Bats In The Shadows

He'll do this on purpose because "okay, I guess having more than the necessary amount of confirmation is weird, so I'll keep the rest in the bathroom and only leave 1 or 2 in the nightstand." And he's thinking he absolutely nailed this Sexual Interaction™

Meanwhile Ilya is going to be mentally CRASHING THE FUCK OUT that there are only two sad little condoms left in the drawer.

Don't get me wrong: I investigate warnings, and I act on them if they're true and relevant. But callout posts are, on a very fundamental level, not about what people say they're about. There are exceptions, but generally speaking they're made for one or more of the following reasons:

OP didn't like the subject to begin with (often for bigoted reasons), and they wanted a reason, and a following, to justify and validate that.

OP wanted to gain popularity, so they made themselves look like either a victim, a hero, or both.

OP wanted to claim victim status in a private falling-out in order to preserve good standing with their own friends/their community.

OP didn't like what the subject was saying, and wanted to silence them (often for bigoted reasons).

OP genuinely just wants "revenge" on the subject, or otherwise wants to ruin their reputation and have them sent harassment.

Again, there are exceptions: there are "callouts" that just unravel a subject's lies, or point out problems in already public actions. If OP is claiming to have been personally victimized in a legitimately serious way, and especially one that indicates the subject might be a danger to others, I'm definitely more willing to believe it- one obvious example being sexual violence.

But oftentimes, callouts are incredibly personal, misleading, emotionally manipulative, blatantly untrue, or all of the above.

This person came to me on anon; I have absolutely no way of knowing what their motives are or how trustworthy they are. There is no credibility or accountability here.

And I did read the post. Lo and behold, it's riddled with emotionally manipulative language, false accusations, and the biggest reaches I've ever seen:

"DON'T READ THIS CALLOUT, IT'S SO TRIGGERING TO EVERYONE, JUST TAKE MY WORD FOR IT. But the proof is here if you REALLY don't believe me"

"Proof" is a scarce handful of screenshots taken out of context that contain emotionally evocative language, but do not support the accusations at all.

Some accusations are genuinely just weird logic leaps with no support, others are matters of personal opinion obviously driven by bigoted motives.

OP themselves expresses very publicly that they believe people who are marginalized in the ways the subject are, who speak on that marginalization, should be silenced.

I try to assume good faith here, and I want to believe this anon was just guilt-tripped and manipulated by the post in question. I don't hold any ill will here.

But anon, I want you to ask yourself:

Are the accusations you're making something you have personally investigated and found to be true?

Does this person deserve the harassment and ostracization they will likely receive as a result of your accusations?

Will you hold yourself accountable for the damage you've caused if you're wrong?

Firstly, the food price surge over the summer and beyond is likely to be significant – and will come on top of a near-40% rise in the price of food since 2020 – due to a devastating combination of the Iran war and a forecast record-breaking El Niño, which will hammer global food production. And secondly, Britain’s food system is painfully exposed to such shocks. The long-held assumption that a global food system can be relied on to meet the nation’s needs, at a reasonable price, no longer applies. With about one-third of the fertiliser trade travelling through the strait of Hormuz, and about half of the world population’s food supply dependent on artificial fertiliser, the shock to global food systems will play out over the next year – regardless of how quickly the strait may or may not reopen. The strait of Hormuz isn’t the only chokepoint in the global food system. In a prescient study from 2017, the foreign policy thinktank Chatham House said the world food system had become painfully exposed to 14 “critical junctures”, from the strait of Hormuz to the strait of Malacca, between the Malay peninsula and Sumatra, to the Black Sea ports that connect Ukrainian and Russian farmers to the world. The Panama canal is another; a multi-year drought across Central America has restricted transits through the freshwater-fed canal, which carries 16% of the world’s grain trade, forcing up global prices.

[...]

World hunger has been rising since 2014, with Covid-19 markedly accelerating the trend. And a belief that open markets can always compensate for disruption flies in the face of the growing dependency of the whole system on a few “breadbasket” locations, with 60% of global food production occurring in just five countries. It also ignores the possibility of simultaneous shocks – precisely what the climate crisis, as it leaves weather systems more unstable, starts to make more likely.

[...]

Our entire food system needs an overhaul. In private, the government recognises this. The grudgingly released summary of a still-secret Defra document on the national security risks from “ecosystem collapse” reported that “without significant increases in UK food system and supply chain resilience, it is unlikely the UK would be able to maintain food security if ecosystem collapse drives geopolitical competition for food … Countries best placed to adapt are those that invest in ecosystem protection and restoration, and resilient and efficient food systems.” Global price shocks alone won’t force the change, as an Oxford University study of previous shocks found. Government action is needed. Tariff reductions on nuts, and pleading with the supermarkets are unlikely to deliver results. Like other countries, the UK needs to rebuild its strategic food reserves, abandoned in the mid-1990s. It needs tighter government control and regulation of essential foods, including well designed price regulations like those being introduced across the world. And it needs a focus on longer-term investments in its own farming, supporting farmers in a more volatile environment with proposals like a basic income for farmers, and incentives to build in more resilient, sustainable food production.