excerpt from e-mail I just sent
“It happened. It was awful. Anyway it’s over now, and I have PTSD and a bottle of klonopin.”
my partner asked me the other day “is there like, an actual treatment for just psychological trauma like you’ve got” and i laughed in his face for like 30 seconds straight
i think i hate the word abuse tho because its like you have to call anything abuse to legitimize it as hurtful and like i cant even put the hell!college stuff and the exfriend stuff in the same category but at the same time theres this pull to if i call it that, i will gain catharsis and what can you do how can you resist that
“abuse” is just “people hurt me, it was a hurt that invaded my brain and stripped me of my personhood” with added political clout
and i hate that “people hurt me” by itself does not have political clout
It really does cut both ways, because if you insist on naming something that was hurtful and dehumanizing and terrifying and traumatic, etc as “abuse” people will accuse you of just naming it that because of the power associated with the word “abuse”, for that political clout
like “you’re just exaggerating”, “it was just hurt feelings”, “why did that even make you feel that way, how weak are you”
it is so alienating on every single level, ugh.
(not to mention that it’s a pretty standard tactic of abusers to make counter-accusations against their victims, so like, one thing I’ve seen a lot recently in “radical” circles is abuse accusations just coming down to who has more social capital, and guess what, abusive people tend to have a lot of that because that’s how abusers work, and they’ll manipulate the language around abuse to their advantage because they have no fucking morals)
- John Darnielle: I hate to say this, because, I don't want to wish death on anybody, but.. it's wonderful when your abuser dies. It's wonderful. It's like nothing in the world. It's like, you are free. There's a feeling that you will never be free of what you were. You know, there's that. But there is this, you know, even though my stepfather was helpless at the end of his life, but to know that the person who used to hurt you no longer can. It's very, very, very deep. It's unbelievable.
- Interviewer: Do you forgive him?
- John Darnielle: No.
tw: abuse, victim blaming
being angry at my abuser, during the abuse and after, meant that it wasn’t real abuse. real victims don’t get to be angry, anger is messy. victimhood in order to be take seriously has to be martyrdom, we have to want the best for our abusers.
I wanted my abuser dead (while still loving him)
and I still am dealing with that. I am still dealing with the idea that in order to be taken seriously as a survivor, to be treated as a victim, anger was not an option.
am I only a victim so long as I promise to forgive?
suddenly struck by the number of times I have said “I just want them to have support/I just want what’s best for them/I’m sure they’re going through some hard stuff” about people who were abusing/had abused me, because I felt like that was expected of me
“accountability” sounds really great when you say it over and over, until it’s someone less popular or influential in whatever social scene you’re invested in, saying that your friend is an abuser. then who gives a shit, because if they wanted their abuse taken seriously, maybe they should have taken more care to remind you of yourself, amirite?
“accountability” is such bullshit. there will never be accountability, for any of it, and the amount of abusers who cling to all their zines on “radical accountability” sicken me, especially the white kids twisting theories of transformative justice that were created by people of colour, turning something significant and practical into bullshit jargon for them to jack off to instead of taking a good hard look at who their friends are and why they leave a pattern of broken commitments and “drama” (read: abuse allegations) in their wake everywhere they go.
I feel like ‘getting over’ abuse is like downloading a large file using dial-up internet in the 90s: it takes a really long time, it buffers really slowly, it randomly goes from like 20% to 3% to 60% to 43% and it randomly stops and then your brother has to use the phone and then it starts all over again and you feel like screaming and crying in frustration.
and like of course you never really get over it but I guess its the best analogy I can come up with.
so my strategy for dealing with the person who abused and harassed me several months ago now has been basically to ignore them and their friends as completely as I possibly can
ie walking away when I see them in the street, blocking their e-mails, screening their calls, etc
and I thought that eventually they would get bored or something and move on to some other project or mark or just continue on their way with their carefree life of being a middle-class kid who loves dumpster diving and oversharing about their feelings or something
but I guess they have e-mailed at least one person who I like and hang out with, trying to escalate or stir up more shit
and I just feel really awful because this person has no boundaries and it sucks that my strategy of “disengage, ignore” has resulted in their bullshit affecting other people
so basically to irl folks, I’m sorry if this person is harassing you or even just making you feel uncomfortable, it’s my fault, I’m just sorry, if you wanna talk about it you can always call or e-mail me.
