we have little to no say in who takes the reins of State power. the work we must do under a Trump presidency is much the same work we would have had to do under Kamala. there is a lot more within our power than ritualistically abdicating it every 2-4 years via a vote. we need to be building up methods of trans healthcare outside the reach of the state. we would have had to do that under Kamala. we need to be continuously, viciously, tirelessly pushing to stop the genocide of Palestinians. we would have had to do that under Kamala.

Many things have tarnished the allure of mass movement politics for me, but what killed it forever is how most of you have acted in this pandemic. the narrative you’re selling no longer has any purchase. it’s apparent it does not go beyond the rhetorical. i’m a transgender disabled abuse survivor. the idea that “the community” can be oriented in such a way to protect me, is supposedly only prevented from protecting me by the machinery of the State, is a fable. community kills. you won’t even be bothered to wear a fucking mask.

More on how viewing violence as a cohesive “cycle” in which perpetrators are all past victims and all victims are seen as potential future perpetrators is a deeply flawed framework that ultimately stigmatizes victims and obscures structures of power. 🧵 Firstly, if violence were cyclical, if the experience of violence is a necessary condition for making an abusive person, oppressed people would make up the vast majority of the perpetrators of abuse. This is demonstrably not the case.

That this is a consistent pattern tells us SO MUCH about the dynamics of abuse. It shows so clearly how deeply structural it is. If abuse was only about individual pathology the aftermath would look wildly different every time.

https://twitter.com/lesbrains/status/1782147627494379668

If abuse were about individual pathology (anger/communication issues, emotional volatility, etc.) the fallout when the abuse becomes public would have a LOT of variation. Not least because those kind of behaviors would be used against everyone, not just the primary victim(s).

When I was younger I often saw and strove for “independence” as The Mechanism of freedom from abuse because of how often my material precarity helped others control me.

As a disabled adult, I have to reckon with the idea of “safety” a LOT differently. And it’s really hard ngl. Where before I had this idea (even though it never came to full fruition, I’ve always been poor lol) that the more I could do and produce the further away from vulnerability I would be. With my body as it is now, that kind of safety is literally impossible.

What I take issue with is the idea that people talking about their difficult experiences some drugs (like weed) is inherently anti-drug, when the reality is that people who struggle with addiction are themselves often the people most harmed by drug criminalization. Doing so pretty much accepts the State line that drug criminalization is justified so long as it’s done in the name of “protecting” people from addiction. And that simply keeping addictive drugs from people is a protective act. Which is not true.

Abuse against children is the most normalized and widespread abuse there is and many adults’ impulse to laugh at and deride calls to acknowledge children as an oppressed group is itself a component of that systemic abuse. “Ha! You think children are *oppressed*?? That’s ridiculous, they’d have to be full human beings to be even *considered* to be oppressed. When in reality they’re all just objects to be controlled because they never know what is good for them.” UHM 👀

Authoritarians and their apologists will repeatedly try to get their victims and their supporters to defend each and every action of the victims in order to even be allowed victim status. Engaging with them on those terms, however, often aligns with their ultimate goals. 🧵 Countering authoritarian propaganda and narratives IS important. But, coming from a abuse survivor support perspective, there is a point in which trying to craft a “perfect victim” narrative to defend can hurt more than it supports.

Something victims of settler colonialism share in common with victims of other violent oppression and coercive control is bearing the constant pressure of voyeurs’ expectations that they be “perfect” victims. Expectations that are NEVER applied to their oppressors. This is because their concern is not about “all violence” as they claim. But about violence that disrupts, or even threatens to disrupt, the status quo of the power structure it occurs within. The everyday violence of settler colonialism is not even seen *as* violence.

I am VERY pro-javelinas and their destruction of golf courses but having grown up around them it’s funny to see people who know of them via pictures all talking about what sweet tiny precious babies they are. Javelinas will attempt to wipe you from the historical record lol.

https://twitter.com/tvscarlkinsella/status/1716788689517380080

They’re also not pigs! There are NO pigs indigenous in the so-called Americas. The javelina is the closest you get and, yeah, not technically a pig. All other pig-like wild animals you see in the wild here are actually just feral domesticated pigs, introduced by colonialism.

