The Strongest Stars Have Hearts Of Kyber

Intellectual property laws used to mean something when it targeted the consumer.

If you've never found yourself as the victim of a cult, or sexual assault, or abuse, the only thing separating you from people who have been victimized by cults / sexual assault / abuse is circumstance. That's it. Sheer luck. Luck over what family you were born into. Luck over who you were surrounded by when you were emotionally compromised or in any way vulnerable. Ect.

You are not better than people who have been victimized. They didn't do anything wrong to ask to be victimized. Anyone can be victimized by these situations given the perfect storm of circumstances. You are not better than people who have been victimized by cults / sexual assault / abuse.

You need to understand that if you are lucky enough to have never been victimized by cults / sexual assault / abuse, it's very little to do with how smart or strong you are or you doing all the "right" things. Someone can be smart and strong and do all the right things and still find themselves a victim given the perfect storm of bad circumstances.

Bullying.

Funny how when I was being bullied as a kid, I did fight back and I did do everything I could to stand up to my bullies. But that didn't make it stop. All the adults at school just told me that the bullying was my fault because I was "giving the bullies the reaction they wanted, if I would just be quiet and ignore them the bullying would stop."

But now that I'm an adult, I hear other adults saying all the time that kids who get bullied are only bullied because they're too weak and insecure to stand up for themselves.

Isn't that funny? How I spent years fighting back and trying to stand up for myself, and this got me told that it was my fault for not just ignoring them? But now I hear other adults, most of whom are parents, saying if a kid is bullied it's their fault for not standing up for themselves or fighting back?

It's a lose/lose situation, either way if the kid fights back, or doesn't fight back, they're told its their fault for how they respond. It's almost as if, the bullying isn't the victim's fault or smthing 🤔

And this type of victim blaming rhetoric ignores that there's in the majority of cases a power imbalance between the bullies and victims.

Common dynamics we see are: white kids bullying children of color, neurotypical kids bullying neurodivergent kids, gender conforming cishet kids bullying GNC and/or LGBTQIA+ kids, abled kids bullying disabled kids, boys bullying girls (he's only teasing you because he likes you!), rich or middle class children bullying poor children, ect. ect.

And this is exactly WHY adults often victim blame bullied children instead of holding bullies accountable, and these adults blaming the children are often privileged themselves. White adult school staff blaming children of color who are getting bullied instead of holding the white children doing the bullying accountable, neurotypical adult school staff blaming neurodivergent children who are being bullied instead of holding the neurotypical children doing the bullying accountable, ect. ect.

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?

I've never understood this, and the most insidious part of it is how this dynamic (the person being tormented is in trouble for getting upset, while the tormentee doesn't face any consequences at all) seems to be most common in children. Or more specifically, how adult caregivers manage these situations with children.

And that feels like an excuse, honestly. It feels like an excuse to let the tormenter get away with it, while still putting the onus on the targeted person to stand up for themselves, while also judging them if they do.

And also, it's harder for the person being targeted to stand up for themselves, not just for those reason, but because they're being targeted! They have to put all this effort into handling themselves and their reaction, that maybe standing up for themselves costs more spoons than they have at their disposal!

I think people also often forget that power dynamics don't always fully favor the customer, and sometimes power dynamics can be tilted in the favor of the customer service worker and subsequently abused. Able bodied customer service workers can be, and often are, ableist to disabled customers. White customer service workers can be, and often are, racist towards customers of color. Customer service workers who are men can be, and often are, sexist towards customers who are women. Customer service workers who are non-immigrants can be, and often are, xenophobic towards immigrant customers. Shall I go on? That's obviously not an exhaustive list and I could very well go on.

When I worked retail I had a co-worker scream at a little old lady and kick her out of the store because she spoke to him in a language he didn't speak. I saw her face as she was leaving and she looked so shaken up like she was about to cry. I've overheard so many of my co-workers calling customers racial slurs behind their back. Once again, I could go on, but I feel like my addition here is already getting long enough.