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Advice for the FA Admin Team
a year ago
I'm writing this journal at my own peril, in a sense. I've largely tried to avoid wading into the conversation over what the Admin/Moderation team has been doing involving Babyfur/Littlefur content, their unclear position on their own rules, and their rather heavy handed enforcement over perceived infractions. I'll leave the general discord about that to Twitter since the community has been taking it to the Admin team extremely vocally. There is no point wading into that discussion for me. Instead, I want to focus on something else.
A lot of the vocal discord surrounding the topic is about this idea of apology. As someone who has is currently trying to break the cycle of constantly apologizing, I think it both bizarre and apt for me to just be honest about it: Apologies don't mean anything. They're hollow words meant to imply a sense of personal shame and the acceptance of personal responsibility. However, in practice, it never really works out that way. When it comes to screwing up (and I am something of an expert on screwing up), you cannot simply apologize. You cannot present false pretenses and set goals that don't mean anything to anyone but yourself. It's harsh for me to say this but the direction the FA Admin team seems to want to go it is in this direction. It won't fix the damage done nor will it prevent things from happening in the future. The only method that they have before them is one that is routinely misunderstood: Atonement.
Atonement isn't about asking for forgiveness. It's about taking meaningful action to right the wrongs you've done while working to ensure they don't happen again. It's an ongoing, constant thing. The greater the mistake you make, the harder you have to work to actually be forgiven. Simply dealing with rogue admins and rewriting the rules to protect members of the community is, frankly, not even surface level. It's the basic requirement to even start making surface level changes. All they seem to be committed to doing right now is acknowledging the screw up that was made. That's not taking responsibility for it nor is it working to prevent it from happening again.
I'm not saying that the admin team needs to roll out the red carpet for Babyfurs/Littlefurs or even elevate the community to some distinguished position. The community has been repeatedly targeted, attacked, and even culled (more than once) from the Furry community. I'm sure there are people within the furry community that were actively celebrating positive inspirations like BabyStar being banned off the platform. You've got users still banned or suspended from the platform with no clear reasons as to why, even if they're just people quietly going about their lives. I've been grateful to say I've dodged the banwave but even I don't feel safe. If the FA Admin team genuinely want to start on the path to atonement, they'd offer to allow a member of the Babyfur/Littlefur/ABDL community a seat at the table. We understand when content crosses the line. We police ourselves regularly and when things aren't right, we actively work toward addressing it. It sounds like a farfetched thing to consider but bear in mind that the Admin team has proven they cannot be trusted to enforce their own rules. They cannot separate their bias from the evidence before them. Recognizing that is the first step toward atoning for what they've done. From there, they can work on building their understanding and proving they can check their own bias. That constantly effort toward change and improvement is what Atonement is about.
Do I believe that will happen? Honestly, no. Do I think the Admins will read this? Probably not. Do I think this is the best course of action? That's not my place to say. At the end of the day, it isn't me they need to convince. It's the community. I don't think what I'm proposing is out of line. It's just a genuinely honest first step that could go a long way into winning back goodwill.
A lot of the vocal discord surrounding the topic is about this idea of apology. As someone who has is currently trying to break the cycle of constantly apologizing, I think it both bizarre and apt for me to just be honest about it: Apologies don't mean anything. They're hollow words meant to imply a sense of personal shame and the acceptance of personal responsibility. However, in practice, it never really works out that way. When it comes to screwing up (and I am something of an expert on screwing up), you cannot simply apologize. You cannot present false pretenses and set goals that don't mean anything to anyone but yourself. It's harsh for me to say this but the direction the FA Admin team seems to want to go it is in this direction. It won't fix the damage done nor will it prevent things from happening in the future. The only method that they have before them is one that is routinely misunderstood: Atonement.
Atonement isn't about asking for forgiveness. It's about taking meaningful action to right the wrongs you've done while working to ensure they don't happen again. It's an ongoing, constant thing. The greater the mistake you make, the harder you have to work to actually be forgiven. Simply dealing with rogue admins and rewriting the rules to protect members of the community is, frankly, not even surface level. It's the basic requirement to even start making surface level changes. All they seem to be committed to doing right now is acknowledging the screw up that was made. That's not taking responsibility for it nor is it working to prevent it from happening again.
I'm not saying that the admin team needs to roll out the red carpet for Babyfurs/Littlefurs or even elevate the community to some distinguished position. The community has been repeatedly targeted, attacked, and even culled (more than once) from the Furry community. I'm sure there are people within the furry community that were actively celebrating positive inspirations like BabyStar being banned off the platform. You've got users still banned or suspended from the platform with no clear reasons as to why, even if they're just people quietly going about their lives. I've been grateful to say I've dodged the banwave but even I don't feel safe. If the FA Admin team genuinely want to start on the path to atonement, they'd offer to allow a member of the Babyfur/Littlefur/ABDL community a seat at the table. We understand when content crosses the line. We police ourselves regularly and when things aren't right, we actively work toward addressing it. It sounds like a farfetched thing to consider but bear in mind that the Admin team has proven they cannot be trusted to enforce their own rules. They cannot separate their bias from the evidence before them. Recognizing that is the first step toward atoning for what they've done. From there, they can work on building their understanding and proving they can check their own bias. That constantly effort toward change and improvement is what Atonement is about.
Do I believe that will happen? Honestly, no. Do I think the Admins will read this? Probably not. Do I think this is the best course of action? That's not my place to say. At the end of the day, it isn't me they need to convince. It's the community. I don't think what I'm proposing is out of line. It's just a genuinely honest first step that could go a long way into winning back goodwill.
