Epiphanies 2022: Inclusion – in what?
Google offers me two definitions of inclusion:
Putting these two definitions together, the concept as it applies to society and culture is one of minority groups being included within a wider whole; does anybody disagree?
From this it appears self-evident to me that inclusion necessarily involves constructive interaction with a majority that do not share the characteristics defining such minorities. Of course, there may be extremist and/or ultraconservative groups working to prevent inclusive laws and policies, but they are not the only ones out there; there's a silent majority, too. If cultural and social changes are framed by minorities as a zero-sum game of “us versus them”, the minorities are likely to lose because the odds are unevenly stacked against them.
Amid these changes, there is doubtless a need for “safe spaces” to allow minorities to express themselves freely and acquire a voice. Advocacy (wherever possible, by individuals speaking on behalf of minorities of which they are part) also has an important role to play, and no doubt this will often be a disruptive one.
At the same time, if the goal is inclusion, an accommodation has to be found with the majority. Raising barriers for members of privileged groups will not achieve that. If advocates are talking to an empty room because they have excluded or alienated not just their extremist opponents but also the majority, inclusion will not be the outcome.
What do others think about inclusion, and how it might best be achieved?
1. the action or state of including or of being included within a group or structure.
2. the practice or policy of providing equal access to opportunities and resources for people who might otherwise be excluded or marginalized, such as those who have physical or mental disabilities and members of other minority groups.
Putting these two definitions together, the concept as it applies to society and culture is one of minority groups being included within a wider whole; does anybody disagree?
From this it appears self-evident to me that inclusion necessarily involves constructive interaction with a majority that do not share the characteristics defining such minorities. Of course, there may be extremist and/or ultraconservative groups working to prevent inclusive laws and policies, but they are not the only ones out there; there's a silent majority, too. If cultural and social changes are framed by minorities as a zero-sum game of “us versus them”, the minorities are likely to lose because the odds are unevenly stacked against them.
Amid these changes, there is doubtless a need for “safe spaces” to allow minorities to express themselves freely and acquire a voice. Advocacy (wherever possible, by individuals speaking on behalf of minorities of which they are part) also has an important role to play, and no doubt this will often be a disruptive one.
At the same time, if the goal is inclusion, an accommodation has to be found with the majority. Raising barriers for members of privileged groups will not achieve that. If advocates are talking to an empty room because they have excluded or alienated not just their extremist opponents but also the majority, inclusion will not be the outcome.
What do others think about inclusion, and how it might best be achieved?
Comments
@Arethosemyfeet So many people claiming to be cancelled do so on nationally broadcast radio and tv, newspapers and social media sites that I am always tempted to cite this.
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My parents used to worship in a church where there was no access to the sanctuary that didn't involve either a number of steps or traversing rough round and entering through a door from a garden area. After observing a venerable and much-loved member of the church having to be virtually carried in to church my mother started raising questions about access for wheelchair users or others with mobility issues. The first responses that there were none such who came to worship. She pointed out, with some justice, that since they were physically obstructed from getting in this was hardly surprising.
There was an initial cost to the church of providing suitable ramped access. But once that had happened there were then consequent issues to be addressed. Where could wheelchair users sit? Were there aspects of the way the church worshipped which made it hard to participate? How did "We stand for…" or "Please stand for…" play with people who could not? What provision was there at after-service coffee or in the way of toilet facilities?
Not everyone liked the changes. Some people felt the cost was too high. None of the changes actually prevented participation by the able-bodied.
Similarly, I normally preach without notes and certainly not a complete script. But if I need a translator, or if I want someone to sign for me, I may have to change my practice. That does feel like a loss or a cost to me. There is considerably more work involved in producing a complete script, and there is a loss of fluency and immediacy of address. But it may be a price I need to pay if I want to communicate with non-English speakers, or people with hearing impairment. Is the need to provide a script raising a barrier to my preaching, or is it a necessary accommodation on my part?
It’s my opinion that these arguments often get heated because when people argue for what they consider “fair”, there tend to be some participants using fair to mean equality and some using it to mean equity - this is quite a good discussion of why that becomes a problem.
At one point the Swedish army did not issue bras for its female soldiers. This did treat all soldiers equally, but it did not treat them equitably - and embodied assumptions about gender and soldiering.
