tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post2232091821999464770..comments2024-03-22T05:55:48.117-04:00Comments on The Pervocracy: The missing stair.Cliff Pervocracyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02080142422250604406noreply@blogger.comBlogger99125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-63660989470652824532014-06-10T21:13:25.887-04:002014-06-10T21:13:25.887-04:00Whoa there.
1. Not every survivor wants their rap...Whoa there.<br /><br />1. Not every survivor wants their rapist stabbed in the throat. It may not bring them any closure, and it may bring massive retaliation upon them. Throat-stabbing badness is not the same as creating goodness.<br /><br />2. You know who's morally obligated to call the cops? The rapist. Why don't we start putting that on <i>him</i> for once?<br /><br />I know it sounds good to say "call the cops and get this guy put away forever," but that's not a responsibility someone incurs by being raped. I just don't ever want to tell someone "congratulations on surviving, but now you have a special obligation to fulfill..." Especially when fulfilling that obligation is going to require an incredibly invasive investigation, major risk of retaliation, and a piss-poor chance that the guy actually goes to prison.Cliff Pervocracyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02080142422250604406noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-36756679186524458682014-03-29T19:36:56.842-04:002014-03-29T19:36:56.842-04:00I said this in response to another article today, ...I said this in response to another article today, but here it is again. In a group that has no central or structured accountability, everyone has to be vigilantly accountable, or bad things happen and then brushed aside in the game of "not my responsibility" with a side of "radical inclusion". The result is that good people with integrity leave because they can't stand the hypocrisy or don't want to watch others being hurt, or they don't want to be hurt themselves, and the creeps and predators stick around to keep playing their game to on a fresh audience. Seems like exactly the wrong way to have community.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-46157617935253047142014-03-29T19:09:10.309-04:002014-03-29T19:09:10.309-04:00So right there with you. I have been that person a...So right there with you. I have been that person as well, the one who spoke up and got dumped because it was easier to do that then confront and deal with the abusive jerk they were all kind of afraid of. It eventually cause me to walk away from that community and I am still struggling with the resulting hurt, anger and betrayal of that.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-34442529069675626042014-03-01T01:02:32.284-05:002014-03-01T01:02:32.284-05:00That your "boyfriend" didn't go sta...That your "boyfriend" didn't go stab the guy in the throat for raping you, is a great indicator that you need to dump said boyfriend, and also call the cops on said rapey dude. What the hell kind of person is so blase about their partner being sexually assaulted? I'm a woman, and when I found out about my husband being attacked, I thanked GOD the person was already dead, because I'd have found them and hurt them.<br /><br />I just cannot fathom staying in a relationship with someone who isn't upset when someone else violates or hurts me. <br /><br />Please, please, please, call the cops. If he's the rapey broken stair, and he's been getting away with it for 10 years now, it's not going to stop.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-44300156010714873382014-02-01T00:41:46.701-05:002014-02-01T00:41:46.701-05:00This is actually a pretty useful analogy for a who...This is actually a pretty useful analogy for a whole bunch of things, good shout! <br /><br />While the stair is missing, by all means jump over it (rather than pretend it's there and fall through the gap), but make sure that you're also taking strides outside the climbing process to get it fixed, replaced, solved, etc. A woman out late at night in an unfamiliar environment should take all precautions she deems necessary, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't continually protest that such precautions SHOULD be necessary, and continually fight to make them not so.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-44207905304753814102014-01-30T19:12:06.948-05:002014-01-30T19:12:06.948-05:00You know what's awesome? I've seen this ar...You know what's awesome? I've seen this article doing the rounds again recently via FB and the like. I read it a while back and it's still amazing and powerful. To show just how powerful it is, it's prompted a whole load of people I know to start talking about we can fix the broken stairs in our particular sub-culture/community. Within 24 hours of re-reading this article, there is a FB group dedicated to discussion about this, about how to call it what it is and do something about. It won't change over night, but if nothing else whole bunch of people in my own little corner of the world are now in touch with each other, know that if they speak up there are people who will listen, support them and have their back. Who will try and address the issue, rather than ignoring it. And that's immense. So I know it's a while since you wrote this, but I wanted you to know it's still reaching people and it's making a difference. So thank you for writing it.