So, I have actually lived in a semi-authoritarian culture, and have a sort of unique experience of seeing high rates of autism function under that culture (and let’s not deny the high rates of autism in this subculture). While this doesn’t sound like “cult” to me, I can think of a couple ways gratuitous harm could occur even if everyone is operating in good faith.
Person A harms Person B. Person B realizes that their violation threshold is much lower than they thought when they signed on, and they want to bring it up for discussion, but you and Person A have a much better rapport than you and Person B. And Person B was uniquely attracted to this because they need their self-care to largely be outsourced to a group structure. So they don’t actually have the skills they need to be agenty outside of group expectations, and simply continue to be harmed while being unable to bring it to anyone’s attention until it’s much to late to repair the relationships. I’d like to present myself as someone who has gotten feedback along the lines of “you’re competent and mature” and who still does this sort of thing. It’s not something that’s easily predicted by the person or by people observing them.
As mentioned in (1), simply outsourcing functionality to a group structure can leave people helpless when they have to act against the group or act without the group. I don’t see much thought put towards transition plans for people when they leave DAB. Relating back to the childhood and adolescent experiences I claimed gave me insight into this, I have seen a lot of people flail once their version of the role you’re taking here is gone. And they get hurt. This applies even more to people who’ve required extra structure to function, as in the case of autism (and I am one of those autistic kids that flailed). You might say that people are accepting that they will get no transition help once they leave the immersive, structured environment you’re creating, but it seems naive to not at least prep them for the struggles they might have.
2a. Transition is even more important given that this is a necessarily isolating endeavor. The things you’re proposing take a ton of time! People will be making a lot of interpersonal sacrifices to participate, and that will degrade whatever safety net they think they’ll have if they leave.
Personally, I’m trying really really hard to separate criticisms from an aesthetic distaste and the fact that this looks like things I have been actively harmed by, when the people in charge were people who loved me and had my best interests at heart. So, apologies, because this comment is definitely biased by that.
As far as “there are different kinds of people and this is bad for helldalgos” goes, this is bad because I would do something like this if I tried to participate: outsource most of my functionality to group norms, overstate my ability to be transparent enough to function in a high trust environment like this, end up hiding rule violations, feel guilty, become dishonest, and have periodic emotional and mental breakdowns where I burn all of my relationships in the house to the ground. The fact that I behave like this under authoritarian structures might be a problem, but it’s not one that’s fixed all at once by starting an immersive group project where someone is in charge of me. I said a few hours ago to someone else that I would definitely participate if I didn’t have so many roots where I live now and if I could actually stand living in the Bay, but upon reflection, I think not.
This is outstanding, and I appreciate you taking the time to write it up.
I think 1) is an interesting and important dynamic that I had not previously thought about, and I’m curious if you have concrete thoughts as to how to repair it. I think that simply acknowledging it, and committing to accede to opinions-other-than-my-own in evaluating whether it’s going on, is an important first step but only gets like 15% of the way there. Similarly, I think norms of regular retrospectives and Circling-type environments will make it marginally more likely that people can bring this stuff forward and get it addressed, but not entirely because anxiety, status, etc.
My first brainstorm there produces things like anonymous feedback structures, “interrupting” norms where people are free to call things to a halt, requests-to-speak-privately and requests-for-third-party-mediation as strong guaranteed “yesses,” and maybe something like a norm that people can call for discussion or mediation to halt until their ideological Turing test has been passed? e.g. I can’t just brush past your claim of harm; you have an absolute right to stop things from moving forward until you are satisfied that I at least understand the magnitude of your internal experience, even if I disagree with your description of what happened externally.
As for 2), it’s an ongoing conversation; back-and-forth in these comments has already produced a lot of clarity on both non-defecty, structured ways of leaving, and also urgent, ejector-seat methods. (I’ve been a little slow to post concrete details because I claim the person clamoring for them loudest isn’t engaging in good faith, but I’d be happy to PM). My current sense, though, is that these structures, while they should be put in place as soon as possible, should also be discussed with the group, rather than emerging entirely under my models.
Thanks again, particularly for your separating criticisms from aesthetic distaste—I feel you absolutely succeeded at that goal, and I felt that your comment was both a) actually valuable and b) entirely constructive.
I’m not sure how to solve it except to avoid authoritarian structures, which is obviously counterproductive for your project. I would recommend taking any opportunity you have to exhibit through actions that fairness can be expected despite your existing rapport with someone. The things you suggested are helpful but not comprehensive. You could screen for anxiety, but this behavior can be found in people who wouldn’t otherwise consider themselves anxious. And it’s not entirely fueled by anxiety, either.
I like the “interrupting” norm idea; I can see it becoming prone to a weaponized-victimhood sort of abuse but that would be easier to see and stop from the outside than the dynamic it could solve. And if someone is constantly claiming that they’ve been harmed, that’s probably a good sign that DAB isn’t a healthy environment for them anyways.