For one thing, there's a significant difference between putting extra work in in order to serve a broader audience and being actively hampered in your normal discourse to the point that some or all of your audience are unable to follow. I can tell you from direct experience that an interpreter will certainly benefit from the extra work you put in giving them your notes beforehand, but they should be able to function if you ad lib (if not, they are not competent); if you read your text straight off the page, nobody will listen in either language.
Thinking about it, the skill of an interpreter is perhaps a good illustration of what I understand by inclusion: inclusion of everybody, speaker and listener, from different linguistic and cultural worlds, in the same environment, as seamlessly as possible for all - including when it gets heated ("you've fucked us over" is a recent personal example that springs to mind).
Just wondering whether scrotal supports were supplied for the male soldiers…
Depends how you read it and how you've written it. Amateur that I am, I always use a full script when preaching, and have had at least some people listen.
I'm not going to comment on whether people listen to my sermons. But, unless you're skilled at preaching without notes I'd say a sermon is more accessible if scripted than ad lib. Plus, the script is then available for anyone who wants it, including people who might be hard of hearing or unable to attend.
But interpreting is a good illustration of inclusion and of equity. It is a vector that allows people from different social and cultural backgrounds, minorities and majorities, to have a conversation in a shared space. It gives both understanding and a voice to those unable to follow in another language. Professionally done, the task involves giving that voice to everyone and making it heard, whatever one might think of what they are saying. It requires a little effort on the part of all participants, and is not perfect ("to translate is to interpret"), but it is a requirement if any of them are to be heard by the others at all.
It is also one of the criticisms of the social model of disability, which is a constructivist approach which sees disability as being the result of barriers and power dynamics in society. Whilst this approach has been invaluable for improving access for disabled people over the last few decades, it does not acknowledge the positive relationships that exist within families and communities (it also ignores the impact of impairment on people’s lived reality). It is not a model that I, as a disabled person, find empowering or helpful as an individual. I prefer the affirmative model of disability which encourages positive social identities, especially important in the field of mental health, and the building of communities.
It has been the dominant model in the social sciences for 50 years and has had an enormous impact on the lives of disabled people. It is the reason people have changed their language about disability and countries have changed their laws about disability. It is used by universities in their guidance about disability and access, for instance, it was mentioned in the guidelines at a higher education conference I presented at last year (which amused me as I was not using it as my model in the doctorate research I was presenting). 35 years ago my brother was refused a place at college to study computer science because he was visually impaired; today he would (or should) be welcomed, have his needs assessed and be provided with the required assistance and equipment. That is the change it has made in daily lives. It has made society more inclusive of disabled people and changed the dialogue; it has set out what it intended to do and continues to do so.
But it is not, in my opinion, a model for disabled people; it is a model for society. It says society puts up barriers and society needs to bring them down. It empowers disabled people by improving of access of and experience of society. But it does not empower me on a personal level, though it may well have empowered those activists who set the trail blazing. I think the social model can be particular hard for those of us disabled by mental health challenges to relate to. For one thing, we were originally excluded from the organisations involved but there are other issues such as our own barriers being mainly in the area of stigma and negative attitudes rather than physical. In its effort to reject the medical model of disability, the social model ignores the impact having an impairment has on disabled people’s lives. But you can remove all the societal barriers you like from my life and I will still have to live with having bipolar disorder. One bugbear is the emphasis on the power struggle between society and disabled people because that doesn’t reflect the experience of the many people who have loving families and communities. I find the model very negative and think that positive models are more helpful for daily life. The affirmative model is a fairly new and evolving model, developed from within the disability arts movement, especially the learning disability community, which emphasises positive social identities, both individual and collective, and doesn’t ignore the issue of having an impairment, instead embracing difference.
So, the social model is obviously better at achieving inclusivity for a whole variety of reasons including its purpose and longevity. But for achieving empowerment at an individual level, I need something more personal, such as the affirmative model.
It's also pretty accurate to say that even people who have personally positive experiences with their families and communities would acknowledge that ableism still exists at a structural level. Likewise, there are certainly many people who would hold to some form of the social model of disability while also acknowledging the problems their disability causes for them - funnily enough in my personal experience this is more common for physically disabled people, since there's quite a big anti-psychiatry contingent amongst people with mental disabilities/mental illnesses, at least in the circles I move in (quite probably related to how psychiatry is often used against trans people). I think there's also an element of chronically ill vs disabled here too - like I for instance will probably always have depression and not be cured as such, but live with it as a chronic illness. I feel like although it is certainly disabling, for some reason I think 'chronically mentally ill' is a better description than 'mentally disabled'? I think maybe because I'm used to thinking in terms of mental disability = SpED in academia, which is different to a mood disorder or personality disorder or whatever.