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-10256096508923080232013-08-03T02:41:33.719-04:002013-08-03T02:41:33.719-04:00Yeah, seriously. I'm into kink but I won't...Yeah, seriously. I'm into kink but I won't go to any group in any area because there are just too many of these, and I'd rather be safe than play around.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-49539415251000575792013-07-14T18:12:43.804-04:002013-07-14T18:12:43.804-04:00It can be very difficult when the issue is your pa...It can be very difficult when the issue is your parents or a parent or even family considering that there seems to be a very strong perception still that parents are as a rule loving, caring, kind, etc. and that anyone who doesn't have a good relationship with them is just over reacting or making a fuss. This is especially true when the abuse isn't overtly physical or sexual. It can lead to an environment where survivors feel very isolate and alone.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-75256455417520372352013-07-05T23:41:19.924-04:002013-07-05T23:41:19.924-04:00ARGH yes, I found myself in exactly the same posit...ARGH yes, I found myself in exactly the same position and it's clear that I'm seen as the problem. The uptight one who won't move on. He's got a history of skeeving and attempted/successful assaults and yeah, he's just treated like he's fucking quirky.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-63106866441802107612013-07-02T15:31:33.867-04:002013-07-02T15:31:33.867-04:00I vividly remember an evening when I was out with ...I vividly remember an evening when I was out with my mother in a bar near her house in northern Michigan. A male stranger who had been drinking quite a bit kept hanging around our table and trying to strike up a conversation. I'd been living in Chicago for several years by then and treated him as I would have in the city, i.e. tried to freeze him out while he kept saying "what a beautiful mother and daughter" we were over and over and tried to sit down with us. My mother kept smiling and laughing and telling this man that it was okay, and telling me that "he really didn't mean any harm." After an extremely uncomfortable conversation (for me) we were able to get out of the place. The same mother that worried about my living alone in the city and sent me rape prevention articles couldn't understand why this encounter bugged me so much, and chided me for taking the incident "too seriously." Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-37400745362802273102013-02-11T19:13:05.293-05:002013-02-11T19:13:05.293-05:00"Being invited to sex parties should be a pos..."Being invited to sex parties should be a positive show of confidence in your character, not some sort of default human right."<br /><br />I know of scenes where, when people have tried to bring up the issue with others, they have been called the trouble maker, and it is them that stop getting "invited to the parties". I myself have walked away from a community for this reason. It made me pretty sad and angry.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-52353865939849549362013-01-24T20:06:38.120-05:002013-01-24T20:06:38.120-05:00I'd like to add to the point that you do need ...I'd like to add to the point that you do need to *confront* people, and especially in kink and other "special rules" environments. Because it's not just about ingrained abusers, it's also about the ignorant and untrained.<br /><br />Many years ago, I ventured into a sexually-open subspace of a larger Pagan community, where I had various interaction with someone else. I was told much later, "under the table", that she'd actually been unwilling... I'd had no idea, mostly because I was young, naive, and somewhat obtuse. (Incidentally, the "space minder" -- a prominent therapist in the community -- hadn't said anything at the time.)<br /><br />The circumstances under which I was told made me feel that I couldn't ask about it openly (I'm also shy), and no-one ever spoke to me about it. But... there was a whispering campaign (which I only heard about indirectly) and future iterations of the space were quietly restructured, to exclude not just me, but other unattached people. <br /><br />Needless to say, that made me feel pretty damn unwelcome in the larger community, when if someone had come to me and actually discussed it with me, they could have taught me the rules i wound up learning on my own, years later. I'm still very distrustful of sexual and kink spaces in general because of that experience: not because I'm afraid of being hurt, or (now) of overtly hurting someone, but because I have no confidence that if I do transgress -- some local rule or something I haven't learned <i>yet</i> -- I have no confidence of being taught better and allowed to redeem myself, instead of just being quietly ostracised within the group.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-91258609744820486852012-12-27T00:44:43.230-05:002012-12-27T00:44:43.230-05:00I agree whole-heartedly with this, and have quoted...I agree whole-heartedly with this, and have quoted you in a number of conversations about the kink community and regular life. My question, however, is if I know of a person in the kink community that qualifies as a "missing stair," but have never personally been a victim of abuse/neglect/hurt from them, how can I play a part in making sure that this person is dealt with in the community? I want to see them acknowledged as a dangerous opportunist and make it so that he is not in the position to hurt anyone else. I don't feel that I have the social standing in the scene, nor any first-hand experience with abuse to speak to, which would allow me to catalyze change in how this person is dealt with. Thoughts?