on privilege and the burden of proof
I haven't said much about Racefail 09, or Bride of Racefail, or Racefail III: The Revenge, mostly because I've been reading and reading, every day reading posts by people who've said it far better than I ever could, and who know much more about this than I do. As always rydra_wong has linkspams and timelines and summaries to help you navigate all the words that are available to read on this issue. More on that later, in fact.
But in the last few days I've been thinking about one particular aspect of this failboat, and it's the manner in which POC and anti-racists and white allies are always, always called upon to bear the burden of proof. This isn't going to be a revelation to most of you, but I think it bears saying: Elizabeth Bear (among others) has claimed several times over the last two months to have been misquoted, taken out of context, misrepresented, misinterpreted - both in terms of her professional fiction and in terms of her blog posts. And it seems like the number of claims of SF/F writers and editors to having been misquoted is actually inversely proportional to the number of times they have been accurately quoted, with attribution, with links, in context.
Read a post by zvi_likes_tv, or coffeeandink, or spiralsheep, or Seeking Avalon, veejane or shewhohashope or any of the other amazing, dedicated, anti-racist folks on this subject - this one is a great example, or this one, or this one, or this one - read these people's posts, and you will find exact quotation, you will find block quotation, you will find links and links and links to the people they disagree with and to the people they agree with. You will find nothing but incredibly well-attributed, well-contextualized quotation. Watch sparkymonster move through a comment thread, and you will see her providing context after context and link after link, with a patience that borders on being a superpower.
In fact, cereta says here that she's linking very deliberately to Elizabeth Bear's most recent non-apology, because, she says, she wants people to know what Elizabeth Bear has to say for herself. This is something I've heard many times over the last two months: "Look at these words that have been said."
It must be really, really annoying - if you're EBear or Sh!tt!rly or tnh or KC, to be held accountable for your words. And it must be even more annoying to be held accountable for your words by people who know very well that the burden of proof is always going to be on them, that they will always have to prove that they've been hurt, that they will always have to prove that they even have the right to feel hurt. All of the people whose blogs I linked to above have been through imbroglios and debates and fails like this one, I imagine, so many times that they have learned very well that if they don't quote, if they don't blockquote, if they don't link and screencap and offer contextualization, then their word is worthless. Even their word on whether or not they are hurting is worthless.
Compare this - compare rydra_wong's immediate reaction to this situation back in January, which was to make lists of links and timelines and to archive people's words and responses - compare this to, just as an example, the most recent post by Elizabeth Bear.
Where, for instance, vito_excalibur is careful to link to half a dozen comment threads in which racist language is being used to silence people of colour, Elizabeth Bear, in this post, feels free to say things like "I've listened to things I said be falsely reported for two months now," and "both sides are guilty of those actions. Equally guilty," and "I know what I said is being misinterpreted and in some cases flat-out misrepresented," and on and on - and at no point in this eyeball-blood-inducing screed does she provide a single solitary link showing us where and how this has happened.
Where were you misquoted, Elizabeth Bear? What do you mean by guilty - who is guilty, and of what, and where, and when? This "everyone is guilty" thing is a familiar refrain, almost to the point of parody, and I've seen it used several times specifically as a tactic to shut down those who would document this situation precisely, to stop the quotation.
Along with the other kinds of privilege that she happily assumes for herself in this post - the privilege to have the last word, the privilege to stop others from talking about it (see bossymarmalade here for more on that), the privilege to summarize the situation in giant, non-specific (and loaded) terms like "human beings" - along with all those other privileges that she gathers to herself, she takes up the privilege of not having to prove herself, not having to quote, not having to attribute, not having to link; she takes up the privilege that many of us white folks are used to having, which is the privilege of being taken at her word.
This is why comment threads like this one drive me completely batty. Check out the casual accusation that people - implicitly coffeeandink - are "smearing" the professional reputations of people like Kathryn Cramer. Asked repeatedly for proof, the commenter doesn't respond - and, presumably, goes on taking KC's word for it - KC's unattributed, quoteless posts - that coffeeandink is smearing people. (plus see that comment thread for bonus tone argument! it's like two bingos in one.) eta: at least one participant in that thread has been good enough to stop taking KC's word for it and apologise; nonetheless, the fact that this keeps happening over and over, with less and less linkage/citation, is discouraging.
