By Punch Up • Kick Down Distro
The ways we collectively respond to harm in our communities is not only a reflection of our broader values, but a critical part of maintaining cohesive and resilient movements. I know that “Cancel Culture” might feel like an exhausted topic not worth rehashing. However, years after #MeToo, sexual violence is still rampant in DIY/Punk/Activist spaces and society in general. Our personal relationships, subcultural “scenes,” and political projects are regularly fractured and weakened by acts of harm and the resulting personal traumas and social fallouts. An inability to adequately and effectively handle harm continues to be a detriment to our mutual struggle against the oppressive forces of capitalist empire and the logics upon which it is built. Cancel culture has proven ineffectual and damaging because it is an individualized response to a fundamentally social problem which relies on carceral, punitive logic. Destroying an individual does not dismantle the systems which allow harm or abuse to occur, and cancel campaigns rarely encourage going beyond surface level punishments towards root causes and potential solutions.
The police, the carceral state, and the prison industrial complex are all institutions of punishment and violence whose primary function is to uphold structures of capitalist exploitation and imperialism. Not only must we reject these institutions as such but also reject their logics, thinking and acting beyond the social punishments of excommunication and punitive models of dehumanization. We cannot reproduce the dominator model if our aim is a social paradigm free from domination.
The idea that people who cause harm are exceptionally malicious monsters fails to grapple with how normalized rape culture is, while framing abusive behavior as an exclusively individual moral failing rather than a widespread phenomenon situated among complex social conditions. While neither gender violence nor gender expression exist on a binary, our society is founded on a patriarchal gender hierarchy, and sexual violence has been used as a weapon of domination and subjugation against women throughout history and into the modern day. Popular culture often depicts sexual coercion as normal; teaches young men that they are entitled to women’s bodies as a sexual object. An overwhelming number of young people’s sexual expectations are shaped by an unlimited access to online pornography, a majority of which portray sex as existing solely for male pleasure. Alcohol and drug use are defining aspects of social life, even within our subcultural spaces. Acts of sexual violence so frequently involve substance (ab)use. Combining a culture of excessive drinking, patriarchal indoctrination which sexualizes the female body, and a lack of education about consent are a formula for rampant sexual violence. Of course, none of this absolves anyone for harm they’ve caused, but it’s worth considering all the factors that lead to abuse beyond the fundamental “badness” of the person who perpetrates it. Likewise, while patriarchy benefits men in ways that are often invisible to them, patriarchy and rape culture are structures — a series of social relationships existing within and among other power dynamics — and power is relative. We should not equate the violent and abusive actions of socially, economically, and politically powerful members of the ruling class and the harmful behaviors of the regular people who occupy our lives.
Public spectacles of punishment, such as social media “call-outs,” or cyber bullying campaigns are inept attempts to root out abuse in the community, one “abuser” at a time. Social media’s profit driven algorithm is fueled by reactive and simplistic moral binaries — these platforms harvest engagement by incentivizing content that instigates moral outrage. Participants in online shaming or harassment campaigns derive a sense of virtuous pleasure for being on the “right side” of a grand moral narrative.
Most punks or leftists have some experience in witnessing an “accountability process” go horribly wrong. Even good faith attempts at responding to harm are too often structured with an orientation of shame and punishment. First of all, if access to support or dignity is conditional on adhering to a “process” imposed by others, it is a form of coercion and ultimately ineffectual. Likewise, the healing of someone who has been harmed is not conditional on the “accountability” or punishment or the person who caused them harm. Support for someone who has been harmed is a markedly different, separate process from one concerning the person who caused harm. Restoration for both parties happens on different timelines and by different means according to the situation, the people involved, and their personal circumstance.