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-67036499214067079332012-11-22T00:18:57.700-05:002012-11-22T00:18:57.700-05:00I have opted out of participating in the Boston sc...I have opted out of participating in the Boston scene - and a scene in another city as well - because I heard about these concerns through the grapevine and observed dangerous behavior once I began meeting people. <br /><br />Personally, I have this message for the community leaders who are silencing the discussion: by choosing inaction, you are ensuring that healthy people who want to have safe relationships will opt out of the scene and tell their friends to do the same. And, by the way, this has an impact beyond the cities where it happens; people in other states who are not in the kink community are noticing that this is going on. The reputation of the community is being affected by this problem. <br /><br />I'd like to ask the leaders in the community - what kind of reputation do you want your community to have? Do you want people advising their friends to opt out of the scene? Or do you want to create a community people can actually be proud of? Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-18628120190274260192012-10-15T21:33:51.788-04:002012-10-15T21:33:51.788-04:00"Just about every workplace has that one pers..."Just about every workplace has that one person who doesn't do their job, but everyone's grown accustomed to picking up their slack. A lot of social groups and families have that one person. The person whose tip you quietly add a couple bucks to. (Maybe more than a couple, after how they talked to the server.) The person you don't bother arguing with when they get off on one of their rants. The person you try really, really hard not to make angry, because they're perfectly nice so long as no one makes them angry."<br /><br />I was bullied for several years because I got sick of picking up this other girls slack. Unfortunately she was really popular and I was bullied until High School, which is when I went to a totally different school than my class mates. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-43003902861671880682012-10-08T16:55:11.795-04:002012-10-08T16:55:11.795-04:00Yep, I think that people need to realise more that...Yep, I think that people need to realise more that they themselves are a gateway through which people they know can affect other people they know, and that if you care about the people you know it is your own job to maintain that gateway and be something of a guardian. It reminds me of a time when I had a boyfriend who was friends with some not particularly groovy people, and rather than 'guarding the gateway' he would abandon it and see it as not his problem if through my relationship with him I was vulnerable to crappy actions, attitudes and behaviours of his friends and occasionally even his family. Needless to say, that relationship didn't go too well. But it made me realise that I instinctively try to guard people from the influences I bring to their lives if they turn out to be ungood. It's all about taking personal responsibility, not just for ourselves and our own behaviours, but for what we allow to affect others too. Yes, I've just re-said what everyone else has said!Zoenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-80038078348011180962012-10-08T16:30:09.770-04:002012-10-08T16:30:09.770-04:00I second that!I second that!Zoenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-7702947001942057412012-10-08T16:25:05.653-04:002012-10-08T16:25:05.653-04:00Oh! What a relief it is to read yours and wally206...Oh! What a relief it is to read yours and wally2069's comment! This resonates so much with me. It affects my interactions with other people almost constantly. I often feel that sadness of knowing that I'm aware of an injustice but feeling that no one wants me to voice it, they don't want to hear it or talk it out, because that might bum them out, or be in danger of 'being negative'.. and so I try to censor myself.. to make myself more palatable for general consumption. I guess I just have to save it up for the times when it can be heard, and just hope that gradually people's eyes will open. They do, eventually, but it's painful whilst you're waiting.Zoenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-69948296687354961442012-09-26T01:47:11.098-04:002012-09-26T01:47:11.098-04:00just wanted you to know that this post and the &qu...just wanted you to know that this post and the "Just One Ally" post from July helped me find the resolve to start spreading the news that someone in the brony group i'm in admitted to raping a 16-year-old and still has apparently free reign at our upcoming convention<br /><br />i have no idea what's going to come of it, but thank you either wayShadowCellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10478686724667028931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-17165543973966715282012-09-24T12:36:26.371-04:002012-09-24T12:36:26.371-04:00Hey Cliff,
Just wanted to post to say that I'v...Hey Cliff,<br />Just wanted to post to say that I've linked this post to quite a few friends, and that it has been very helpful in conceptualizing how to deal with some less than charming individuals floating around my social circle. Thank you so much for this analogy.<br /> - Trinityroseblackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17613008288045782730noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-882789428515331822012-08-29T03:56:30.285-04:002012-08-29T03:56:30.285-04:00Great post.