I think this relates to the comments in the Styx thread re neurodiversity and disability. Quite a lot of people with ADHD would consider it to *not* be a disability even if they're medicated for it - they would distinguish between neurodiversity and having a disability (edited to add that this is not my stance personally). Certainly, I've seen people include various mood disorders and personality disorders in their definition of neurodiverse...which I am personally kind of unsure about, but I'm not really educated enough in the actual differences to articulate as to why.
The first thing I take away from your response is that all the ways we have of looking at this are models rather than the absolute truth, and I think that's important.
Secondly, it seems to me from what you say that while the social model may have facilitated inclusion of the minority in question considered as a group, it does not do well when it comes to facilitating inclusion of individuals. For that, individual empowerment (the assertive model) does better (please correct me if you disagree).
My next question is whether the 'group inclusion' nurtured by the social model might not sometimes actually work against rather than in favour of the individual empowerment and inclusion of members of that group - perhaps by making it hard for the individual in question not to be viewed solely through the lens of belonging to the minority group?
Sometimes, accommodating a disability makes more freedom for everyone. Curb cuts, for instance, make it easier for everyone to travel from a road to a sidewalk. They're not just for people in wheelchairs or who are visually impaired. I don't think I could imagine anyone being confined by a curb cut. People may kvetch about the expanse of constructing them or maintaining them, but...they're generally convenient.
Of course, other disabilities are a little dicier. Because I grew up with epileptic parent, let's take epilepsy.
There are some environments where Bright Lights and Loud Noises are simply fundamental to the experience. Rock concerts, for instance. Most people go to these venues for the express purpose of having their sensory inputs overwhelmed for the purpose of deep emotional enjoyment.
Now, in case it's not known, bright lights and loud noises are classic triggers for an epileptic seizure.
So, there is simply no way to include someone with epilepsy into this experience. And you could put content warnings for such people, even out of benevolence (more frequently liability avoidance) but these well-intended warnings would be functional barriers.
And the question, which thoroughly invaded my childhood, was the ethical question my parent raised whenever they walked into a room. Family dinner? Can't eat this and this and that. Musical concert? Better be careful. Church service? Can't stand flickering candles, also sitting for a long time creates the wrong kind of spinal pressure and it hurts.
Mom, without trying to, trained me on disability awareness from a tender age. I guess it's no surprise I ended up working at an institutional facility. This stuff gets instinctive.
And maybe (as someone would accuse) mom was hypochondriac? Perhaps, but then, who are you to question someone else's experience of their own nervous system? That's pretty intimate space.
Sometimes including one person means, necessarily, excluding other things, excluding certain kinds of stimuli that are just plain painful. And if you truly wish to be inclusive to people of various sensitivities, unless you intend to be disrespectful (or worse) you modify your behavior to accommodate them. To me, this has forever been common courtesy. I picked it up as a kid and I think I've learned to apply it to many, many issues of "identity politics." Even if I think I'm objective, I watch my behavior when I'm sharing a common space with another human being.
Can someone passive aggressively use this to manipulate a community? Sure. You can push any virtuous behavior to an unhealthy extreme, and people can (and certainly will) bicker about the precise location of that line between "don't offend" and "don't easily take offense." But I do think there's a line and, over time, communities settle on one. Push to shove, I'd rather sacrifice a principle to protect a person than sacrifice a person to protect a principle.
This does get tricky when people become carriers for principles, I can respect that struggle, but on some level if my identity is a topic for debate, that's a higher level of sensitivity than my principled opinion about how a debate should be had.
Hope this helps.
As @Pomona mentioned, these aren't mutually exclusive, and really we're talking about a hybrid. Forgive the gross simplification, but my understanding of what @Heavenlyannie described is that the social model is talking about opening space for people, and assertive models about how to help individuals move into the spaces as they open up. They feed each other, people can only be empowered to enter space that exists, and individuals asserting themselves provides impetus for opening spaces that others may then follow. That, at least, is how I understood what's been said here.
