dear Sharon, Michael et al. Sharon, many thanks for this, and I think your reaction is infused with wisdom and experience, I have found leaving FB very liberating; it had become a burden since a very long time, and it took up half of my working day; I don't think I will be coming back any time soon as I had already decided with my colleagues to look for an alternative. It is unlike to be any corporate owned social media, but either some kind of newsletter (minimising the constant need for interaction) or some kind of integrated environment, we'll see. This may take quite a long time unless something comes along that really appeals to me. In the meantime, it gives a lot more time to read and reflect, Michel On Sat, Aug 18, 2018 at 7:51 PM Michael Lewis <[email protected]> wrote:

Wonderfully said Sharon. You are clearer in your fog than many ruminating under the radiance of the sun. Thanks so much for the insight and sensitivity reflected in your reaching out to Michel in this painful time.

Michael Lewis

On Aug 18, 2018, at 2:12 AM, Sharon Ede <[email protected]> wrote:

Dear Michel

I am so sorry it has come to this, and I understand something of what it's like to be personally attacked for posting certain positions, articles or opinions.

As the primary admin for the Post Growth Facebook page since 2010 (and other pages), I have had to manage some conflict, and my own emotional response to it, my cognitive capacity diverted into worrying and thinking how best to reply (just imagine this: posts on population and responses from the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement!). Still, those were with people I didn't know, and as a page admin - not as me, personally, with virtual and real life colleagues of my networks.

I haven't weighed in sooner, aside from posting those links to how to have conversations with people one disagrees with, as it all 'caught fire' when I wasn't at my computer much over last weekend. Since Tuesday night I've been sick with a head and chest cold (still am), not at work and hardly able to keep up or get my head around everything that spiralled out of it.

Though I was not engaging in the posts over the last week, I was reading. I've got a whole bunch of thoughts and reactions to what has played out over the last week, but they are not organised or properly thought through due to my current brain fog! So here are my less-than-complete-or-coherent thoughts on how things happened, more than what the conflict was about.

I'd barely heard of Jordan Peterson prior to all this, to be honest - I'd seen a couple of FB friends who are well-informed, female 'sustainability' voices I trust posting in support of him a couple of months back, and that was it. So as I watched this unfold, I saw a group of people, many of whom I know and respect, posting opposing views, and then not knowing what to think. Who was right about this character I'd hardly heard of? If I am going to engage in a debate, I would rather do so from an informed position of reviewing primary sources (ie. the words from JPs mouth and pen), not others' interpretations, and* then* consider the viewpoints (in support of, and also not in support of) of others whom I trust. I haven't had the time to do so - and now I am too annoyed with Peterson to want to spend time watching his vids, because his very existence has driven a wedge between people who need to be working together!

If Peterson is pointing out that large swathes of disaffected people, including those who are white/male AND who are being marginalised economically through shifting socioeconomic trends, are susceptible to dangerous arguments of the right if they feel they are being 'blamed' by the left, I'd agree - that is an observable and concerning phenomenon we need to pay attention to, *because if we don't,* *anyone concerned with the social position of 'minorities' is going to end up having a lot more to worry about*. If JP is advocating dodgy 'prescriptions' in response to any reasonable 'diagnosis', then I vehemently disagree (eg. his enforced monogamy nonsense - um, for whom?!). And we should bear in mind that this figure is only one representation of wider social trends.

In addition, I can't stand participating in debates where there are ad hominem attacks. If we can't debate issues without resorting to name calling or attacking the person, then we've already lost the bigger quest. I also saw people responding to things that hadn't been said, but things that they 'heard', their own interpretation due to their own attachments. There were many valid points made by lots of people, and I've gone around and around in my head saying 'I agree with that but ALSO that, but there's more nuance needed with that', and a lot of terms being thrown around that I didn't understand (WTF is 'cultural Marxism?!!'), or thought needed challenging, and I just didn't have the energy or depth of knowledge to engage with. I don't believe in squashing debates among colleagues who trust and respect each other, the only thing I want to see squashed is associated attacks and abuse. You can't develop your own understanding by self-censoring to avoid hostility. Having said that, I also understand the fear and anger of people who think even engaging with certain debates is yielding something long fought for and still not fully realised, that it is an appeasement, and that appeasement is a slippery slope to kinds of places we don't want society to go, because they benefit no one.

Recently, I had a phone call with a (white) friend who was having trouble in a local group for reconciliation <https://www.reconciliation.org.au/what-is-reconciliation/> (between indigenous people and non-indigenous Australians). Aboriginal politics are fraught with the kind of pitfalls you've just experienced, and my friend was encountering similar, with the Aboriginal people she was talking to in conflict about how to speak about the issues with non-Aboriginal folks within the circle. The first thing I pointed out to her was: 'how can you expect to do reconciliation with a wider group when you can't do it among yourselves?' And she was stunned.

I think that P2P is facing the same issue at the moment.

And I think it is a good idea, *purely* for your own self-preservation, for you to take a break from Facebook for a bit (though no doubt the debate will roll on). This kind of experience is exhausting (keeping up with comments, messages, emails), and takes an emotional, psychological and energetic toll on you and everyone it affects. Of course I hope you are not lost to those forums forever. You provide immense value in curating and sharing useful content from all over the world, which is unpaid and for which you are not often thanked or acknowledged.

I'm not sure you're right about Jordan Peterson - he raises many red flags for me as someone who perhaps makes an accurate diagnosis of social concerns, yet offers dangerous prescriptions - BUT that is not the point.* I don't know. *I don't know if he's suckering people in (from the left AND right) with reasonable sounding observations, or if people on the left are seeing something others on the left are not, or if the left or right are interpreting him in totally different ways and what are the implications of that...or that left/right are even useful terms any more.

But I do know you, and your ethics, and that you are not racist or sexist.

I am very sure that you are correct on this: *we are not going to build a positive society while we are polarised*, and cannot engage in debate in a spirit of koinonia <http://www.cruxcatalyst.com/2013/02/13/awakening-our-collaborative-spirit/>, either in politics or in the P2P networks, and how to do that with 'taboo' topics, especially ones that create fear and apprehension. And if we can't do that with each other (others-like-us), how are we going to do that with wider society (others not-like-us), and especially those who are in danger of being seduced by the siren song of extreme ideas? It is possible to say someone is right about x, but wrong about y (and why). It is possible to hold opposing ideas in your head about the same issue or person. It's uncomfortable though! Which is why we end up with good/bad, right/wrong, left/right binaries.

What we have all learned from this is that an open, online forum like a public Facebook group isn't the place to explore potentially inflammatory topics, or at least not without a lot more context, ground rules etc. A key 'ground rule' I have seen elsewhere is: 'curiosity without judgment'. Given online spaces remove the opportunity for the kind of nuanced communication that happens in person, a way to do this might be to talk to a few trusted folks, back-channel, to say 'I want to discuss this, what do you think?'. That gives a chance for blind spots to be checked, to formulate a contextual background and a couple of key questions, and then go out to wider discussion, preferably moderated by some kind of quasi-independent third party.

Take a rest from this Michel - let the cortisol work its way out of your system, do things you love that engage your senses around you and re-ground yourself. Then see how you feel in a little while!

Big hug Sharon

On Sat, 18 Aug 2018 at 15:05, Michel Bauwens <[email protected]> wrote:

...

dear friends,

I am leaving FB for a as yet indeterminate period of time,

This almost means that my curation duties are hold, since I have no ready alternative. The reasons for my departure are not technical but have to do with a unfortunate polarisation on the p2p foundation's fb group, that I have been unable to steer in a positive momentum,

Michel

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