At a place I frequent who has a horrib...Great post.<br />At a place I frequent who has a horrible co-ordinator. This "wonderful" person let not ONE but TWO mass inconvenience's with MAJOR emotional issues, stay for period ranging from 1 year to 2 FULL YEARS of their various and MANY issues. <br />One was basically a rapist and a sociopath, the other one simply couldn't handle his own feelings and got fridayitis and started fights almost to clock work, every week, FOR A YEAR! <br />"I don't like it either, but that's the way things are." is probably his justification for being so behind on acting to crimes and actions people did repeatedly in his presence. <br />I just think he's pathetic! Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-26531435124262715922012-08-13T21:18:03.052-04:002012-08-13T21:18:03.052-04:00"I don't like it either, but that's t... "I don't like it either, but that's the way things are." When talking about online harassment, the response I've heard far too often in the last year is, "Well it's the internet, what do you expect?" I expect to not have a stranger threaten to rape me. I expect not to be called a stupid cunt. I expect to be treated like a fucking human being. Is that really so much to ask?Kschenkehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06655115199381639363noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-66093334527412123842012-08-07T21:14:41.034-04:002012-08-07T21:14:41.034-04:00A guy in my social circle who had a reputation for...A guy in my social circle who had a reputation for being a bit awkward creepy, but probably pretty harmless, sexually assaulted me twice when I was 20. He sort of drifted out of the social scene not long afterwards and after a year or so I stopped feeling guilty and embarrassed and realised that I had actually been sexually assaulted, not just "let myself" be coaxed into a regrettable sexual encounter, but by that stage he wasn't around so it was fine. I started telling people about what had happened, at first leaving his name out of things for fear of people telling me not to be mean to him, but eventually it became reasonably common knowledge that this specific guy had assaulted me, and had probably assaulted other women in and around the social group, and had definitely been creepy to a lot more. <br /><br />I was recently at a semi-public event (essentially a con, but for musicians; the social group I'm talking about is a musical group) where that guy turned up after nearly six years of not being in contact with anyone from the group. The con involved a lot of people who didn't know this guy at all, and some who knew him and knew that he'd assaulted me. There were about 200 people there, though, so it wouldn't have been feasible to spread the word that he was a rapist without standing up and making an announcement or something, which seemed inappropriate. I definitely found myself keeping an eye on - or rape babysitting - him during the week, especially if I saw him talking to women who I knew hadn't met him before or heard about what he did to me. I was worried about sounding like a grudge-holding bitch if I started spreading it around that he was a rapist (and truth be told, he did seem both less sleazy and more isolated this time around). But I didn't want to run the risk of anyone else ending up in the position I had been years previously.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-52355818270273221532012-08-07T15:34:02.287-04:002012-08-07T15:34:02.287-04:00Great post. Thanks for writing.Great post. Thanks for writing.Dan_Brodribbhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14026291343082142533noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2770580070906411828.post-64571712644667670162012-08-03T14:54:40.527-04:002012-08-03T14:54:40.527-04:00Thanks for mentioning the Burner community in this...Thanks for mentioning the Burner community in this context. Many bad things have happened in the six years I've been in that community-- to me, to my husband, and to friends and acquaintances. I agree that Radical Inclusion is a slippery slope and silences survivors as the ranks of Fun Above All Else close....<br />I'm like several of the above posters: i don't really give a flying fuck if people shoot me for being a messenger. I've used my meager influence to oust / shun predators, and I called the cops on the guy in his mid twenties who insisted on secretly dating my teen daughter while she was underage.<br />Luckily, we do have B.E.D. (Bureau of Erotic Discourse) and Rangers in our community to help.<br />I love my Burner family, AND i am vigilant regarding anti social tendencies! Fix the stairs!<br />Much love and light to this amazing blog and its high caliberf commentors! You people rock!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com