhatsApp group there were 495 people subgroups in the community, which was subdivided into three groups, which were aimed exclusively at black people, another for women, and the last for LGBTQIAPN+ people, to which I linked. For months, the communications were about job opportunities or improvement, maintaining LinkedIn's communication standard. After a long period, some less common exchanges of messages open to the following dialogue between people whose gender identity, sexual orientation, race/ethnicity I cannot locate because they do not always have a visible profile picture or even a description on WhatsApp. In a tone of outburst, one person says: "I write here because I share a very distressing moment that a friend is experiencing. He is a black person with more than one undergraduate degree and a postgraduate degree, but he is having great difficulty relocating. On a recent job opportunity, after the week of "experience" he went through a contract suspension and is unemployed again. I ask anyone who can collaborate to help him have a new opportunity, he is from the human resources and logistics area and skilled for changes". In a few hours, the conversation unfolded between reactions with emoji, comments of support or identification with the story, messages corroborating racism in hiring processes. At the end, a person responds to the message from which the dialogue originated, saying that: "Look for me on LinkedIn, I work at a megacorporation [name withheld] and we have vacancies in the area of logistics and human resources". The message receives praise and thanks, as well as a large number of reactions with a heart emoji (Field Diary, September 24, 2024, emphasis added).

In this sense, the construction of solidarity and mutual care (SPADE, 2021) offers a path to mobilization and survival in times of crisis. Allied to this, the proposition of ethics of vulnerability (BUTLER, 2015) adds to the political horizon on which we need to base our practices and actions.

Conclusions

Álvaro Vieira Pinto (1979) calls us to the "social dangerousness of science", because, in his view, there can be no such thing as innocent science "because it would only be such if it served no purpose, which would be the negation of its essence. Knowledge is always a weapon of man in the fight against adverse forces, physical or social", as Grohmann (2020) recalls.

In this exercise, this text sought to present perspectives to contribute to the LGBTQIAPN+ field in the construction of strategies to disseminate information about surveillance and platformization, and that, above all, value initiatives that enable platforms produced and controlled by working people.

It was also found that the culture of connectivity (VAN DIJCK, 2013) intertwines work, gender, sexuality and social networks, sometimes as a business strategy and digital reputation qualification, sometimes as a mobilizing element of central notions for the production of resistance and for the struggles for circulation (2019a; 2019b).

In the light of a queer Marxist perspective, an intersectional reading was proposed, critical of Marxist economism, and at the same time integrates gender and sexuality issues with the analysis of class and power (Guilherme FERREIRA; Bruna IRINEU, 2024), interpreting how these intertwinings produce specific hierarchies and oppressions for LGBTQIAPN+ people, but above all, pointing to a social direction for the struggles for diversity and human emancipation.

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• 5
  This study received funding from the Public Notice for the Settlement of Young Doctors, linked to the Mato Grosso Research Support Foundation - FAPEMAT and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development - CNPq, to whom we thank for the support and investment.
• 6
  It is necessary to make a brief distinction between the use of the terms "agenda" or "strategy" to define ESG practices. In circulation on LinkedIn, both terms are used recurrently; however, in this text we will use "agenda" more constantly, considering it more appropriate to define the set of political issues that make up a public debate that will require decision-making. The term "strategy" seems to us to be more related to actions adopted by political subjects towards a specific objective and may be only one of the elements used to influence the "agenda" of political decisions.
• 7
  All the extracts from posts shared in this article follow ethical indications from digital research, such as the anonymization of the authorship of the posts - both individual and corporate profiles - which were also paraphrased without changing the meaning, seeking to scramble the words so that they are not identifiable (RECUERO, Raquel. Introdução à análise de redes sociais online. Salvador: Editora da Universidade Federal da Bahia, 2017).
• 8
  For Menezes (2010), although the intervention of corporate neo-philanthropy wants to be different from charitable philanthropy, in its essence it has the same moralizing objective that seeks to control misery but based on the "morality of responsibility".

• 1
  Este estudo recebeu financiamento do Edital de Fixação de Jovens Doutores, vinculado à Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa de Mato Grosso - FAPEMAT e ao Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico - CNPq, a quem agradecemos o apoio e investimento.
• 2
  É preciso fazer uma breve distinção entre o uso dos termos “agenda” ou “estratégia” para definir as práticas ESG. Na circulação no LinkedIn, ambos os termos são usados de maneira recorrente, contudo, nesse texto, será empregado com maior constância “agenda”, considerando-a mais adequada para definir o conjunto de questões políticas que conformam um debate público que demandará tomada de decisão. O termo “estratégia” parece mais relacionado a ações adotadas pelos sujeitos políticos rumo a um objetivo específico, podendo ser apenas um dos elementos utilizados para influenciar a “agenda” de decisões políticas.
• 3
  Todos os extratos de postagens compartilhados neste artigo seguem indicações éticas da pesquisa digital, como a anonimização da autoria das postagens - tanto de perfil de indivíduos ou corporativos -, as quais foram também parafraseadas sem que se modificasse o sentido, buscando embaralhar as palavras para que não sejam identificáveis (RECUERO, Raquel. Introdução à análise de redes sociais online. Salvador: Editora da Universidade Federal da Bahia, 2017).
• 4
  Para Menezes (2010), embora a intervenção da neofilantropia empresarial queira se mostrar diferente da filantropia caritativa, na sua essência, tem o mesmo objetivo moralizador que busca controlar a miséria, entretanto baseando-se na “moral da responsabilidade”.
• Como citar esse artigo de acordo com as normas da revista:
  IRINEU, Bruna Andrade. “Sentidos do trabalho para LGBTQIAPN+ e a agenda de diversidade no LinkedIn”. Revista Estudos Feministas, Florianópolis, v. 33, n. 1, e104258, 2025.
• Financiamento:
  Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Mato Grosso (FAPEMAT) e Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq).
• Consentimento de uso de imagem:
  Não se aplica.
• Aprovação de comitê de ética em pesquisa:
  Não se aplica.
• How to cite this article according to the journal’s norms:
  IRINEU, Bruna Andrade. “Sentidos do trabalho para LGBTQIAPN+ e a agenda de diversidade no LinkedIn”. Revista Estudos Feministas, Florianópolis, v. 33, n. 1, e104258, 2025.
• Financial support:
  Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Mato Grosso (FAPEMAT) e Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq).
• Consent to use image:
  Not applicable.
• Approval by research ethics committee:
  Not applicable.

Publication Dates

• Publication in this collection
  14 Mar 2025
• Date of issue
  2025

History

• Received
  16 Dec 2024
• Accepted
  17 Dec 2024