Good Victims definitely do not mention the impacts of their abuse on their daily/professional/accademic lives in scholarship applications
trying not to not think about the words reserved for victims who try to own their stories in ways that benefit them personally because ffs for everything that’s happened don’t they deserve a good thing
Taylor Swift is really coming through for me w/r/t this tbh
“Begin Again” has been on repeat all morning, moving on to “I Knew You Were Trouble” soon, I swear.
tonight at dinner w/ friends I recounted this anecdote and one person who knew who I was talking about was like “he’s right though, they’re not cute at all” and I felt more validated than I ever even thought possible, I’m not even kidding
it’s funny because I have seriously stopped speaking to people irl, not to mention unfollowed them on tumblr, for posting photos of this person and talking about what a babe they are
I feel like after they told me I was responsible for them trying to kill themselves and then tried to literally blackmail me and spread lies about me to all our mutual friends and posted fake craigslist ads to send people to my apartment to harass me I can say they’re really not a babe okay
the end
excerpt from an e-mail I just sent to a friend, tw emotional abuse, rape
like I think “I want you to not have friends who tell me that they wish my rapist had killed me” IS A PERFECTLY VALID AND HEALTHY AND NON ABUSIVE THING TO SAY
Like that seems like a really reasonable boundary.
But of course the hilarious thing about having a history of being abused is that when someone tells you you’re not allowed to say that, instead of going “what, fuck you”, your first reaction is “oh my god I’m sorry is that not normal of me oh god I don’t want to be like my abuser(s) i’m so sorry of course my partner can hang out with people who tell me that they wish my rapist had killed me!!!!!!” and then cry
p.s. if you believe that i would idly tell someone they needed a lawyer to be able to talk to me, without any kind of extenuating circumstances, consider the fact that you don’t know me at all and there’s probably a reason for that.
if you know me irl, read away, if not feel free to skip this.
"
(Trigger warning for abuse.)
In activist communities, who is believed? And beyond that, what is the harm being addressed? Is it abusive power, control, and exploitation? Is it certain violent acts? Is it the exercise (or simple presence) of privilege? A survivor of domestic violence is likely to use violent behaviors to resist the objectification of being abused. A person who is battering can report actions taken by their partners that are mean, cruel, scary, or confusing. Out of context, they could be seen as abusive. In context, they can be understood as resisting power and control. People have the mistaken idea that batterers are “bad” and survivors are “good.” Battering is bad. Surviving battering is good. But, batterers and survivors are people. Understanding a given survivor’s actions when they confound our notion of “good victim”— or interpreting a given batterer’s charming manipulations— is not simple. In our experience, folks in activist communities too often end up confused and mobilize against the survivor.
People who batter can use their own vulnerabilities (such as their own experience surviving racism or homophobia, dealing with a mental illness or a previous assault, or facing exploitation in their family of origin or in the workplace) to control and manipulate friends, lovers, family, colleagues, and comrades. They set up loyalty tests. They believe that they are the victims. Often their vulnerabilities are real— and everyone’s vulnerabilities matter and merit reasonable attention— but their sense of persecution and entitlement is devastating to their loved ones and the community. Activist communities are particularly susceptible to manipulation by abusers because we are most likely to have compassion for how abusers experience institutional oppression and to understand how they are victims of unjust systems. Our empathy confounds our ability to see people who face oppression as people who could also be capable of, and should be accountable for, abuse.
"Connie Burk, Think. Re-think. from The Revolution Starts at Home. (via saltmarshhag)