Cis men are “allowed” and *encouraged* to have any and all emotions under patriarchy. What they are discouraged from doing is expressing emotions in ways that do not serve to differentiate them from women and other marginalized genders. Cis men can be angry, just not in the way women are angry. Cis men can be sad and even cry, but just not in the way queers do. Which means they are encouraged to express their emotions in ways the reference their power within patriarchy.

Finally saw the Barbie movie and tbh there’s a lot of feminist language and posturing in it but at the risk of being dragged into oblivion I have to say there was very little content actually recognizable as feminist in it at all, and much that was explicitly anti-feminist. That people are hailing it as a feminist movie is actually kind of depressing to me now that I’ve seen it, ngl. Like, I’m glad that some women have felt empowered by aspects of it but it presented a toothless and honestly confused idea of feminism.

The standard of “I’ll only take illnesses/disabilities seriously if they’ve been diagnosed as-such by a doctor” in a society with extreme disparities re: access to healthcare in practice invariably looks like only acknowledging illness/disability in wealthy people. And that’s at best lol.

Stop articulating masculinity as something inherently patriarchal and start understanding masculinity as something that has been *captured* by patriarchy. When you theorize about masculinity as something inherently patriarchal you allow the focus to shift away from the very real agents and benefactors of patriarchy (cis men) and validate their belief that masculinity can only be affirmed via a dominance relation.

Tbh you know the “your parents did their best” is an empty platitude bc there’s no specificity to what goal they were “doing their best” to achieve. Just assumes that all parents are part of the same unique social group who have a set of shared and benevolent goals. Yeah I could say my parent “tried their best” in that they poured a LOT of energy into their parenting goals. But their goals as a parent was to control me, shape me into an image that conformed to gender norms, and punish deviations from those goals.

Misinformation about abuse proliferates so I don’t believe that only abusers spread apologia but what I do believe is that *many* of the people who consistently theorize and push abuse apologia have more than a passing or theoretical interest in the outcome 👀 I’m just saying that a high concern for the wellbeing of abusers and rapists, which usually comes with a preoccupation with “resisting cancel culture” or something similar, is a red enough flag that it might be worthwhile for you to take note when you see it.

To say that being abused is what *causes* someone to be abusive has its roots in the belief that abuse is individual pathology and only comes about when someone has been “broken” by previous abuse, thus positioning all survivors as inherently more dangerous bc of their trauma. It’s a fundamentally ableist and anti-survivor position. Traumatized people are more likely to become victims of further abuse than to perpetuate it. Abusers with histories of being abused are common because abuse itself is common.

Therapy can help with plenty of issues but what it does not do is change someone’s values and ideology. You can give an abuser insights into their trauma, work on communication skills, etc. and what you’ll have is a more insightful abuser with better communication skills.

https://twitter.com/gabydvj/status/1678495372417593352

Therapy “works” for abusers in much the same way it works for anyone else, because individual therapy in general has never been intended to change anyone’s value system. A therapist is literally not even socially positioned to do that work in a meaningful way.

When you hear someone state an accessibility need you feel yourself responding with “that can’t possibly be true/necessary!” take that as a sign to reflect on what it would mean if it were true and why that feels threatening to you, rather than as a signal to double down. Why does it feel better for you to believe that people are just “lazy,” not trying hard enough, trying to play a 4D chess level con on others, etc. than to believe that people have different abilities and capacities that require accommodations?

tbh i’ve tried to figure out a way that i can post a picture of my new tbutch muscles bc frankly i LONG to share them with the world but alas i have too many tattoos to make that possible and maintain opsec so you just have to believe me when i say they’re like this 💪 seriously though y’all idk what it is but i have always had this like, primal urge to flex my muscles at people whenever i have them lol. and being on T and thus having bigger muscles to flex is so intense for me 😂 it takes up like 50% of my impulse control.

Abuse is not defined by singular events but by a context of control. When you only determine abuse by one’s behavior in a singular event, or even multiple events, rather than by the entire context of the relationship, you may easily accept an abuser’s attempt at DARVO. There are victims who use physical violence, lie, cheat, yell at/insult their abusers, break things, steal, and pretty much anything that many people seem to think disqualify someone from being a “true” victim! Often victims will do these things *because* of the abusive context!