[sudo-discuss] Fwd: Re: Fwd: [Noisebridge-discuss] Consensus on Barring Shawn Landden from the Noisebridge space and community (Was Re: On Asking People To Leave (Was Re: Shawn L. ))

[Naomi Most]

Look a little deeper before you call what I wrote "garden-variety
victim blaming."

This is victim blaming:  "Women should just be more confident and
report their problems sooner."

What I wrote was defining the parameters of the social problem.

I have no problem defining my thick skin and confidence as privilege.
There's nothing about being underconfident that says to me, "well,
they should just snap out of it."

--Naomi




On Sat, Mar 23, 2013 at 9:17 PM, netdiva <netdiva at sonic.net> wrote:
> I think while its apparent that a discussion on issues of privilege, who is
> sheltered from what types of harm by existing social structures, and related
> topics are beyond the reach of this discussion, some of the statements i'm
> seeing in this sound like garden variety victim blaming. If that many people
> had been that overwhelmed by him, there wouldnt be criminal charges on
> record.
>
> On 3/23/2013 8:42 PM, Naomi Most wrote:
>>
>> Yeah... I'm going to chime in here to perhaps add some perspective as
>> to why it did take so long.
>>
>> Shawn seemed like a pretty decent guy.  I thought he was a little
>> skeezy (he was always heaping more attention on the ladies at
>> Noisebridge than was warranted by normal dictates of conversation /
>> situation) ...
>>
>> ...but I just figured "slut", not
>> multiple-misdemeanors-warrant-for-his-arrest-etc.
>>
>> And I'm (probably) a lot more socially aware than most hackers. I'm
>> also pretty fearless for someone of my gender.
>>
>> What that means is that someone like Shawn instinctively goes after
>> women full of fear and self-doubt, who don't see his manipulation
>> coming.
>>
>> So while people like me, who interacted with Shawn on a very regular
>> basis (he was there almost every afternoon I happened to be there),
>> figured, "hm okay, nice enough guy, here a lot, whatever..."  he was
>> able to throw down some major bullshit in other social territories.
>>
>> When you've got victims being fearful and unconfident people in the
>> first place, it's extremely unlikely they will come forward about
>> whatever happened to them.
>>
>> And in this case, the victims all (reportedly) said, when they were
>> approached about his actions, "I thought I was the only one!"  The
>> subtext of a declaration like that is, "I thought there was something
>> wrong with me, so I didn't want to tell anyone."
>>
>> ...
>>
>> I hope that helps.
>>
>> The huge question Noisebridge is presently dancing around right now
>> is, how many of our current cultural disturbances are based on
>> Noisebridge being broken, and how many are basically inevitable
>> outgrowths of NB having grown to 10 x Dunbar's Number in community
>> size?
>>
>> My money's on situations like Shawn L. coming up again, and not
>> because NB is broken, but because these are the problems of our time.
>>
>> The positive side of that is, maybe, despite these being hard problems
>> that nobody has yet been able to solve, hackerspaces can figure this
>> out. And then we'd win Civilization!
>>
>> --Naomi
>>
>>
>>
>> On Sat, Mar 23, 2013 at 7:18 PM, rachel lyra hospodar
>> <rachelyra at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Feel free to follow through on the ideas you have posted here and report
>>> back to the group.
>>>
>>> If you believe that people acting on their own agency haven't gone far
>>> enough it would be more productive (and considerate of mitigating
>>> factors,
>>> such as the social shitstorms heaped on women who pursue harassment
>>> remediation within the tech community) to go for what you see as the next
>>> step, rather than criticizing the tactics chosen.
>>>
>>> I disagree with some of what you have stated (re permanent demonization
>>> of
>>> bad actors) but you are welcome to that opinion.
>>>
>>> R.
>
>
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-- 
Naomi Theora Most
naomi at nthmost.com
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skype: nthmost

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