I suspect I'm autistic, I am aware that my son is, and so I've read a lot about that particular community. There are a lot of people who are autistic who would be absolutely thrilled to have you understand them as autistic people, because it makes socialization so much easier instead of beating around the bush. People who are allowed to speak for themselves will speak for themselves.
The only space where this gets problematic is when the viewed person is - by a measurable degree - incapable of self-advocacy, in case which it falls to their legal guardian or representative (who is hopefully a carefully trained professional) because that is ethically some very dangerous work.
But in a forum where people are able to communicate, let people speak for themselves. They'll tell you how they want to be identified, and it's generally most respectful to grant them that personal dignity instead of taking up a cause on their behalf without their express consent.
Disability activists quite rightly point out that if we live long enough, nearly all of us become disabled to one degree or another - we don't call it disability when we can call it old age, but if you need a grab bar in the bathroom, it doesn't matter if it's age or something else that makes that the case, you need that grab bar to be there. If you count up all the people who at some point in their lives have some level of disability, that's most of us. Thinking of able-bodied people as a majority and everyone else as a minority means we keep thinking of ability as a norm from which some are deviating rather than looking at the wide variety of ability across the population.
Another example: I live in a "majority-minority" city; the majority of the people who live here belong to groups that are ethnic minorities in the US. In addition, no one ethnic group is over 50% of the population, and the largest ethnic group is Latinos, who are of course an ethnic minority in the US. So when we're talking about inclusion where I live, it's not a matter of a majority needing to include a majority. It's a matter of a white minority needing to cede power to a larger Latino minority that is terribly disenfranchised, which in turn will need to make sure smaller, even less powerful minorities also have a seat at the table.
In addition to the failure to adequately describe many situations in its either/or binary logic, the terminology of majority and minority doesn't just situate power with a majority (who may not actually be a mathematical majority) - it keeps that power there.
I don't know what inclusion means for people in other countries, but in the US our willingness and ability to include people will determine whether our multi-racial, multi-ethnic democracy will survive.
Assuming a curb cut is what I know as a drop kerb, I can illustrate a situation where they actually cause difficulty. My local Co-op (our only real food shop) opens onto a short bit of pavement and then meets a small parking bay with one bus spot and one disabled spot. All other parking is along the pavement and around the corner. There is a drop kerb right in front of the door, so anyone approaching or (more of a problem given the load) exiting the door with a trolley has to fight a sideways slope. If a child or frail adult is pushing this can be a real problem. The irony is that the drop kerb doesn't appear to even help anyone, as it's not needed for getting onto the (accessible) bus, and there is no pavement on the other side of the road to be reached via it.
And this would appear to be a perfect example of that - to make matters worse, it is also a new barrier for other users.
Not only that, I think some of the greatest disservices to inclusivity occur when causes are taken up by those not in fact speaking for themselves.
@Ruth whether or not minority and majority are helpful (I am very familiar with "majority-minority" environments, too), they appear to be part of the dictionary definition and the way the subject of inclusion is framed. When talking about inclusion within a wider group, it seems to me that acknowledging the numbers is important. Real-life inclusion will always involve a trade-off between the numbers of people excluded, the impact of their inclusion on everyone else, and what the activity for which inclusion is sought is - sport, debate, work, shopping, or attending a rock concert.
My university considers mental health challenges to be a disability and many of my students have registered personality and mood disorders. But a lot of students don’t register, perhaps due to stigma, or the need to supply medical evidence (universities say they use the social model but that medical model seems to sneak in anyway) and some don’t identify as disabled. Some register a different disability, despite the mental health one being more likely to impact on their studies (multiple disabilities are common, as you said on the other thread, I think). My own research invites students who self-identify as having mental health challenges to participate as I know registration is not a reliable indicator. I am registered as disabled on both my staff and student profiles; registering on my staff profile offers me greater employment protections.
Yes, I think a hybrid model is needed. The social model was a determined effort to reject the medical model of disability, which is presumably why it ignores the personal issues of impairment or chronic pain. The affirmative model supposedly builds on the social model but nobody has developed it enough to show how. But ignoring the impact of an individual’s impairment also ignores things like rehabilitation and therapy (you also rightly discuss issues such as self-help on the other thread).
Back in the late 90s/early 00s, it was simply assumed *by everybody* that anyone looking after babies and toddlers were women. All baby changing facilities were in women's toilets, all daytime parents' groups were women-only spaces. 'Family' changing rooms in swimming pools were on the women's side.