Anyhow, I wanted to post this just to point out that POC and allies who want to talk about race are always the ones who bear the burden of proof - and that as a result, most of the non-failing Racefail participants have gotten very, very good at providing it. Elizabeth Bear's recent post, in which she repeatedly claims to have been misquoted, just demonstrates that it doesn't matter how diligent or how well-sourced the posts of POC and allies are - they will always be accused of misquotation, because misquotation doesn't really mean misquotation - for Elizabeth Bear and for others, it's a code word for "wrong," and it's a code word for "you don't know how to read," and it's a code word for "nothing you say can have value." It's like the tone argument, it doesn't matter how nice people are, they will always be accused of being irrational, angry, too confrontational, too aggressive, etc. if they want to discuss issues of race that racists don't want discussed.
The fact that most if not all of the flocking, journal-deletion flouncing, password-protecting, and link-redirecting has been on the side of WS and KC and EB and tnh also demonstrates this point perfectly: what they fear, really, isn't misquotation, but quotation as they've just been exposed to it, quotation as POC and allies have been forced to learn to practice it. They fear being held accountable for their words. KC is reportedly threatening to sue several people for defamation - by which she means, of course, quoting fairly and with attribution words that she wrote and made publicly available.
As I said above, I doubt that this is a revelation to anyone who's been through these things before, or who has had to deal with it all their life - obviously it isn't. But I suppose I just wanted to draw additional attention to that particular inequality, which has been present in this imbroglio from the beginning, because it just keeps happening.
eta: and now of course Bear has locked down her "cease fire" post, linked above. You know, I really want to avoid misquoting her, and I really wanted to offer context to her post by linking to the entire thing, but now I guess you'll have to take my word for it, and I'll have to rely on my memory of the post. Or the screencaps that I'm sure someone was forward-thinking enough to take. It's perfect, isn't it? What a perfect illustration of exactly this problem. She says that she's taking the post down as a form of apology for it, which is kind of the opposite of apologising, if apology = taking responsibility for your words and actions. Jeez.
eta2: and Bear has unlocked her post again, after being convinced that, given the behaviour of KC and WS and others, hiding or changing what she's said is a terrible move in context. Good for her; I'm glad she did that, at least. I stand by what I said above re: attribution and privilege and my analysis of that original post, though.
But in the last few days I've been thinking about one particular aspect of this failboat, and it's the manner in which POC and anti-racists and white allies are always, always called upon to bear the burden of proof. This isn't going to be a revelation to most of you, but I think it bears saying: Elizabeth Bear (among others) has claimed several times over the last two months to have been misquoted, taken out of context, misrepresented, misinterpreted - both in terms of her professional fiction and in terms of her blog posts. And it seems like the number of claims of SF/F writers and editors to having been misquoted is actually inversely proportional to the number of times they have been accurately quoted, with attribution, with links, in context.
Read a post by zvi_likes_tv, or coffeeandink, or spiralsheep, or Seeking Avalon, veejane or shewhohashope or any of the other amazing, dedicated, anti-racist folks on this subject - this one is a great example, or this one, or this one, or this one - read these people's posts, and you will find exact quotation, you will find block quotation, you will find links and links and links to the people they disagree with and to the people they agree with. You will find nothing but incredibly well-attributed, well-contextualized quotation. Watch sparkymonster move through a comment thread, and you will see her providing context after context and link after link, with a patience that borders on being a superpower.
In fact, cereta says here that she's linking very deliberately to Elizabeth Bear's most recent non-apology, because, she says, she wants people to know what Elizabeth Bear has to say for herself. This is something I've heard many times over the last two months: "Look at these words that have been said."
It must be really, really annoying - if you're EBear or Sh!tt!rly or tnh or KC, to be held accountable for your words. And it must be even more annoying to be held accountable for your words by people who know very well that the burden of proof is always going to be on them, that they will always have to prove that they've been hurt, that they will always have to prove that they even have the right to feel hurt. All of the people whose blogs I linked to above have been through imbroglios and debates and fails like this one, I imagine, so many times that they have learned very well that if they don't quote, if they don't blockquote, if they don't link and screencap and offer contextualization, then their word is worthless. Even their word on whether or not they are hurting is worthless.
