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Reposted by Smallproblem

brainfrog👩‍🦼🫁 @brainfrog.bsky.social · Nov 29

We cannot talk about the suffering disabled people face without also talking about the ways the state creates and upholds the conditions of suffering.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 1h

My kids painted pumpkins today.

Among other joys of childcare, this is one of my favourites - watching children get focused and fascinated with exploring something new to them, with building a skill. Pumpkins are round and slippery, paint interacts with them in novel ways. It drips. It slides.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

And furthermore, no less a schism in the community.

A quieter one perhaps, but no less a schism.

The only difference is that the bulk of the community is siding with the abuser's right to "fairness" over the victim's right to anything at all.

Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

Do you understand that that is telling victims "you must face your abuser or have no community"?

Instead of kicking someone out of your community for harming others, you are effectively kicking someone out for not accepting harm to themselves.

Unacceptable.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

Because everyone else sees that pattern, and they either get out, or they go talk to you, and you say everyone has a right to community, even abusers, and then they go "this is not the space for me".

Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

If your priorities go

- everyone gets community
- victims feel safe

You are hosting a community of rapists and idiots.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

If you host a group where there's someone who has a known history of doing harm, people who identify themselves more with their victims will not tell you what you're doing is not working, won't tell you your safety mechanisms are failing.

They will simply go, and not come back.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

Siobhán, I've personally left two groups, quietly, because the person being weird and harassing me there was better established and better friends with the group at large, and I did not trust the process to protect me.

These people had merely creeped me out.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 18h

So you ask the victim how far they are willing to bend, for your priority of keeping their abuser in community with them.

As they are healing.

As they are asking their community to protect them?

Unacceptable.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

When someone is doing harm, step one is resolve the harm. You cannot start healing the break in the community's trust while the harm is ongoing.

And insisting on being in space with someone you've gone and traumatized is continual harm. Insisting that you get to remain in their safe space is harm.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

I don't believe abuse should be resolved by exile as an overarching social thing. But among friendgroups, social clusters?

Abuse, intimate abuse, is not repairable the way theft is. It causes ongoing harm, both to direct victims and to vulnerable people who see it as a statement of priority.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

Repair work cannot and should not be asked of victims.

I may be willing to do the hard work of reaching out to someone I think is problematic, of trying to figure out how to bring them into the fold.

If the person they hurt never wants to see them again, it is still them that must leave.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

Because often, the abuser is going to be very willing to accept a form of "justice" that means they get to stick around. And it becomes the victim who is construed as stubborn, unyielding, unforgiving and causing trouble, for bringing the issue up. We settled this. Why can't you be chill?

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

There is no option in which no one feels hurt and pushed out.

The question is, is it the person who has done the abuse, who may want to repair things, who is being removed?

Or is it their victims, quietly removing themselves, as their community proves 'unity' is more important than their safety?

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

Sometimes repair comes at the cost of a permanent further harm to an existing victim.

And the fact is that because we struggle -rightly- to offer grace to people who have been abusers, it is incredibly difficult for them to have the space and humility to alter their behaviours.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

We have spoken about this a lot, you and I. I have repeatedly been placed in a position where I have to make a call, and in which no choice is pleasant or correct feeling. So have most people involved in queer community long enough, especially in trust roles.

Sometimes repair is not possible.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

Within closed communities, where entry means entry into a semiprivate space of assumed trust, allowing known abusers to remain is, at best, going to shove out their victims. At worst, it is providing them with more access to vulnerable people and a buffer from consequences.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 19h

This, specifically, becomes the sticking point.

Because in order to be fair to abusers, in offering them the opportunity to grow and do better, we also offer them the opportunity to collect further victims. And preventing further harm feels like the correct priority.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 22h

I love derivative work and it can be creative! Building on what others have done is great! But the best artists and creatives I know eagerly name their sources, every inspiration, every teacher, even the ones who don't have a legal claim. Only the rude claim to be entirely original.

Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 22h

This is a thing professional artists have to learn. This was classes I had in art school.

Laypeople conflate "I made it, and own the physical object" with ownership of ideas. But. You can buy a cake, add candles. You still didn't design it, even if you gave very specific instructions to the baker.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 22h

If you want to sell the artwork, you have to track down the original artist or artists, ask their permission, possibly pay them royalties. Because you own the physical object, NOT the artwork. If it's digital, you can't even sell the canvas. If you want it tattooed, gotta ask permission!

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 22h

To be clear, it is both legally and morally A-OK to do a paint by numbers or copy a work for your own use, to learn, to teach technique, whatever. But it's not really yours - it is at most something you customized a little. If you want to claim you made it, you have to do that. From scratch.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 22h

I spent about 5 years professionally copying as a paint and sip instructor (ethically-ish, the people who made the originals were paid and agreed to this use, though some of them were fully plagiarising too). Nothing I painted based off other work is mine. Legally. Even though I made every stroke.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 22h

AI "artists" have zero underatanding of what creative work actually means omfg.

-If I trace, it's not my work
-If I copy as closely as I can, it is not my work.
-If I tweak details, the details are my work. The rest isn't.

I can make non original work.
It is unethical to claim it as mine.

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Smallproblem @scritchyscratchy.bsky.social · 23h

In order for "your work" to exist, someone modeled the character. Someone modeled all its clothing. Several other someones provided the artwork the AI is stealing from to make the style you enjoy layering over your images. Taking a screenshot and typing a prompt makes all that work yours?

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