It is not that community intervention of harm or abuse is impossible or unworthy of our efforts, but the approach, expectation, and understanding of what a “successful” process looks like cannot be an abstraction. It is essential to remain behaviorally specific, focus on realistic and manageable expectations, and practice patience with everyone involved. Mistakes will be made and should be met with reaffirmation of goals and adjustment towards them, rather than a dismissal of those involved in the process or the process itself. There is no “correct” way of confronting harm. These situations are dynamic and contextual. There are no blueprints, no easy answers, no neat categories. What is required is dynamism, critical thinking, and remaining principled in our values against dehumanization.
While it has become one of those terms frequently misused and co-opted, “accountability,” properly understood, can be a guide for taking responsibility for harm, committing to meaningful change, and repairing damaged relationships. Accountability is not some goal to be achieved, nor is it a constant state that can be objectively defined for all people. It is a fluctuating needle on a spectrum of how much your values and behaviors align in any given moment or decision.
Accountability must come from a place of authenticity, rather than a performance of shame. Shame only calls attention to flaws rather than building on strengths — it lets people who have caused harm off the hook for being inherently bad, essentializing that behavior and rendering them incapable of ever doing better.
In contrast to shame, regret is a healthy response to realizing one has acted out of alignment with their values. Regret is a realization that one has taken a regrettable action, while shame internalizes that action as a fundamental part of one’s character.
Responding to harm productively requires a basic retention of dignity for everyone involved, a willingness to engage in challenging dialogue, and opportunities for people to take responsibility for the harm they’ve caused without threatening their material safety and access to support. For people who have caused harm, the opportunity to be honest and transparent without the threat of public humiliation or the fear of dehumanization is crucial for genuinely reckoning with their harmful behavior in order to change it. If attempting to take responsibility for harm is a guarantee of social exile and public shaming, those who have caused harm will go into hiding, run away, turn to substances, and/or try to justify their behavior.
Embodying our values also means recognizing how truly damaging sexual violence is. When someone in our life causes real harm, we need to take it seriously. As friends and members of shared communities we have a responsibility to provide support, however we are capable, for survivors of abuse. Sexual violence in particular can be profoundly, debilitatingly traumatic. The call for harsh and immediate punishment is justifiable when someone has been abused, violated or traumatized. However, we cannot hope for legitimate forms of restoration or reconciliation to come from a trauma response, and punishment does not incentivize anyone to change their harmful behavior.
Consequences are to be expected when harm is caused, but that does not require punishment. Someone who has caused harm must accept the social ramifications of those actions and diligently respect the needs of the survivor. These are justifiable consequences of harmful behavior, not needlessly cruel punishments or denial of personhood, and it is important not to confuse the two. A consequence of causing harm may be that the trust and respect of members of the community is lost. That consequence becomes dehumanization when someone’s character is set in stone, when the possibility for transformation or reconciliation is denied. Likewise, reminding people that they are expected to make changes to their behavior and encouraging them to do so, does not require punishment and humiliation. It’s important to check people who have caused harm if they are straying from their commitments, or showing signs of slipping back into harmful behavior, as long their autonomy is respected and their humanity maintained.
We must identify and overcome the puritanical ideologies that are adopted from corrupted, outdated, and oppressive judicial and theological systems which rely on fixed, formulaic morality. We have to find ways to confront harm and abuse without getting lost in procedure, seduced by vengeance, burnt out by conflict or demoralized by ineptitude. We need to foster social relationships with trustworthy people where we can be honest in considering the ways we have caused harm without being subjected to cruelty or punitive judgement. Confronting harm, we have to accept the reality of the world we live in and the social context we are all subjected to while challenging the logics of punishment and disposability.
Strong communities of mutual obligation and reciprocal care weaken the potential for harm to take place to begin with. The resilience of these communities is only possible if we keep firmly intact the basic humanity of everyone, even those who cause harm. Our response to abusive behavior must be grounded in the shared fundamental belief that nobody is disposable. It is our shared responsibility to reinforce this belief, to build a collective capacity to handle harm without taking on the logics of our mutual oppressors.