Thread by @GregDowney1

1/? Okay, at the risk of igniting a firestorm, one thing has been bothering me a lot about the #hautalk discussion that I think is being left out that I want to highlight. That's the issue of shame and the con artist...

2/? Although I enjoyed the #hautalk panel yesterday tremendously and, as the editor of a AAA journal, am still contemplating how I want to respond constructively and through changed practices to some of the critiques, I think that the autopsy of what happened is incomplete.

3/? #hautalk One missing element is the real acknowledgment of the 'bad faith actor' problem and the fact that 'old white men' (and old white women and old people of other colours) were actually conned in the HAU trajectory...

4/? I am NOT a qualified therapist and I have actually never met one of the key actors firsthand, but even from accounts of his behaviour that I have heard, it seems hard to avoid concluding that some variety of narcissistic behaviour was present. #hautalk

5/? #hautalk But one key thing forgotten about narcissists, which I DO know from firsthand experience (longterm, very painful experience), is that they are some of the most brilliant con artists. They lack shame, normal dimensions of doubt, and other personality traits that...

6/? #hautalk ... impede most of us from lying without hesitation or remorse, so they are often at the centre of pyramid schemes & other large scale deceptions. (Most of you will no doubt already know this; if so, I apologise for stating the obvious.)

7/? #hautalk The typical narcissist behaviour pattern is class 'kiss up and kick down': slather people in positions of power with attention, praise, and other ego stroking while simultaneously abusing, exploiting, and tormenting those over whom they have power.

8/? #hautalk The person at the centre of the scandal, the one who most resembles a 'bad actor,' is not a senior, graybearded academic, but actually a graduate student who may look 'old' to some critics, but certainly doesn't from my perspective.

9/? #hautalk The prestigious, elitest, ego-driven structure of privilege in our field was approached by a younger, dynamic, entrepreneurial 'talent' who seemed to incarnate, simultaneously, a tear-inducing return to 'classic' ethnographic values at the same time that he also...

10/? #hautalk ... talked a new, revolutionary language of 'openness' & digital opportunity. To my younger colleagues, remember that the 'old guard' is also often excited by similar values, but digital stuff intimidates the f* out of many of them (us?).

11/? #hautalk So the bait is set: old skool culture theory, a return to ethnography, new-fangled digital excitement (don't ask too much), as well as anti-capitalist 'openness' (again, don't ask too much about business model). YAY! Something for everyone!!

12/? #hautalk Senior people are lined up. Boards are assembled. Cultural capital is donated in large amounts. Colleagues are invited ('hey, why wasn't I invited? I'm just as important as X?'). Donations. Expansion. Don't ask how -- it's 'open' 'digital' magic!

13/? #hautalk Meanwhile, in the back room, the bad actor is using the enormous front-of-house social & cultural capital to abuse lower status volunteers. The double con is on: hang with me, endure the humiliations & abuse, pay the extortion I demand, & I will give you...

14/? #hautalk ...access to the Luminaries of our field. Pay the fee & you will be published alongside the Heroes. Meanwhile, to the heroes, we will offer the Premium experience, the Ethnographic Theory of yore that leaves you dewy eyed & content.

15/? #hautalk The take-over of many of our journals by corporate actors & 'professionalisation' of academic publishing has made the kind of expertise necessary to see holes in the business plan of HAU increasingly rare in the field. Besides, who the hell WANTS to focus...

16/? #hautalk ... on how ownership of the journal and book series is being held, on governance structure or business viability?! Seriously, we're anthropologists. Most of us are secretly glad someone else can take care of that.

17/? #hautalk When the whole thing comes apart: when the abuse is revealed, sexual harassment, pattern of extortion, misappropriation of money, interpersonal bastardry, the whole stinking, sordid mess, what do the people on the board do?

18/? #hautalk EVERYONE has been lied to and gaslit. Is just damn confusing, let alone the shame that comes from enabling predatory behaviour. Yes, some folks got manipulated because they had big egos, but some got manipulated because they were really excited about the principles.

19/? #hautalk Christ, I'll admit it: I was so damn excited about HAU on principle when I first saw it. I did my PhD at Chicago. I love obtuse theory (well, not ALL of it). I'm probably just lucky I'm too inconsequential, in Oz & too 'biological' to have been a target of the con.

20/? #hautalk It's just my read on the situation, living far away from the metropoles where it went down, but that would be my offering. Yes, racism, elitism, theoretical pretensions, erasure of Indigenous knowledge & culture, sexism, etc. all played roles.

21/? #hautalk And yes, we need to have multiple iterations of SERIOUS talks about elitism, citation practice, intellectual capital, cronyism, nepotism, obscurantism, etc. in anthropology. Yesterday was an EXCELLENT contribution & there will need to be more.

22/? #hautalk But for me, at the heart of the whole mess was a con that manipulated core values for different actors, pitched itself differently depending on to whom it was speaking, & took advantage of both our strengths and weaknesses, including 'our' diversity.

23/? #hautalk When I see the silence, I can also feel the shame, even though I was never invited to be involved (except reviewing manuscripts). And for those involved with narcissistic tendencies of their own, what would be more difficult than admitting they were conned...

24/? #hautalk ... by another narcissist? (and again, I'm not pointing any fingers, just trying to use some painfully-acquired insight from more than a decade of direct experience of this sort of thing.)

25/? #hautalk I have no desire to absolve anyone for anything, nor am I trying to take sides. I think one of the most brilliant things about narcissist cons is that, even when people see through them, they often sow so much confusion that there's a kind of 'confusion hangover.'

26/? #hautalk Victims of a con can turn on each other when, in fact, all might have been played, just played in different ways. The critiques & insights that come out of this can STILL be incredibly valuable, but we have to remember that LOTS of people go played.

27/? #hautalk And I say this as someone who shared many of the values that were exploited. I probably would have fallen for the con, too, if I wasn't too inconsequential to be included on the list of targets. And I would feel deeply ashamed if my name had been used...

28/? #hautalk ... to do some of the things that are central to what is alleged to have happened. I believe the victims. But I also believe that there are a LOT of victims. It's not at all heroic for me to boycott; I might have been rejected anyway.

29/? #hautalk And I never wanted to steal the platform that was being much better used by younger scholars to make change & offer necessary critique. But what I can say is that some of us -- including some who are 'old, white men' (although 'old' kinda hurts & I'd caution...

30/? #hautalk ... about ageism) -- are listening and trying very hard to think about how we can institute change: immediate, short term, and long term. So thank you again to all those who suffered & are brave enough to stand up & help us to better understand what happened.

31/? #hautalk And how we were vulnerable to this con. My hope is that, although this crisis will not produce all the change we want or need, it will produce some important gains for inclusion, respect, opportunity & dignity for everyone in our field. Peace out.

32/? #hautalk PS: And yes, I was the 'old, white' guy who put my hand up first after the panel. it's what I ALWAYS do at colloquiums when no one else puts up their hand. It's part of what I feel my duty is as a senior scholar, esp. after presentations by junior people...

33/? #hautalk Don't leave a colleague hanging with no response after they present but to ASK AN ACTUAL QUESTION, not a comment thinly veiled as a question. I wanted to ask about concrete practice suggestions for editors.

33/? #hautalk I still want to ask this question. I thought Jules & discussion of their points had some great ideas for making review process more congenial to non-canonical intellectual legacies. Bloody brilliant idea! Would love more. Will try to implement.