Compare this - compare rydra_wong's immediate reaction to this situation back in January, which was to make lists of links and timelines and to archive people's words and responses - compare this to, just as an example, the most recent post by Elizabeth Bear.
Where, for instance, vito_excalibur is careful to link to half a dozen comment threads in which racist language is being used to silence people of colour, Elizabeth Bear, in this post, feels free to say things like "I've listened to things I said be falsely reported for two months now," and "both sides are guilty of those actions. Equally guilty," and "I know what I said is being misinterpreted and in some cases flat-out misrepresented," and on and on - and at no point in this eyeball-blood-inducing screed does she provide a single solitary link showing us where and how this has happened.
Where were you misquoted, Elizabeth Bear? What do you mean by guilty - who is guilty, and of what, and where, and when? This "everyone is guilty" thing is a familiar refrain, almost to the point of parody, and I've seen it used several times specifically as a tactic to shut down those who would document this situation precisely, to stop the quotation.
Along with the other kinds of privilege that she happily assumes for herself in this post - the privilege to have the last word, the privilege to stop others from talking about it (see bossymarmalade here for more on that), the privilege to summarize the situation in giant, non-specific (and loaded) terms like "human beings" - along with all those other privileges that she gathers to herself, she takes up the privilege of not having to prove herself, not having to quote, not having to attribute, not having to link; she takes up the privilege that many of us white folks are used to having, which is the privilege of being taken at her word.
This is why comment threads like this one drive me completely batty. Check out the casual accusation that people - implicitly coffeeandink - are "smearing" the professional reputations of people like Kathryn Cramer. Asked repeatedly for proof, the commenter doesn't respond - and, presumably, goes on taking KC's word for it - KC's unattributed, quoteless posts - that coffeeandink is smearing people. (plus see that comment thread for bonus tone argument! it's like two bingos in one.) eta: at least one participant in that thread has been good enough to stop taking KC's word for it and apologise; nonetheless, the fact that this keeps happening over and over, with less and less linkage/citation, is discouraging.
Anyhow, I wanted to post this just to point out that POC and allies who want to talk about race are always the ones who bear the burden of proof - and that as a result, most of the non-failing Racefail participants have gotten very, very good at providing it. Elizabeth Bear's recent post, in which she repeatedly claims to have been misquoted, just demonstrates that it doesn't matter how diligent or how well-sourced the posts of POC and allies are - they will always be accused of misquotation, because misquotation doesn't really mean misquotation - for Elizabeth Bear and for others, it's a code word for "wrong," and it's a code word for "you don't know how to read," and it's a code word for "nothing you say can have value." It's like the tone argument, it doesn't matter how nice people are, they will always be accused of being irrational, angry, too confrontational, too aggressive, etc. if they want to discuss issues of race that racists don't want discussed.
The fact that most if not all of the flocking, journal-deletion flouncing, password-protecting, and link-redirecting has been on the side of WS and KC and EB and tnh also demonstrates this point perfectly: what they fear, really, isn't misquotation, but quotation as they've just been exposed to it, quotation as POC and allies have been forced to learn to practice it. They fear being held accountable for their words. KC is reportedly threatening to sue several people for defamation - by which she means, of course, quoting fairly and with attribution words that she wrote and made publicly available.
As I said above, I doubt that this is a revelation to anyone who's been through these things before, or who has had to deal with it all their life - obviously it isn't. But I suppose I just wanted to draw additional attention to that particular inequality, which has been present in this imbroglio from the beginning, because it just keeps happening.
eta: and now of course Bear has locked down her "cease fire" post, linked above. You know, I really want to avoid misquoting her, and I really wanted to offer context to her post by linking to the entire thing, but now I guess you'll have to take my word for it, and I'll have to rely on my memory of the post. Or the screencaps that I'm sure someone was forward-thinking enough to take. It's perfect, isn't it? What a perfect illustration of exactly this problem. She says that she's taking the post down as a form of apology for it, which is kind of the opposite of apologising, if apology = taking responsibility for your words and actions. Jeez.
eta2: and Bear has unlocked her post again, after being convinced that, given the behaviour of KC and WS and others, hiding or changing what she's said is a terrible move in context. Good for her; I'm glad she did that, at least. I stand by what I said above re: attribution and privilege and my analysis of that original post, though.