Cancel culture, prisons, and all forms of punitive ‘justice’ that dehumanize perpetrators fundamentally abandon survivors and leave us alone with the question: Why?
We have been through some organized abuse as a kid and have been seriously hurt as well as forced to hurt others...
At some points we were so close to becoming just another lifetime perpetrator.
We did not, and part of that was our choice (not wanting to be like them) but part of it wasn't (finding friends who genuinely cared). Alone we wouldn't have made it out of the cycle of violence
my sister and i have been having an ongoing argument-she believes in everything i absolutely don’t stand for when it comes to responsibility (incarceration, legal punishment, the death penalty)- thanks for always sharing your ‘hot takes’ (that shouldn’t freaking BE hot takes) and sticking firm to what you believe in. Makes me feel good to know I’m not alone with these ideas, with the feeling that people are still people, even if they do fucked up things.
Love this. Thank you Clementine. I’ve swayed back and forth between that total, visceral, consuming and no doubt dissociative anger that leads me to feel like dehumanizations, punishment and retribution is the answer but in the quiet, calm, more centred moments I know that I can’t even hate someone that much. I can see the webs of influence surrounding me/them/what happened and I have been slowly unravelling them. There is no Justice for anyone in retribution.
Does it get lonely trying to offer solutions that involve seeing people's whole humanity in a culture that is so attached to 2D characachures of victims and abusers?
Thank you
We have been through some organized abuse as a kid and have been seriously hurt as well as forced to hurt others...
At some points we were so close to becoming just another lifetime perpetrator.
We did not, and part of that was our choice (not wanting to be like them) but part of it wasn't (finding friends who genuinely cared). Alone we wouldn't have made it out of the cycle of violence
my sister and i have been having an ongoing argument-she believes in everything i absolutely don’t stand for when it comes to responsibility (incarceration, legal punishment, the death penalty)- thanks for always sharing your ‘hot takes’ (that shouldn’t freaking BE hot takes) and sticking firm to what you believe in. Makes me feel good to know I’m not alone with these ideas, with the feeling that people are still people, even if they do fucked up things.
Love this. Thank you Clementine. I’ve swayed back and forth between that total, visceral, consuming and no doubt dissociative anger that leads me to feel like dehumanizations, punishment and retribution is the answer but in the quiet, calm, more centred moments I know that I can’t even hate someone that much. I can see the webs of influence surrounding me/them/what happened and I have been slowly unravelling them. There is no Justice for anyone in retribution.
Does it get lonely trying to offer solutions that involve seeing people's whole humanity in a culture that is so attached to 2D characachures of victims and abusers?
It used to but honestly the more I've followed this path the more I've found I'm not alone on it.