I would be louder about insisting on plans for various types of leaving if I had more of a stake in this project. If I were planning to participate or someone I cared about was, I would be insisting on it with a similar degree of intensity as the other comments you’re referencing. That’s a major part of what will keep it from being what some people are calling abusive, but that I think belongs under the wider umbrella of “dysfunctional.” You’re right that it should be collaborative, and I don’t expect graceful exit plans to leap fully formed from your skull, but yeah. I endorse that level of intensity in terms of expressing just how important exit plans are.
I should admit that as of a few hours ago I have an ongoing bet about the year-long success of this project, and I took the pessimistic view (for reasons other than abuse or harm). I was also incredibly worried about people getting hurt when I read through the document and some other comments. But, having talked to some other people that know you and reading other things you’ve said, I am definitely less worried about harm through intent or negligence than I was. I am still pretty concerned about harm through ignorance or dynamics inherent in the interaction between the people and the system.
Also, excellent post from Slatestarscratchpad that sums up (I think) something like 85% of the fundamental disagreement:
One thing that’s seemed striking to me in this Dragon Army discussion is the priors on different people’s threat assessments.
I remember when I was younger, I used to want to meet my friends from the Internet, and my parents were horrified, and had all of these objections like “What if they’re pedophiles who befriended you so they could molest you?” or “What if they’re kidnappers who befriended you so they could kidnap you?”, or less lurid possibilities like “What if they’re creepy drug people and they insist on bringing you along to their creepy drug abuse sessions and won’t let you say no?”
And I never developed a good plan that countered their concerns, like “I will bring pepper spray so I can defend myself”. It was more about rolling my eyes and telling them that never happened in real life. I’ve now met hundreds of Internet friends, and I was absolutely right—it’s never happened, and any effort I put into developing a plan would have been effort wasted.
I’m not claiming there are no Internet pedophiles or kidnappers. I’m saying that based on my own Internet communities, and my threat-detection abilities, and the base rate, I was pretty sure it was more in the realm of terrorism (the kind of stuff you hear about on the news) than the realm of car accidents (the stuff that happens to real people and that you must be guarding yourself against at every moment).
This is also how I think of people turning out to be abusers. It’s possible that anyone I date could turn out to be an abuser, just like it’s possible I could be killed by a terrorist, but it’s not something likely enough that I’m going to take strong precautions against it. This is obviously a function of my personal situations, but it’s a real function of my personal situation, which like my Internet-friend-meeting has consistently been confirmed over a bunch of different situations.
(Please don’t give me the “that’s just male privilege!” speech; men and women get abused at roughly similar rates. I do think that probably women are socialized to fear abuse much more, and that’s a big part of this, and probably other axes of marginalization contribute more)
One interesting thing about Tumblr and the SJ-sphere in particular is that because it comes disproportionately from marginalized communities, it has this sort of natural prior of “people often turn out to be abusers, every situation has to be made abuser-proof or else it will be a catastrophe”. I once dated someone I knew on Tumblr who did a weird test on me where (sorry, won’t give more details) they deliberately put me in a situation where I could have abused them to see what I would do. When they told me about this months later, I was pretty offended—did I really seem so potentially-abusive that I had to be specifically cleared by some procedure? And people explained to me that there’s this whole other culture where somebody being an abuser is, if not the norm, at least high enough to worry about with everyone.
I’m not sure what percent of the population is more like me vs. more like my date. But I think there’s a failure mode where someone from a high-trust culture starts what they think is a perfectly reasonable institution, and someone from a low-trust culture says “that’s awful, you didn’t make any effort to guard against abusers!”.
And then the person from the high-trust culture gets angry, because they’re being accused of being a potential abuser, which to them sounds as silly as being accused of being a potential terrorist. If you told your Muslim friend you wouldn’t hang out with him without some safeguards in case he turned out to be a terrorist, my guess is he’d get pretty upset. At the very least it would engender the “stop wasting my time” reaction I had when my parents made me develop anti-pedophile plans before meeting my Internet friends.
And then the person from the low-trust culture gets angry, because the person has just dismissed out of hand (or even gotten angry about) a common-sense attempt to avoid abuse, and who but an abuser would do something like that?
I think it’s interesting that the Dragon Army idea received more positive feedback or constructive criticism on LW (where it was pitched to, and which is probably culturally more similar to me) and more strongly negative feedback on Tumblr (which is more full of marginalized people and SJ-aligned people, and also maybe more full of abusers as judged by the number who get called out all the time).
