Taking responsibility for the spaces I create

[sqbr]

I really like synecdochic's "comfort the disturbed, disturb the comfortable" is not just a bumper sticker for me. The only passage which threw me and I still have trouble coming to terms with is

7.1. When I do speak in the online sphere, I should take responsibility for controlling any resulting conversation that occurs in any space I have control of, to ensure that the conversation does not cause others pain. If I don't have the time or the spoons to exercise that moderation, I should not allow conversation. I should not allow a conversation I begin to be used to hurt others.

Because while I aim for this, my health is far too unpredictable for me to ever be able to guarantee it. I've done what I can by creating the comment policy here to help people realise what not to say in advance, but that's not foolproof and this isn't the only place I initiate conversations.

And this does cause genuine hurt to others, and it is my responsibility. For example, in my most recent post to debunkingwhite¹ I wasn't feeling up to much conversation, but decided that some links I'd found were worth posting and it didn't look like anyone else was going to do it. Posting links is usually pretty safe: there isn't the danger of saying something inadvertently hurtful, and there usually isn't that much of a response.

But someone started trouble in the comments and said a bunch of offensively racist crap. I eventually decided, and said, that they weren't going to listen to reason and I didn't have the energy to argue with them any more. A POC who was also arguing with them called me out on it (though I think they were more annoyed at all the other white people who said nothing at all) and since I had started the conversation I decided it really was my responsibility to deal with it, so I did. This was very difficult and tiring, though, and I ended up having to wait several days between some of my replies to build up enough mental energy.

I could have asked the mods to intervene, but that still feels pretty irresponsible, I can't just go around saying things that cause trouble and expecting other people to clean up after me. And on my own journals (and some communities, though none of them are prone to much conversation) I am the moderator.

I could simply stop posting about "tricky" concepts all together, or at least in public. But: I don't know if this is just my arrogance, but I feel like on the whole my posts do more good than harm, I've certainly gotten a lot of positive feedback on debunkingwhite about the links I post (I make some effort to record stuff that happens in Australia, though I miss a lot) And also I would, no ablist hyperbole implied, go mad if I couldn't talk about gender and race and all that stuff somewhere. I guess i could do it under lock but I'd rather not.

There's also conversations like this on other people's journals:

Me: *tangent likely to create discussion*
Commenters: *Problematic replies*
Me: OOps, sick now, got to go!
OP: Man, now I have to deal with this!

Commenter: *Problematic reply*
Me: That's problematic.
Commenter: Why?
Me: Oops, sick now, got to go!
Commenter: Oddly enough I don't find that very convincing.
OP: Man, now I have to deal with this!

(And similarly if the OP says something problematic)

And again: as much as this causes trouble, I think me not calling people out on their problematic statements would be overall worse.

And there's times when the replies I get aren't problematic, my original post or comment is, and I'm not up to processing people's criticisms fast enough to deal with the resulting conversation let alone for general politeness. If someone doesn't know me, me taking a week to reply seems pretty darn rude. Not to mention I'll spend that week obsessing about it because I freak out at criticism. This is a major reason I'm really uncomfortable with the idea of disabling comments on any of my entries.

Something it's important to note: synecdochic is chronically ill herself. I'd ask her how she balances these problems but she deliberately didn't allow comments on the entry.

I think a lot of this would be helped by me gaining abetter feel for how well I'm feeling, so I avoid the "Oh crap, in retrospect I wasn't feeling well and this is full of crap and now everyone is talking about it and I can't deal with it" phenomenon. But there really is no way to be totally safe, especially since people can comment on things well after I post them.

So, I'm not sure I've described what I wanted to say properly and I'm pretty sure I missed some stuff, but my brain is mush, as always, and this is something I needed to get off my chest. I am very interested to her people's replies but, well, all the stuff I just said applies.

EDIT: naraht suggests comment screening, which while not a universal solution could I think be really useful for some situations.

Acouple of things from the first draft of this post which I realised didn't make it into the final one. I may edit these in more seamlessly tomorrow or whenever I'm up to editing:

I have trouble concentrating on writing or reading for extended periods², and have unpredictable bad periods when I'm not up to much beyond reading my email and maybe replying to really basic enquiries.

I've seen people pull the "I'm disabled (or having a bad day or you remind me of my father, or whatever), so I can't help it if my behaviour is hurtful, and if you criticise me you're just a big meanie" card, and I do not want to be that person.

When it comes to stuff like race where I have privilege my first reaction to any given situation is often pretty screwed up and I have to think carefully to avoid saying something hurtful and dumb... but I have trouble thinking carefully.

Every time my health takes a dip I go through a period where I end up accidentally offending a whole heap of people before my "You probably shouldn't say this" alarm recalibrates.

I've used disclaimers but there's only so much they can do.

EDIT: I posted about it at debunkingwhite: Digging at racism with no spoons and got some really helpful responses.

1)Which I haven't linked to avoid the "absent-mindedly click on a link and say whatever pops into your head" phenomenon. You can find it pretty easily if you're interested but I'd really rather you didn't get involved or start defending my honour against the Mean POC or anything.
2)Which obviously doesn't stop me from writing long posts, it just stops me thinking about it too hard when I do :)

Comments

[sqbr]

That is a difficult situation. And I think we hit stuff like that all the time, ie every time an election comes around ("Do I vote for candidate X who does Y I like but is terrible on issue Z? Or candidate A who is bad on Y but pro-active on Z?") I think it's important not to be totally dogmatic in the pursuit of your agenda, and sometimes compromise is necessary because everyone is flawed.

Does that automatically negate their cause for you? ...do bigots also get your support if they are suffering inequality?

No and yes. I don't think it's right to totally boycott an entire social justice movement or organisation on issue X because it does poorly on issue Y unless there is an alternative, the support of which would do just as much for X without doing so badly on Y. And this is definitely a situation where I would follow the lead of people in the intersection. The important thing is to not set up a false dichotomy: in this case, POC and disabled are not mutually exclusive terms, and pursuing the rights of one, done properly, should benefit the rights of the other, not work against them.

In the made up example you give (since I agree, real life ones are by definition fraught) I would probably complain, and see what if any actions disabled POC were suggesting, and if there was a less ableist group pursuing the same goals join that instead. The thing is: either the disabled POC are on my side or they're not, so it either ends up being "POC vs white person" or "Ablebodied people against disabled people". (If there happened not to BE any disabled POC in the discussion, or their opinions were divided that would be more complicated) And in this sort of situation what I think often happens is that the disabled POC would say "Ok, no, disabled people should have access, this community is ableist and we need to fix that. But I think it still overall does good and we shouldn't let ourselves be totally distracted from fighting racism while also fighting ableism."

I'm..not sure I got my point across there, but if I try any harder I think it'll just get longer rather than more clear :)

[ex_peasant441]

(see disclaimer on previous comment regarding tiredness)

I think your point came across clearly. A summary of what I am hearing would be: In theory you would accept discriminatory behaviour from a group if you thought their cause was good enough, but in reality there is nearly always an alternative so you don't have to.

I think this may be one of the fundamental differences between us as people, and the reason why you can become an ally and why I can't - I would not and am not willing to make compromises like that. If I don't like the rules a group are setting I will try to get them to change the rules or I will walk away. Hmm, what an interesting discovery.

[sqbr]

If I don't like the rules a group are setting I will try to get them to change the rules or I will walk away. Hmm, what an interesting discovery.

That is interesting, and yes I'd say it's a significant difference. It's also mixed up with the fact that I'm simply not always very good at standing up for what I believe in when it involved creating conflict :/