I'm angry & upset about @Arisia's repeated, at times willful mishandling of the situation. I believe Crystal, I admire her strength & courage in sharing this story. I'm also grateful for her honesty; there are many lessons for con-runners & safety teams to learn here. Thread.
Many people do not understand how consent or personal boundaries work. People who refuse to acknowledge that crossing other people's stated boundaries is a violation cannot be trusted not to do exactly that. They do not think it's A Bad Thing, so they don't choose not to do it.
This is why @Arisia's president does not think he is rapist. He chooses to believe (& tell other people) that he didn't do anything wrong when he chose to do a thing Crystal had clearly stated she did not consent to. He knows he did it, he just doesn't think it's bad.
A person who does not think consent is important should not be in charge of a con safety team, much less a whole convention, @arisia. A disregard for personal boundaries is a massive red flag. Claiming to know what a person needs/wants better than they do is a massive red flag.
For a start, let's not hire people with a history of disregarding clearly established boundaries to lead safety teams, or to be on those safety team at all. Safety team should also receive training in how to take reports. @arisia
Crystal was not asked one of the most important questions a safety team member taking a report should ask, she wasn't asked what outcome she wanted to see. This is so important, @arisia!
People report incidents for different reasons, some will want the con to take action and others won't, but how can we ask con-goers to trust we are prioritising their physical & emotional safety if we don't even ask them what they want to see happen. @arisia
There's a repeated pattern of abuse that emerges from Crystal's account. It's been documented, there is evidence, the pattern is very obvious. Yet each incident, taken on its own, can easily be dismissed as insignificant (as @arisia did in this case). Abusers rely on this.
So @arisia says they can only take into account what happens at the con, obscuring the pattern of abuse. This makes no sense, since people don't live exclusively at this one convention, but more importantly, it plays right into the hands of abusers.
The role of a convention safety team will vary as mission statements & codes of conduct will vary, but it really SHOULD include protecting its members from physical & emotional abuse. You can't do that by willfully ignoring existing patterns of abuse @arisia.
Going back to an earlier point, @arisia worked out various arrangements with Crystal's rapist to minimise contact between them and he broke those arrangements. Again, that's a clear boundary violation, which should be a massive red flag.
When working to resolve conflicts between people & drawing out future boundaries, there should be a clear indication of what will happen if the agreement is broken. "Do not contact this person" isn't enough, we also need "if you do contact them, this will happen". @arisia
(I have more thoughts, but it is 3am, I am angry & tired, I'm going to go hug my cat. Please send @crystalvisits cute cat pics.)
(To the @arisia social media volunteers who probably didn't know about any of this (don't you love how the scariest bit is you never know who you can trust?!), I'm sorry your con values the comfort of a rapist over the safety of its staff & membership.)
Also, it's weird thinking about how to create & maintain better, safer convention spaces in the wake of what happened to @crystalvisits, when so much of what I know about convention safety, I've learned from Crystal. I am just really fucking angry & tired.
