On Accountability, Abuse
The three forms of accountability are
1. Fixing the harm done
2. Removing the ability to cause this harm again
3. Improving yourself such that you would not cause this harm again
But I think when it comes to matters of community safety, #2 is often the one that makes people feel safest. It's harder to feel confidently that someone has self-improved enough to feel safe. But knowing that they *can't* do it again, you can imagine they're doing the work to self-improve
On Accountability, Abuse, Sexual Assault
in college I had a friend who was an RA and overall community leader in a lot of student groups and he slept with a first-year who later said he was not consenting but felt unable to really say no because of the power dynamic
I believe my friend that he believed it was consenting, and it wasn't on purpose, but i also like, believed he had Fucked Up Big Time and hurt somebody
The accountability solution was for him to step down as RA and resign from leaderships
On Accountability, Abuse, Sexual Assault
Even if I believed he was smart enough not to do it again; the fact of the matter is not everyone felt that way and if we wanted to foster a community where people felt safe, he needed to not be in these positions of power while he did whatever process of self-improvement would rebuild that trust.
Unfortunately in reality he refused to resign and dug his heels in and made everything worse. People supported him staying in leadership. And it was a shitshow
On Accountability, Abuse
If the abuse cannot be "repaired"
Remove their power to abuse
so they can self-improve without being potentially a thread
That's what i think is a useful accountability model.
On Accountability, Abuse
Is there any other way to shut them down?
On Accountability, Abuse
@succfemboi Holding yourself accountable and holding someone else accountable can both follow this model
If they won't hold themselves accountable, we hold them accountable
If they abuse their power and won't willingly give it up
We take it away
If they are the Highest Power
If that's by force... well, we have a word for that
R E V O L U T I ON
On Accountability, Abuse
On Accountability, Abuse
Which is to say
If your moderator is exposed as having a history as an abuser, you should remove them from the moderator position at least temporarily.
You don't have to ban them from the community necessarily, if you really trust that they're improving then maybe that's not necessary, but for the sake of everyone feeling safe, not having them remain in power is probably wise for now!