Let’s talk more about safe spaces. Let me start by saying no space can truly be completely safe and that shouldn’t be the aim. It should be to make the space as safe as it can be for the most amount of people. In yesterday’s post, I spent two-thirds of it in a footnote about religion. I guess that’s what was really on my mind so I gave into it.
I want to talk more about how to create a safe space. Oh, I also talked about how thirty years ago, I was involved in theater with people (women) who were interested in creating safe spaces for performers. Maybe it wasn’t phrased that way, but that’s definitely how the women in charge handled it.
I was appreciative of it because I was a hot mess back then. I still am, but in a different way. Back then, I was doing one-person performances at difference festivals events. It was for minimal or no money because funds were tight in the arts back then. I mean, they always are so that’s just a given. I was truly doing it for the love of it and because it made me feel alive. Getting and stage and performing something I had written and directed? Nothing could beat that feeling.
Each performance was three to five minutes, and it took me three months to write, memorize, stage, and practice each one. Well, to be fair, the first month was me running around avoiding thinking about it at all. The second month was me panicking and writing frantically. There was a lot of creating going on. The third month was when I really buckled down and did my thing. I always worried about getting it done in time, but I always did. I made more than a few mistakes (once a rather big one), but I still consider all of tehm successes.
The one I mentioned was for Dyke Night, and the only stipulation at that time to attend was that you considered yourself a woman. I’d like to think that would expand to genderqueer people and agender people nowadays, but I haven’t kept up with them in decades so I could not tell you for sure.
Side note: I haaaaaaaaaate ‘but what if he’s autistic’ as an excuse for creepy men. Any time there’s a question of a man creeping on a woman/women/anyone else he wants to creep on, the first thing people ask is, “Is he autistic?” “Maybe he just’s just awkward.” I’m saying this as someone who’s neurodivergent myself. Fuck that shit. The end.
Not the end, but that’s my automatic first thought. That along with an eye roll. Even when there’s evidence that the guy (and, yes, this is usually a guy thing because other genders aren’t afforded the same grace) is sexually harassing other people (mostly women), people make tons of excuses. What’s worse is now some people view “he’s autistic” as a get-out-of-jail-free card, even when there’s plenty of evidence that the guy is being creepy.
I was reading about a guy who ‘might be autistic’ being banned by a hobby group is several locations. Some who led a hobby group that was in a building he had been banned in, but no longer was (as in the ban just expired), had an employee saying they would quit if the guy wasn’t pre-banned. This guy had yet to show up at this particular hobby group, so the person who was talking about it thought it was premature and was, quite frankly, way too biased in favor of the guy.
There were a few people in the comments also pushing the, “But the awkward, though!” and saying it was just as likely he was being bullied because he was different. I mean, I’m not saying that doesn’t happen because it most certainly does. But people who are truly awkward are awkward with everyone and not just the people they’re hitting on. Oh, and this guy was able to get women to date him before he turned “awkward” on them. Maknig sexual comments that were unwanted; touching someonoe on the leg unasked (which even presented like this made me flinch, and it was slid in like an aside); maybe following an ex to an event; and rreported sexual abuse in relationships.
One person was insistent that all of this fell under ‘bad dating experience’ and was no reason to preemptively ban the guy. Like, she (and it’s definitely a she. I know the commenter. She has some serious internalized sexism) dismissed all of the evidence or diminished it, and she was doing this all over the post. Several people called her out on it, and they were right. She was neurodivergent, and had seem some men get bullied for being neurodivergent, so she, too, was taking her baggage into the post.
Several autistic women said that they had been creeped on by autistic dudes who were then shielded/enabled by other people in the community with the dreaded “he’s just awkward” bullshit. In addition, this guy clearly knew where that line was because he did not cross it until he actually was on a date. One autistic person was trying to say that ‘we autistic people’ can’t tell where that line was and was rightfully pushed back against by other autistic people. Some of us non-male autistic people learned how to do it REAL well because we were forced to. And, as I was thinking and someone else pointed out–if he really can’t tell where the line was when it came to dating, then he should be more conservative.
Or, as I thought to myself and someone else pointed out, “If he can’t tell where the line is, then he shouldn’t date.”
I don’t remember where I read it (it was probably Captain Awkward), but dating is a high-risk arena. Meaning that if you fail to be respectful, it can be really upsetting. So those who consistently fall on the wrong side of the line should stop doing it until they can reliably not cross the line.
As for the preemptive ban, I’m mixed about it. In this case, I think there’s enough evidence to put it in place if he ever decides to go into the space. But as people pointed out, what the agency really needed was a solid policy to put in place to stop all the future creepers. There were a few really good ones outlined in the post, and I agreed this was needed.
It’s so tiring, though. All the people willing to dismiss evidence until it reaches a violent point, and then it’s blame the victim for not protecting herself better. There is no win, really, and I would rather err on the side of protecting the women from the creeps than to give the creeps endess grace.
More tomorrow.