hey there! i have a question i'd like your input on, if you have the spoons to discuss these two topics. (trigger warning: harassment, violence, fasc*sm.) i know you have policy of no harassment, no verbal violence, etc, against people who have done horrific things or have dehumanizing and violent opinions, on tumblr. but i also see you endorse physical IRL violence against fash. this is a duality ive struggled with- how to justify "do not engage" and also "fight them off the street". (1/2)

(2/2) (cw: harassment, violence, fasc*sm, cont’d); im going with “engage offline if Very sure, and if its safe to do so andor if consequences seem worth bearing” and “do not engage online” as a compromise, since i can’t be certain online most time. or else, “do not engage online unless absolutely sure, witnessed with own eyes or ears, that this person is Active threat” but with that, theres risk of creating “acceptable targets”. inb4 slippery slope, but im legit worried. (ok2 publish if u want)

Okay. SM here. I’ve gotten special permission to answer this one, since it’s really more in my wheelhouse overall.

Well. To begin with, we’re in the kinda unique position of having dual policies on a lot of things. I endorse the “bring a bat” mentality— from a distance, but it’s Ashlyn who would actually show up with one. (We’re still negotiating boundaries on who wins in conflicts like these.)

But speaking more generally? The key questions to me as regards morals and ethics are “What impact will this have,” and “How do I win?” I want to see a world in which marginalized people are less marginalized, where we’re accepted as full and equal members of society as we are. How do I bring that about most effectively?

Hate-mobbing has a lot of black marks against it from this angle. It’s an escalation - responding to speech with violence. It makes people miserable and harms their mental health. It more often than not makes them double down on hateful politics. And it’s poisonous to rational thinking and winning strategies.

To expand on that last part: The fundamental problem with saying “But this time I’m right, so the hateful tactics that oppressors use on me are justified here” is that, by and large, the oppressors are saying the same thing. The Slymepit, Gamergate, Swarmfront? They all think of themselves as oppressed by a conspiracy of marginalized people. They think that justifies the shit they do. They’re sitting there going “Well, sure, it’s evil when those uppity SJW types do it, but this time I’m right!” And frankly, it feels really good to say that, to engage like that. it feels like vindication, like justice. Revenge usually does. So it encourages you to think a little less about it and lash out a little more.

But revenge isn’t justice. Revenge doesn’t actually accomplish our goal of making the world better for marginalized people. And it does make us gloss over an important question, one that requires the exact sort of difficult and careful and considered thought it discourages:

How do you know that you’re not falling into the same trap as those guys?

Finally, particularly here on tumblr, it fails the “winning” test. A lot of people spewing bigoted rhetoric - a lot of them - are kids just making their first forays into forming political opinions. They’re going to fuck up and do/say/think something wrong. Sometimes it’s going to be terrible. But if we respond with a hate mob, not only are we bullying a child, we’re making sure that kid’s first exposure to us is a rage-filled mob that wants them to die because they said the wrong thing. These kids could have been talked around or educated, but now they’ve seen that and they know we’re The Enemy. They’ll always be looking for the knife in every word we say.

When we’re talking about fighting fascism, though, we’re looking at a different situation. We’re looking at people who have already been hardened. There’s no talking someone around or educating them by the time they’re ready to engage in actual violence against you. They won’t listen to a single word you say - if you’re an Acceptable Target for violence, then they already see the knife in everything you say or do, whether or not it’s actually there.

(And yes, this should be taken as a general warning against Acceptable Targets, because you’re not immune to this way of thinking either.)

So with words off the table, we’re left with the question: how do we actually stop the violence? Police and authorities aren’t going to help - they’re complicit in it, when they’re not actively engaging. The only people we can rely on are our siblings in this fight. And the only tool that has been shown to get the job done is violence.

I know this seems like I’m just going back on the Acceptable Target principle above, but— well, to me, at least, there’s a clear line. You can’t turn to violence as an acceptable tool without endorsing its use to resist your violence. And yes, that works both ways - if you’re going to engage in antifa action, then getting hurt might be the cost of doing business, and you have to be willing to pay that cost when it comes. But frankly, sometimes that price is worth it.

So it seems that the only point of confusion remaining is “Why is fascism categorically violence?” And sure, a lot of it doesn’t look like things we associate with the word ‘violence.’ A lot of the time it’s holding rallies, distributing leaflets, etc.

But every one of those leaflets, every one of those rallies, is a veiled threat. The core of fascism is and always has been “surrender what we want or we will take it by force.” And people who have been targeted by it know this. They see that, and they know that they can be hurt or killed anywhere, at any time, by someone like that. They are less safe, and their mental health is directly impacted, long before the first blow lands.

Fascism is violence against marginalized people for simply existing, and the tool that stops it is violence against oppressors for harming innocents. And y’know what? All things considered, I’m okay with that.