There are at least two ways to undermine and not-so-low-key sabotage the work we are doing and the community we are building here, both of which we see daily.
One is to refuse to accept and respect the guidelines in this space. That includes emojis, yes, but it absolutely also involves refusing to engage with pinned posts, reacting with one word or a stock phrase as opposed to a thought out comment, feeling entitled to attention to your needs and resistances as holding primacy to the work this space was created to do, as happens every time we request tangible engagement or reading required material, and yes, making the erroneous and somewhat insulting assumptions that I and the team are not well versed in what we are doing here, whether in administering this space, the content that we present, or our approach and method.
The second is what we have seen in multiple subthreads these last few days, and also in private messaging, where there is either overt or covert moves to leave a space that was opted into. That is a different kind of undermining, but no less harmful. There is no lock on the door, no exit interview. If this space is not for you, so be it.
But be honest with yourself. A five second scan of your internal state will tell you if you have the capacity, willingness, and agency to do this work.
Putting hours into what is almost inevitable is detrimental. To everyone. To our staff, who work tirelessly, and whose enhanced engagement could be focused elsewhere, to the community, who has to wait for content, and is deprived of enhanced engagement that would actually be productive and conducive to the health and growth of themselves and of their overall praxis, of the viability of this community, to me, who, as an actual, flesh and blood person, has to expend still more emotional energy to a losing proposition, and, most importantly, and what so frequently gets lost here *to the communities that we impact and serve outside these walls, not least including the very people of color you are here to learn to stand with better than you do now*.
Read it again. Now, Again.
You are not here *for you*, or not only for you.
That gets so forgotten.
You need to have this top of mind when you enter this space. Or you will almost certainly indulge in the very maladaptive and violent behaviors you are here to overcome. This is part and parcel of confronting white supremacy, and you don’t need a hood and a flaming cross to do so. We see it on the daily with this very cohort, who are, ostensibly, dedicated to eradicating it.
It hurts in this way as well. Those who have indeed bought in to the ethos and method of this community, who are truly making bold, resilient, reliable and and relentless resolved moves to do better, are held back while we deal with issues that should have been settled long ago, and that we confront daily. It means we move slower than we should; and, because this work is cumulative, that there are some material which requires relational fitness and competency cannot be presented. It means that those who need help, not because of funky behavior, but because they genuinely struggle with what is no doubt challenging material are shortchanged.
I love engaging with you all. There is nothing I love more than pouring a glass of something, settling down with Tikka Rose snoring in the background, and really digging in. I have, and will continue to, spent hours with one person, digging deeply, rejoicing with them when authentic progress is made, however long that takes.
I have faith that each and every one of you has at least the beginnings, the stirrings, of moving in mighty ways. Assisting you in getting there is one of my great joys. Spending most of my time policing and cajoling is not.
Here is something that the flouncers and the emoji lovers don’t consider: that what we do is in fact considered.
If we say no emojis, that’s not for our aggrandizement, it’s for your benefit.
You say you want to move in better ways; we choose to believe you.
We know you won’t get there with a react. We see people here who have been here a year or more, making unforced errors, and flouncing at the slightest touch, and we see people who, despite their tenure are extremely reactive and resistant when told not to react and when invited to course correct. When that happens, we are sure that they have chosen, despite their time here, that they have chosen to not fully sink into community, that they hold themselves apart *and above* from the guidelines and ethos that drive and hold this space, and that they want credit for work that they have absolutely no intention of actually doing. So yes, emojis are, in the absence of a more formal way of gauging the health of the community as a whole, and of the growth of individuals within the space, an assessment of sorts. For you.
The material I present to you is important. But secondary. You can get the material anywhere. With the exception of my or my staff’s commentary, you can find everything that I find; I have no special access to the internet.
You can also find spaces that do not ask of you what we do; places where you are not expected to engage, or if you do, there is no responsive engagement and guidance from moderators; places where you are not invited and expected to contribute to the health of this community *in ways that enhance your praxis and your retention and internalization*; places where the standard of success is how many emojis are garnered (all of these points have been addressed exhaustively in posts easily found). That’s pretty much *every other social justice space out there*.
That’s why we have 4000 people to their 40,000. That’s still too many. Even the 400 or so who cycle in and out as active community members are too many. I would be happy if we went down to a tenth of what we have, if those 400 people were truly down to do the work in the way we prescribe.
Oh, wait. We did that 4 months ago, with the ‘All In’ posts, where fully 600 of you affirmed exactly that. Which did not happen. We are still beating the bushes for engagement, for support, for depth.
If the 600 of you who had committed (notice I am not mentioning the lurkers and those who clicked on the page and promptly forgot about it) actually had followed through, a lot of our issues would have been resolved. We would be at the website already, we would be orders of magnitude farther along than we are with Relational Ethics, and really ready to tackle hot button issues in a way we have not seen. We do good work here, despite all that, but can you imagine if the 600 of you who pledged to break the shackles had actually done so?
So. No more.
The behaviors that undermine the health of this community need to be stopped, and we as leaders of the community need to stop enabling bad behavior that is being modeled and is infecting the shared ethos, mission, and method of this space.
In subsequent posts today, I am going to hit on the three things that need to be changed. I will also respond to all those who have wanted to help, in ways that are either more or less actually helpful, and offer a prescription for going forward.
I fully expect an exodus.
That has to be ok.
Even here, especially here-no reacts.