Yeah, I saw that earlier. In my case, I’m not panicked (or at least, I quickly became not panicked) about rampant abuse, and I also have not been directly exposed to a lot of abuse. My concerns are more about ways I’ve been directly exposed to harm by authoritarianism with good intentions. It’s no coincidence that that is what I was inclined to bring up. Since I’m probably not unique, there’s probably something worth taking seriously in every complaint. But everyone is probably weighting their own concerns the most. So that summarizes to something like:
-abuse is often perpetuated in structures that share significant characteristics with DAB, and you should think about specific plans to avoid abusing people
-there are unique systemic issues with authoritarian structures that facilitate unsustainable dysfunction even when no individual person is deviating much from normal behavior
-sex and romance will cause problems and it might be worth restricting behavior inside the house
+1 to all this. In particular, if my pendulum swing model is correct, the new position of the pendulum (extreme aversion to the risk of abuse) is a result of the pendulum’s previous stuck point being “a lot of people suffering abuse in these kinds of environments.”
I’m proposing swinging back toward the old norm and trying not to cross the ideal point, and I agree it’s a hard problem. Posts like yours are excellent for improving models and reducing risk as a result.
I think it’s okay for people to bet against it; we’re going to have a large betting norm within the house. If nobody bet against, I wouldn’t have anybody to bet with!
Exit plans are now #1 on the “to finalize” list, and have had multiple eyes on. I strongly endorse the way that LW has focused me toward that part of things, which I was underweighting. However, I also note that some people SHOULD ultimately still be dissatisfied with the exit norms, and therefore choose not to participate. Like, that’s part of the definition of high-stakes, high-commitment—it’s not for everybody, and in fact if everybody were on board with the exit norms being sufficient it … wouldn’t be much of anything?
The key, in my opinion, is being clear clear clear clear clear, and that particular part of it was not clear enough to the potential participants, and it will be now.
Thanks again for your willingness to write things up.
So, I have actually lived in a semi-authoritarian culture, and have a sort of unique experience of seeing high rates of autism function under that culture (and let’s not deny the high rates of autism in this subculture). While this doesn’t sound like “cult” to me, I can think of a couple ways gratuitous harm could occur even if everyone is operating in good faith.
Person A harms Person B. Person B realizes that their violation threshold is much lower than they thought when they signed on, and they want to bring it up for discussion, but you and Person A have a much better rapport than you and Person B. And Person B was uniquely attracted to this because they need their self-care to largely be outsourced to a group structure. So they don’t actually have the skills they need to be agenty outside of group expectations, and simply continue to be harmed while being unable to bring it to anyone’s attention until it’s much to late to repair the relationships. I’d like to present myself as someone who has gotten feedback along the lines of “you’re competent and mature” and who still does this sort of thing. It’s not something that’s easily predicted by the person or by people observing them.
As mentioned in (1), simply outsourcing functionality to a group structure can leave people helpless when they have to act against the group or act without the group. I don’t see much thought put towards transition plans for people when they leave DAB. Relating back to the childhood and adolescent experiences I claimed gave me insight into this, I have seen a lot of people flail once their version of the role you’re taking here is gone. And they get hurt. This applies even more to people who’ve required extra structure to function, as in the case of autism (and I am one of those autistic kids that flailed). You might say that people are accepting that they will get no transition help once they leave the immersive, structured environment you’re creating, but it seems naive to not at least prep them for the struggles they might have.
2a. Transition is even more important given that this is a necessarily isolating endeavor. The things you’re proposing take a ton of time! People will be making a lot of interpersonal sacrifices to participate, and that will degrade whatever safety net they think they’ll have if they leave.
Personally, I’m trying really really hard to separate criticisms from an aesthetic distaste and the fact that this looks like things I have been actively harmed by, when the people in charge were people who loved me and had my best interests at heart. So, apologies, because this comment is definitely biased by that.
As far as “there are different kinds of people and this is bad for helldalgos” goes, this is bad because I would do something like this if I tried to participate: outsource most of my functionality to group norms, overstate my ability to be transparent enough to function in a high trust environment like this, end up hiding rule violations, feel guilty, become dishonest, and have periodic emotional and mental breakdowns where I burn all of my relationships in the house to the ground. The fact that I behave like this under authoritarian structures might be a problem, but it’s not one that’s fixed all at once by starting an immersive group project where someone is in charge of me. I said a few hours ago to someone else that I would definitely participate if I didn’t have so many roots where I live now and if I could actually stand living in the Bay, but upon reflection, I think not.
This is outstanding, and I appreciate you taking the time to write it up.
I think 1) is an interesting and important dynamic that I had not previously thought about, and I’m curious if you have concrete thoughts as to how to repair it. I think that simply acknowledging it, and committing to accede to opinions-other-than-my-own in evaluating whether it’s going on, is an important first step but only gets like 15% of the way there. Similarly, I think norms of regular retrospectives and Circling-type environments will make it marginally more likely that people can bring this stuff forward and get it addressed, but not entirely because anxiety, status, etc.
