it/its * just a local jester * artist of many mediums (for hire!) * Artist featured in POOLS by Tensori (F.K. In the poolrooms) * 10 Dead Doves #1 soldier ant 3 years in a row. join the Duonix fanserver HERE https://discord.gg/PhWt4GyXUT * fan of the unique, unusual, and macabre * polyam
Alright! I’m all done. Screencap redraw/paintings (that conclude in the animation I did) from episode 2 of Scarlet Hollow. Really quite proud of how these came out.
in the contemporary world, the most fundamental human right - and, it often seems, the least protected one - is “being both Allowed and Able to go Somewhere Else.” the rest is commentary.
the torments of prison are predicated on Not Letting You Leave. the most terrifying and degrading aspects of childhood are predicated on Not Letting You Leave. misogynists wail and moan and fearmonger about divorce and equal opportunity employment because they Allow Wife To Leave. borders and immigration restrictions exist, in no small part, to Prevent People From Leaving countries where they will be exploited and/or oppressed. fuck you for trying to leave. fuck you for exerting any control over your life whatsoever. that makes you the one at fault, actually.
david graeber described three fundamental freedoms: freedom to move, freedom to disobey orders, and freedom to reorganize social relations
Getting an anon that says “someone should rape you to death” is neither a death nor a rape threat. It is harassment, and harassment is bad, but that’s not a death threat and I feel like the scale of that is something that’s important to consider.
Similarly, reading and documenting things that people have posted publicly is not stalking. Going through someone’s entire instagram isn’t stalking, and someone finding your old blog that you mentioned in a post two years ago isn’t stalking.
There are definitely people who do use information collected from public posts as a part of stalking, but “stalking” means something and if you’re uncomfortable with the idea that someone might be archiving every single thing you post in a place that you can’t see or aren’t aware of, you might need to reconsider what you’re posting or if you’re comfortable posting at all.
Also, someone reblogging or retweeting or responding to your post isn’t harassment.
(If they’re subverting a block or a ban, this might be harassment, but someone just being annoying in the replies isn’t harassing you)
Is harassment: Someone setting up a coordinated campaign to mass report a user in an attempt to get them banned from a platform.
Is not harassment: Someone reblogging your post and saying that you’re wrong.
Is harassment: Someone you’ve blocked screenshotting posts to direct their followers to bother you.
Is not harassment: people reblogging you critically because your post ended up getting reblogged by someone popular.
There are definitely also people who are subject to a kind of stochastic harassment - trans women receive a huge amount of vitriolic attention that is often uncoordinated and unjustifiable, for instance - but one of the uncomfortable things about certain kinds of freedoms is that they will always be weaponized by bad actors.
If Alice is starting a whisper campaign against Barbra and sends anons to Charlie, Dani, and Ellie with lies about Barbra, Charlie, Dani, and Ellie may be unwittingly participating in a harassment campaign by answering those anons (even if it’s to refute the ask!) but it is Alice who is doing the harassing, not Ellie.
This is not the kind of harassment that it’s easy to meaningfully police while still allowing people to communicate, and the policing can be directed right back at the targeted individuals by the harasser.
It’s bad! It’s frustrating! It’s exhausting!
It’s also better combatted by improving community norms (don’t answer anon asks accusing people of wrongthink/crimes/abuse/whatever, don’t reblog callout posts, question whether accusations you see online might be part of a harassment campaign) than it is by, say, banning callout posts (because then you can harass someone describing their abuse by mass flagging it as a callout post).
To be clear: Your dorm neighbor writing on your door “they should hang you in the quad so we can watch you twitch” is an actual death threat. Your coworker saying “wouldn’t it be a shame if someone tackled you in the parking lot and fucked some humility into you” is an actual rape threat.
Someone in a forum saying that? An anon? A twitter egg? That’s not a threat. That’s harassment, and almost certainly a ToS violation that should be reported, and you should 100% block them. But “I hope you get raped” coming from some rando online is not actually a threat to rape you.
Part of the reason that it bothers me that people call these death/rape threats is because it means they might be processing them as an actual threat, which is WILDLY skewing their perception of the amount of danger they’re experiencing, which makes them panicky and reactionary and untrusting and WAY more likely to lash out at people trying to build a coalition with them who they perceive as a threat.
There are a lot of people who have been conditioned to experience discomfort as danger, and who have been told to speak out about any danger they are in from their community in order to protect the community.
These people are ticking time bombs who pose a huge risk to people who might be perceived as dangerous due to an enormous amount of cultural of marginalization and demonization.
“I felt threatened” is not the same thing as being threatened. “I was scared” is not the same thing as being in danger.
Just because your hat is tilted aside jauntily does not prove your superiority. My wizard hat is set neatly atop my head so that it is secure against strong breezes and someone condescendingly flicking the brim
I can tell that people condescendingly flicking your brim is a recurring issue for you.
I’m not going to give your anon the delight of me answering them because I’ve blocked them.
I haven’t even posted about that here and wasn’t planning to.
The only way they could have known is if A) they are one of the two private invite only servers that I spoke very briefly about me leaving (and not even saying why), or B) they are one of the people that are the reason I left.
I’m too tired to get into this today, and maybe even soon. Yes I’m done with the btg server for some time. I hope that my legacy of being welcoming and silly about the Goop continues.
