Already Gone

And if you also hadn't heard of her go read this because uhh... Holy Shit

This story sounds like it could have been a brilliant exploration of gender and warfare and violence but instead it was attacked by people who didn't know how to confront a story that made them uncomfortable, and the author faced horrible consequences.

I am not saying all this to excuse my friends and colleagues by saying "Oh, they had good intentions, they didn't mean it." I'm telling you that because I want everyone reading this to feel deeply somber about the idea of what YOU could do when you truly, genuinely think you're acting with good intentions. I want you to see what could happen when YOU run your mouth unthinkingly on social media and lean into collective hysteria instead of practicing prudence and thinking for yourself. They had good intentions, and they ruined someone's life anyway.

No one person ended Isabel Fall's career. No one came at her with a knife to personally, individually stab her in the back. But hundreds and thousands of people threw just one little pebble and thought NOTHING of it, because it was just one little pebble, right? Except it contributed to ten thousand other pebbles. It was part of the five tons of pebbles all crashing down on Isabel's head at once.

Out of the authors I personally know who were involved with the debacle, all of them felt absolutely crushed with shame and regret when they learned the truth afterwards. I have spoken in person to people who, during the debacle, were calling for Fall's story to be taken down because it was "transphobic", and who later realized that they were the ones doing violence for absolutely no fucking reason at all except collective hysteria and getting caught up in the mob, and who even to this day are embarrassed and regretful of what they did and who wish deeply that they could take it back and sincerely apologize to her. They can't. It's too fucking late. And that's a tragedy all of its own. The people I've talked to know that. They mourn that.

The community that killed Isabel Fall's career was not a community of "bad people" or evil monsters or secretly-awful bigots. It was a community of people who cared deeply and had good intentions who nevertheless ended up doing a really really REALLY BAD THING. Being a good person doesn't prevent you from hurting others. Having good intentions doesn't prevent you from hurting others. "uwu listening and learning from my trans siblings <333" doesn't prevent you from hurting others. And no matter how famous and talented an author is, they are still a human being who is just as capable of making a horrible fucking mistake and hurting someone as you are.

Don't put people on a pedestal -- either as some kind of writing god or as a witch to burn at the stake. They are people. And Isabel Fall is a person. Be so fucking careful of what you say and who you say it to or where on the internet you say it, and if there's a loud bit of confusing drama happening and you aren't absolutely fucking sure that objective, real-life LITERAL MATERIAL HARM has been done to someone, consider shutting the fuck up and staying out of it instead of amplifying it. Consider watching from the sidelines and waiting a week or so for the dust to die down before you have a take, if you really feel like you must have a take. Consider using intellectual judgment instead of acting reflexively from your gut-reaction feelings. Consider discussing it with a friend in private instead of publicly airing your grievances.

And treat others the way you'd want to be treated. How would you feel, if you were in Fall's position? How would you want people to deal with your work if it upset them or if they disagreed with it? Would you want to be publicly stoned to career-death, or would you want people to discuss it calmly and with restraint, and for the ones who didn't like it to go, "I think it's not for me, actually," and for the ones who didn't understand it to say, "I think I need to sit with this for a while."? How would you want people to act, if it was you? Great, now act that way yourself.

You’re wiping out swathes of children, and the fact that they will almost certainly be replaced with similar ones and their parents will never know the kid that parent loved and raised and gave everything to is a different child, their own beloved baby just gone and never existing, makes it all WORSE AND

How to identify, and then deal with, your emotions

Emotional regulation skills

Conflict resolution skills

Creating and enforcing boundaries

Dialectical Behavioural Therapy skills

Emotional intelligence ideals to aim for

Axes of self-care/wellbeing

Self-care self-evaluation (find out where you’re starting)

How to make a self-care checklist

How to start a self-care habit

Reparenting resources

Crash Course Psychology

KhanAcademy: Understanding the Self and Society (some units more relevant than others)

Emotional education activities for children and teens

of course a close up picture of their baby's hand holding a cup ring. it's probably the first picture ilya ever posts of her. he captions it: dynasty.

picture of shane with a burp cloth on one shoulder and spitup completely staining his other shoulder, holding a bottle and staring exhausted into the camera. probably captioned something like #dadlife

close up video of ilya's face, the top of his head visible, where a tiny little hand is pulling his curls and banging a rattle toy against him (baby hollanov is cooing and screeching) caption: my daughter thinks my head is a drum

video of hollanovling toddling up to ilya with a closed fist. ilya holds out his hand and says, "for me?" and she hands him a single macaroni noodle and babbles something incoherent. ilya responding, "oh...thank you sweetheart..😟"

video of shane on the deck of their house; outside is blanketed with snow and there is a giant snowbank off the deck. shane is repeatedly gently tossing their daughter into the snowbank. she is giggling wildly and kicking her little legs in the snow and going "dada again!!" shane is laughing and jumping into the snow too. anya is circling around them wagging her tail and licking their faces in the snow.

picture of anya with purple and pink marker scribbles on her face and muzzle. caption: daughter decided anya needed a makeover today, doesn't she look pretty!