StrypeyDec 17, 2019
"I am so ready to let go of the America’s Next Top Radical model of social justice; it’s unsustainable, unproductive, and frankly a pretty bad strategy. It seems as though some of us – us being folks invested in the advancement of social justice in some way or another – are calling folks out sometimes not to educate a person who’s wrong, but to position themselves a rung above on the radical ladder."
(1/2)
Show threadStrypeyDec 17, 2019

"What’s worse, both in real-world organizing and online, this behavior is often rewarded: with pats on the back, social status, followers. We’re waiting and ready to cut folks out when they say the wrong thing. We’ve created an activist culture in which the worst thing we can do is to make a mistake."
- #VerónicaBayettiFlores

http://feministing.com/2013/12/20/on-cynicism-calling-out-and-creating-movements-that-dont-leave-our-people-behind/

On cynicism, calling out, and creating movements that don’t leave our people behind

  Lately, I’ve been thinking about the ways that the movements for social justice of which I am a part deal with mistakes folks make publicly. I’ve been thinking and talking with my friends about how quickly we shun and publicly shame our folks that are in a different place from us ...

Show threadStrypeyDec 17, 2019

"But I’ve been guilty of writing off folks because they said something transphobic, or something ableist, when as a cis person and an able-bodied person the better thing to do may have been to address it honestly, with an open mind, and head on. Not writing off our people, folks that are part of our communities, because they fucked up once? Spending time educating someone on an issue that you’ve had the privilege to get educated on? That’s what operating in #solidarity looks like."

This!

Show threadStrypeyDec 17, 2019

Also, this!
"So much online social justice activism has become hyper-vigilant against sin, great or small, past or present."
- #KatherineAlejandraCross

https://quinnae.com/2014/01/03/words-words-words-on-toxicity-and-abuse-in-online-activism/

Words, Words, Words: On Toxicity and Abuse in Online Activism

To all new readers: I’ve written a follow up to this article. Not long ago my partner and I were seated in her car discussing the arbitrary nature of certain holidays and I opined, perhaps ha…

Cross With You
Show threadStrypeyDec 17, 2019
This article discusses the author's fear of the way her radical community might overreact to some of the things she wants to write about, and the silencing effect this has.
Show threadStrypeyDec 17, 2019

"Time and again, I speak to people of my background in the whisper filled shadows of corners and corridors, quietly fretting about “getting it wrong” or being accused of collaboration or being a sell-out for voicing such criticisms. Even when such whispers have the audacity to become a loud conversation (behind locked doors) they rarely grow into public debates– too many of us fear we’re alone."

Been there.

Show threadStrypeyDec 17, 2019
"... moving beyond nativism does not mean abandoning nationality, but it does mean thinking of local identity as not exhaustive, and therefore not being anxious to confine one’s self to one’s own sphere, with its ceremonies of belonging, its built in chauvinism, and its limiting sense of security.”
- #EdwardSaid, quoted by Katherine Alejandra Cross
Show threadStrypey
I've always thought this is the most effective way to think about deprogramming folks getting sucked down crypto-fascist rabbitholes. Not railing against nationalism and nations, but advocating forms of patriotism that are inclusive, cooperative, and, hospitable, rather than exclusive, grasping, and paranoid. Inter-nationalism, not national chauvinism. Indigenous liberation movements offer many helpful examples.
Dec 17, 2019 at 5:34pmWeb