I was faced with a choice of either deliberately and consciously (and often awkwardly) going into those places to sort out the kids or give them time with their cohort - knowing that the social disapproval of me, from both women and men, would be great, or not doing so and making mine and my children's experience significantly different.
Sometimes I had the spoons, and sometimes I didn't. At least I have an enviable relationship with both my now-adult children.
So I get what @Heavenlyannie is talking about. Simple acts of kindness - which were routinely offered to young mothers - would often reduce me to exhausted tears of gratitude. But all I really wanted was the space in which I could make my own choices, rather than have those dictated to me by the built environment and other people's attitudes.
Accessible buses were an absolute game-changer to someone juggling a baby, a toddler and a buggy. And they still are. More of that. Not less.
Legislating a space for me to be present might have helped secure me a place in the room, but it wouldn't have guaranteed a welcoming attitude on the part of everyone else. It seems to me that inclusivity is about more than legislating, and that sometimes, legislating can have adverse consequences on the attitude of others.
I've been in the same boat, possibly a generation younger (eldest is 13) and I can see the difference. It's definitely a thing.
This is textbook argument for denying steps towards any kind of equality by raising the spectre of a backlash.
Our village still advertises a weekly "Music with Mummy" session for toddlers and, presumably, their mothers. I have no idea what would happen if a father turned up as mine are all hulking great teenagers now.
My experience of those kinds of things is varied. Some of them are really things for the children, and I've found myself welcomed at them. Others of them are really social groups for new mothers, and it seems the women involved want to talk about things in a single-sex environment and don't want a man invading their space.
And there's room for both kinds of things, I think.
Only if both exist in a given place though. And they often don't. Often the choice is between "mother and baby" orientated stuff and sitting on your own at home.
While it might be part of some terf-o-sphere arguments (note the similarities to fundie gender roles though...) it's something that exists because of misogyny - both the misogyny of considering any childcare to be inherently the task of women only, and also the misogyny of considering a man taking on a 'female job' to be emasculated and weird. It's part of the wider patriarchal narrative that 'feminine' things are silly/boring/weird/shameful etc etc (which is also a major source of the transmisogyny experienced by trans women). It's saying that wanting to be treated 'like a woman' is wrong because to be like a woman is humiliating.
Yes, inclusivity is about more than legislating. But it's a really very good first move. No one who ought to be inside should be left outside because they can't access a space created and curated by people who can't hear, won't listen, don't see, and care less.
As to the second part of your argument, sorry, but that's really just pandering to bigots. I trust that you don't pander to bigots, so I'm giving you the chance to explain yourself.
All of that is true, but does it mean that rock concerts with loud music and bright lights should be banned for not being inclusive or does it just mean that people with epilepsy won't be able to go to them?
My local cinema has autism-friendly screenings, and special rooms for families who might want to be able to turn the sound down a bit. No one is talking about banning rock concerts for not being inclusive, but there's plenty that rock concert promoters and venues can do to make them more inclusive.
I've been to a lot of storytelling sessions at the local library, the librarian is a friend. There are usually a few dads in the crowd, never felt weird or out of place.
I'm not sure this is typical for most places but I've gotten used to it locally, and appreciate it.
I think it depends on the kind of venue one is trying to establish, and it's ultimately up to the person or people responsible for the venue.
@Doc Tor and @Doublethink both make excellent points above, IMO.
Separate, additional provision for people who for one reason or another aren't able to enjoy the provision that already exists is something I definitely agree with. But there are many who would say that such a separation of provision is inherently exclusive, and that (in this case) people with epilepsy should be able to access all spaces. And if that means that people who enjoy loud music or flashing lights have to forgo that enjoyment then that's a small price to pay for greater inclusivity.
What if some people with physical disabilities want to exhibit themselves for money? After all, many people without physical disabilities do exactly that. Should they be allowed to, or is such exhibition considered so inherently dehumanising that people should be denied the personal agency to choose to do it if they wish?
and it depends on the activity. If what you have is a formal garden, nature preserve, or similar, then you should be providing accessible paths for wheelchairs etc. If what you have is a week-long backpacking trip in the wilds somewhere, you don't have a sensible way to include wheelchairs. And if you are organizing such a trip, it is reasonable to include minimum fitness requirements (if part of the enjoyment of such a trip is a physically arduous challenge, then you want a group of people with compatible capabilities, so everyone enjoys it. One person who is a long way behind the rest of the group in capability could ruin such a trip for everyone.)
