On Calling Out, Piling On, and Effective Criticism

"I used to be afraid to comment in the feminist blogosphere because I was anxious of being shredded publicly – the chances of this happening to you are much higher when you’re a new face and you haven’t established an online presence yet. So I went about protecting myself from this outcome in the most self-hating and submissive way possible: by trying to make my ideas ideologically perfect before presenting any of them at all. I would become UNASSAILABLE. If someone rebuked me, it was my fault for not assimilating all of internet feminism’s talking points and most sacred cows." -- Feministe commenter igglanova  

If you do anything this week, read Flavia's post on call-out culture  and blogging as performance over at Tiger Beatdown. Then read Feministe's reblog and the discussion that followed.

Still not sure whether calling-out is an effective tool in combating prejudice, or just another form of bullying intended to make the person initiating the call-out a more righteous and better ally? Me too.

Between the two posts and the comments that followed, there is a lot to digest. I've been critical of call-out culture before, mostly born out of frustration than anything else. By feminist blogosphere standards, I'm old. I'd rather not have other people telling me how to think or when it's okay for me to talk. I've done a pretty good job of educating myself on vocabulary of the SJ/feminist blogosphere, and I came into it with a good knowledge of feminism, including its failures. I rarely comment these days, and I'm pretty selective where.

There's a big difference between, say, someone like Amanda Marcotte, who has tons of power and pretty strong following regardless, and a lesser known blogger getting called-out. The turning point for me was watching someone bullied over what I thought was a simple gaffe. The blogger apologized and corrected her mistake, but it wasn't enough. (I'm being intentionally vague here. This was not my fight, and I'm only providing it as an example.) That gnawed at me -- isn't that what we're supposed to do when we screw up? Granted, apologizing doesn't necessarily make everything all better, and sometimes it only makes the perpetrator feel better, but she was, I thought, needlessly bullied for a mistake that was more careless than silencing. Which brings me to something Flavia said in her post that's seldom mentioned, and even anathema to the SJ blogging world:

"What is rarely pointed out is that a person can be at once oppressed and an abuser."

I think this is important to remember, but in no way means we get free rein to say what we want without repercussion. Calling out is effective, but call-out culture is damaging.

In the comments to the Tiger Beatdown post, Sady Doyle provided a guide  which should be an invaluable tool in combating bigotry online without, you know, actually being combative. It doesn't guarantee peace and goodwill among all, but as a practical guide, these things should be a given: positive and negative feedback should be specific, it should improve the work, and if you feel safe, level the critique directly rather than publicly.

I wish I knew a way to tie this up in a neat little bow, but like most aspects of life, communication in virtual spaces is often messy, not always sophisticated, and can cause hurt feelings. I think the important thing to remember is that we are not all privileged, or all oppressed, and what we say has consequences, even when it's supposed to be for the greater good.