[OSM-talk] I’m running for OSMF board and I’ve set up office hours for questions

stevea steveaOSM at softworkers.com
Thu Dec 3 15:48:36 UTC 2020


Mikel:

I’m disappointed to see you characterize Frederik’s characterization of behavior as “garbage;” to do so is a red herring (intentional distraction).  While I don’t want to put words in Frederik's mouth (indeed, I said I fully understand why he used such colorful language — to vividly identify what he sees as actual or perceived disingenuous or deceitful behavior), Frederik did so to identify hypocrisy and aggressive abuse.  This is because identifying and calling out abuse is the first step is tamping it down when it (or even its potential) is seen in any group — whether a family or a foundation.

A sad but true fact about people who abuse is they frequently “project,” blame-shifting and deflecting  their own atrocious behavior (abuse of women, abuse of power, aggressive power plays…) onto the very person who is victimized or who calls out and identifies this behavior.  This (bullying) can be a devastatingly effective tactic that actually re-victimizes the target of the abuse, making him or her appear to be the crazy (weak, abusive…) one in these actively aggressive acts.  It also intimidates “good (people) who say nothing and do nothing about those who perpetrate bad or evil acts” (I paraphrase) into CONTINUING to do nothing.  This allows the perpetrator to continue to get away with the abuse, effectively silencing many who would defend not only the single victim (target, survivor…) but those in the greater group (family, congregation, company, foundation, organization, country). 

The entire point of using such strong and colorful language is not to “make a point with garbage, further promulgating garbage.”  It is to highlight abuse as abuse — raw, difficult and uncomfortable as those facts are.  Pointing out that somebody else engages in atrocious behavior (and using strong language to do so) does not make the one pointing that finger a “slinger of garbage.”  This is an old (yet sadly, quite effective) trick from the playbook of nasty, aggressive people, especially as they put on a public face of charming “nice guy.”  This often results in one who identifies dangerous perpetrators of aggression, simply in their quest to call it out, becoming suspect themselves:  “look at the histrionic, crazy drama-queen behavior by this unfortunate, name-caller” (but he won’t say “victim,” as that would identify the psychosocial dynamics of what is truly going on).  This ruse has existed forever in the history of people who exercise power with terrible acts of aggression while remaining covert as they do so, pointing to others as “garbage slinging, accusatory, overly dramatic / histrionic, name-calling, unstable people.”  It’s a sad, old trick, and the only way to stop it is to identify it and have it recognized by “good people who do (or say) SOMEthing” about it, rather than perpetrating the evil themselves with their silence.

In many years of often close and intimate interaction / collaboration with Frederik in OSM, I have never, not one single time, even had a HINT that he “evokes violence against women.”  That is a highly inflammatory statement, especially as you offer no evidence of it in what appears to be blame-shifting, when all Frederik did (it appears to me) was to make an analogy of one leader’s atrocious behavior having the potential for similar bad havior to infect our Board.  We should call that out as we see it, and that is what is going on here, nothing more.  Blame-shifting in the face of identifying bad behavior is something I (and others who have experienced this first-hand for what it is) find this behavior of yours highly suspect.

I apologize to the list for going into the deeper and darker aspects of human behavior here.  Sometimes, it is required to do so.

SteveA

On Dec 3, 2020, at 3:32 AM, Mikel Maron <mikel.maron at gmail.com> wrote:
> Thanks Mateusz, I agree. Points can easily be made without such garbage. Unfortunately Frederik has a habit of using rhetoric that evokes violence against women. I’m not saying that he or anyone here personally holds biased views about women. But the effect is the same, it degrades our entire community. And we wonder why there are no women running for the board. 
> 
> Mikel




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