Inclusivity doesn't necessarily have to mean having everything available to everyone all the time.
To give another example, having a couple of women-only swim times at your local pool can increase inclusivity, by enabling women who have religious or other scruples about mixed bathing to swim, even though those specific slots will obviously be exclusive.
Thing is - is it specifically called "Storytime with Mummy" or similar?
It wasn't an argument, it was an observation. I'm not against the general principle of legislation in favour of inclusivity, but I think its success or otherwise depends a lot on how the legislation is framed and what the outcomes for everybody are. As @Bullfrog says, it also depends on the kind of venue one is trying to establish. That may be true in principle, but if the moves in favour of inclusion are such that those for whom special efforts have been made are the only ones left in the room, those excluded will have been excluded twice over. I sincerely believe this to be a potential problem.
I think use of the word "bigot" is like a nuclear first strike: whoever throws it into the argument first wins, or think they do. The definition of "bigot" I get when googling says Note that bigotry is not the sole preserve of any one group. To my mind, real inclusion is about overcoming bigotry, to the greatest extent possible, on the part of all groups.
That's a good point. I think the phrasing of the event is gender neutral, and that definitely helps a lot.
If I were interested in such an event, I might try to have a chat with the organizers first. Or I might just show up and damn the awkward. If anyone looks askance, just say I'm a stay at home dad and this is clearly an event for toddlers.
I do recognize that awkwardness, and how it's an impediment for folks.
Firstly, there is difference between “being exhibited” and choosing to be a performer.
I used to live as an ex-patriot in a an extremely poor country as a teenager. In that society at that time, unless your family were rich, if you were physically disabled you begged on the street.
If you had said to people on Monday that on Tuesday you were going to enforce a law that prevented begging in order to help them - many would have told you they wanted to beg, you were ruining their livelihood and putting their survival at risk. This was a reflection of there being so few opportunities open to them in their society at that time.
Years of work and the setting up of an advocacy organisation got a wheelchair using individual into the president’s office of as an interpreter and a team to the Paralympics. The idea of such initiatives being to raise the status of people with physical disabilities and by doing this, open more opportunities up for them to end the need to beg to survive.
If you don't have epilepsy, I'm going to question why you're using a hypothetical epilepsy sufferer to try and ram home your fairly spurious point. In my experience, those with auditory/visual triggers to their epilepsy know not to expose themselves to environments where those effects are going to be present (and that warnings are hugely helpful in allowing them to decide that for themselves). They don't want rock concerts banned - in that, they are more accepting and tolerant of us non-epileptics.
You're literally talking about them. Not with them.
I don't have epilepsy. I do, however, suffer from motion sickness.
I don't want rollercoasters banned - I just don't want to go on the things. I can see that if I didn't have motion sickness, rollercoasters would probably be quite fun. But I do, and so they aren't.
I don't go on them, and if my friends want to go on a trip to a park containing them and spend the day riding on them, I don't go. Whenever we take the kids anywhere like that, Mrs C goes on the rides with the kids, and I stand and wait holding the bags / babies / whatever.
And that's fine. I'd only feel excluded if all forms of entertainment included surprise rollercoasters for no good reason.
If this is anything more than a strawman, you're going to have to explain this far better.
You've not explained yourself here either. If your argument is that there should be no legislation to include disadvantaged people in wider society until the bigots come around, then I can reliably inform you that Hell's thermostat isn't like to move in the foreseeable. This is exactly the sort of attitude criticised by MLK in his letter from Birmingham jail - I don't see why we should have to make that mistake (over and over) again.
Listen people, I'm going to pause this thread overnight because while we have some very valid own-voice narrators and experiences here, there's also an argument that seems to have been imported from the Styx, and that's not the purpose of Epiphanies. We're short on Hosts and this topic might need a redirect.
Hosting off
Mary Louise, Epiphanies Host
Because that was the example Bullfrog used in the post to which I was originally replying.
Thread open again.
Much of this thread appears to be in response to a current Styx discussion, in particular this post which relates to options for a thread on discomfort and advocacy.
If the line of argument can be kept to own-voice narratives, the thread can stay open but it will be carefully moderated.
Hosting off
Mary Louise, Epiphanies Host