# The Often-Ignored Question at the Core of Analytics By:: [[Ross Jackson]] 2025-04-26 Once the elements are selected, it is relatively straightforward to conduct analysis. For decades, computer software has enabled quick calculations of data. Free, AI-driven programs have increased access to specialized software and decreased the required knowledge. Analysis is becoming increasingly easy to conduct and more democratic. For all its complexity in terms of algorithms, equations, and techniques, there is an often-ignored question residing at the core of analytics. In its simplest form, that question is, why this? Selection is essential for analysis. No selection, no analysis. But the process of selection is often obscured. Organizationally, selection happens before direction. Those in power decide to have something examined and then direct personnel to analyze it. Blind obedience is the norm in organizations, so this direction is almost always implemented. This is a problem for anybody concerned with disrupting the status quo. Optimization is a standard analytic technique. Organizations are driven by efficiency. One can take a dataset and optimize it without much difficulty. Without questioning what is being optimized, one might find the most efficient way to exterminate a group of people or exploit their labor. Like Sartre’s notion of freedom, we are now condemned to live in the age of choice. Modifying slightly a critique emblazoned on a protest poster from the late 1960s, there are no spectators in the age of choice; everybody participates, whether they know it or not. In this regard, there are only three groups of people. Those who actively support the status quo either benefit or hope to benefit. Those who actively resist the status quo. And those who passively support the status quo through their inaction. This is it. It is essential to note the asymmetry. No group passively promotes resistance to the status quo. If a person concludes that the status quo is unjust and supports resistance intellectually, but then does nothing, that person helps sustain the status quo through one’s lack of oppositional action. This asymmetry is one of the reasons why changing the status quo is so difficult. Many see its defects but conclude that there is nothing to be done. While those in power prefer adulation and support, they are willing to accept defeatist condemnation. Ultimately, they don’t care if people like the way things are; they only care that things remain the same. Analysts perpetuate the status quo when they ignore why this is. As analytics is deskilled, the number of people capable of pressing a button to analyze data unreflectively is dramatically increased. This means the organization has an ever-widening pool of people who will follow any direction. This bolsters the status quo. Understanding that a given situation is unjust is an essential first step, but alone awareness accomplishes nothing. Active resistance is required to dismantle the status quo. Asking why is the subversive imprint that mobilizes active resistance. #### Related Items [[Status Quo]] [[Questions]] [[Analytics]] [[Organization]] [[Decision-making]] [[Resistance]]