My first brainstorm there produces things like anonymous feedback structures, “interrupting” norms where people are free to call things to a halt, requests-to-speak-privately and requests-for-third-party-mediation as strong guaranteed “yesses,” and maybe something like a norm that people can call for discussion or mediation to halt until their ideological Turing test has been passed? e.g. I can’t just brush past your claim of harm; you have an absolute right to stop things from moving forward until you are satisfied that I at least understand the magnitude of your internal experience, even if I disagree with your description of what happened externally.
As for 2), it’s an ongoing conversation; back-and-forth in these comments has already produced a lot of clarity on both non-defecty, structured ways of leaving, and also urgent, ejector-seat methods. (I’ve been a little slow to post concrete details because I claim the person clamoring for them loudest isn’t engaging in good faith, but I’d be happy to PM). My current sense, though, is that these structures, while they should be put in place as soon as possible, should also be discussed with the group, rather than emerging entirely under my models.
Thanks again, particularly for your separating criticisms from aesthetic distaste—I feel you absolutely succeeded at that goal, and I felt that your comment was both a) actually valuable and b) entirely constructive.
I’m not sure how to solve it except to avoid authoritarian structures, which is obviously counterproductive for your project. I would recommend taking any opportunity you have to exhibit through actions that fairness can be expected despite your existing rapport with someone. The things you suggested are helpful but not comprehensive. You could screen for anxiety, but this behavior can be found in people who wouldn’t otherwise consider themselves anxious. And it’s not entirely fueled by anxiety, either.
I like the “interrupting” norm idea; I can see it becoming prone to a weaponized-victimhood sort of abuse but that would be easier to see and stop from the outside than the dynamic it could solve. And if someone is constantly claiming that they’ve been harmed, that’s probably a good sign that DAB isn’t a healthy environment for them anyways.
I would be louder about insisting on plans for various types of leaving if I had more of a stake in this project. If I were planning to participate or someone I cared about was, I would be insisting on it with a similar degree of intensity as the other comments you’re referencing. That’s a major part of what will keep it from being what some people are calling abusive, but that I think belongs under the wider umbrella of “dysfunctional.” You’re right that it should be collaborative, and I don’t expect graceful exit plans to leap fully formed from your skull, but yeah. I endorse that level of intensity in terms of expressing just how important exit plans are.
I should admit that as of a few hours ago I have an ongoing bet about the year-long success of this project, and I took the pessimistic view (for reasons other than abuse or harm). I was also incredibly worried about people getting hurt when I read through the document and some other comments. But, having talked to some other people that know you and reading other things you’ve said, I am definitely less worried about harm through intent or negligence than I was. I am still pretty concerned about harm through ignorance or dynamics inherent in the interaction between the people and the system.
Also, excellent post from Slatestarscratchpad that sums up (I think) something like 85% of the fundamental disagreement:
Yeah, I saw that earlier. In my case, I’m not panicked (or at least, I quickly became not panicked) about rampant abuse, and I also have not been directly exposed to a lot of abuse. My concerns are more about ways I’ve been directly exposed to harm by authoritarianism with good intentions. It’s no coincidence that that is what I was inclined to bring up. Since I’m probably not unique, there’s probably something worth taking seriously in every complaint. But everyone is probably weighting their own concerns the most. So that summarizes to something like:
-abuse is often perpetuated in structures that share significant characteristics with DAB, and you should think about specific plans to avoid abusing people
-there are unique systemic issues with authoritarian structures that facilitate unsustainable dysfunction even when no individual person is deviating much from normal behavior
-sex and romance will cause problems and it might be worth restricting behavior inside the house
-etc (I have not read every single complaint)
+1 to all this. In particular, if my pendulum swing model is correct, the new position of the pendulum (extreme aversion to the risk of abuse) is a result of the pendulum’s previous stuck point being “a lot of people suffering abuse in these kinds of environments.”
I’m proposing swinging back toward the old norm and trying not to cross the ideal point, and I agree it’s a hard problem. Posts like yours are excellent for improving models and reducing risk as a result.
I think it’s okay for people to bet against it; we’re going to have a large betting norm within the house. If nobody bet against, I wouldn’t have anybody to bet with!
Exit plans are now #1 on the “to finalize” list, and have had multiple eyes on. I strongly endorse the way that LW has focused me toward that part of things, which I was underweighting. However, I also note that some people SHOULD ultimately still be dissatisfied with the exit norms, and therefore choose not to participate. Like, that’s part of the definition of high-stakes, high-commitment—it’s not for everybody, and in fact if everybody were on board with the exit norms being sufficient it … wouldn’t be much of anything?
The key, in my opinion, is being clear clear clear clear clear, and that particular part of it was not clear enough to the potential participants, and it will be now.
Thanks again for your willingness to write things up.