#i shared my personal statement in my friend discord a couple of weeks ago and havent touched it since

[wtylas]

“every word had a purpose”

[goldheartedsky]

I told myself I wasn’t going to make a post like this—that I wasn’t going to stoop to the level of making call-out posts—but I really can’t stay silent after what has happened in the last day or so.

The TOG fandom has a serious issue with excusing antisemitism and allowing people who have painfully hurt marginalized groups to continue to ignore, dismiss, and refuse to acknowledge their limits of intersectionality in regards to social justice. I have seen it myself, been on the receiving end of it, and have talked to other Jews in this fandom about what’s been going on and it needs to start being addressed.

Now, I’m not going to name names or tag people (mainly because I have been blocked by almost all of them for this very issue) but if you message me I will gladly tell you the users involved in this. Also, if you have doubts of any of this’s validity and would like screenshots, feel free to reach out to me here or via Discord and I will share them.

A lot of this started when a member of the All&More server had brought up the scientific and medical “discoveries” during the torture and medical experimentation that took place during the Third Reich and how a lot of the origin of it isn’t taught. LR made a comment saying that “we are three-dimensional creatures who are stuck moving forward in time and can’t go back” and added that not using the research won’t make past horrors not happen. When the original user added that there has been a movement in medicine for removing Nazi scientists names off discoveries and that progress was slow moving, she deflected the conversation onto herself, saying “Not using research won’t make my family not harmed by the Japanese” and then immediately pivoted into admitting that, from what she understood, there weren’t any particularly valid scientific discoveries made by them. She then said, in regards to said Nazi atrocities, “Take it, learn about it, put it in context, and then own it and transform it.”

A Jewish member of A&M voiced their discomfort about possibly taking medicine that was a direct result of the murder of their grandparents and other relatives, to which LR said, “Still stuck in the 3rd dimension, still moving forward in time.” I brought up the fact that medicine was built on antisemitism and racism and that starting over would be better than a lot of the procedures we have now. There is a longstanding issue in medicine of disregarding black pain and so much of what we have now is created by eugenicists—including Nazi scientists. There is still a lot of Jewish trauma due to medical experimentation and that is oftentimes dismissed.

LR then made a flippant comment about “Does this count as Godwin’s Law?”—which is about how all internet discussions lead to someone being compared to Nazis/Hitler. When called out on the inappropriateness of the comment, she did not respond and was backed up by one of the mods of the server. There was no apology made nor an acknowledgment about the casual antisemitism of the comments she made and the dismissal of Jewish trauma/pain.

Now, fast forward a couple months when I was contacted by a third party who had not been in the server at the time but had joined and heard about what LR had said there. H said they were friends with LR and had concerns about antisemitism and would like my perspective. I explained what had happened and offered screenshots if they would like them, which they did. They thanked me and apologized that it got to a point that I felt unsafe in the server and had to leave, which I appreciated.

A couple weeks later they reached out to me again and offered to broker a conversation between LR and myself because the situation wasn’t sitting well with them. I was skeptical (because I had been blocked at that point) and didn’t have a lot of hope that this conversation would actually take place but I felt a responsibility to try and be the bigger person and deal with what had been said head on, so I agreed to sit down and have a discussion with her as long as there was a third party in the chat as well—given our history.

After a couple weeks of back and forth with H and hearing that LR had said that she would “think about it”, she finally agreed. I was asked for a time and date and I gave my availability and was told she would be asked for the same. A couple days later, I was suddenly told LR would only be comfortable with this conversation if H acted as a “literal go-between” with us copy-pasting our responses in their DMs so we can “sit with the message and everyone can get to them when they can” rather than it being a session with an actual back and forth and was asked if I was okay with that. I honestly said no, because this was supposed to be a situation where she and I sat down and discussed what she said in the server, not a back and forth message relay where the conversation got dragged out for days or weeks or however long it was going to take. I said if she was serious about meeting me halfway on this, she needed to be able to sit down and actually talk.

H copy-pasted my response to LR and came back that she had backed out of the conversation, which part of me had expected from the beginning—even though all I wanted from this sit down was for her to understand how hurtful the antisemitic comments were and an apology.

These comments that were made in the server are not a secret. It’s pretty well known what was said and again, these were all on record, not privately made in some DM. She has still not owned up to the comments she said, nor has she ever apologized for them. She has ignored message after message about them and blocked more people than I can count. Many of the people defending her when the discourse begins have also been messaged about the comments she’s said and also either block people or ignore the messages completely and refuse to acknowledge them.

Now, this being said, in the most recent conversation about fandom racism, someone brought up the post that was made reducing users on ao3 to faceless, nameless numbers without saying who they were, what they had done, and how they were specifically contributing to the problem of racism in this fandom. They made the comparison of other situations like HR looking at pay stats to see how to fire and included “Nazis, capitalists, and colonizers.”

This is not an invalid argument. There have been other Jews in the fandom who specifically voiced feeling uncomfortable for the exact same reason. However, another person, LT, decided to specifically make a post calling the OP out and drag them for having the audacity to liken it to the Shoah (which, mind you, this person is not Jewish nor did they decide to capitalize Shoah or the Holocaust as they should have). She received a reply saying, “you’re offended by antisemitism? Here’s LR’s (someone LT has agreed with multiple times over racism in fandom) track record of antisemitic comments” which outlined everything I delved into previously.

LT said that they were “unaware of this incident until a couple days ago” but agreed that it was an upsetting display of casual dismissal of Jewish pain and hoped that LR had apologized. She was then called out for being aware of it and still continuing to reblog LR’s posts even after knowing about the comments and was linked to my post clarifying that LR had not apologized and refused a discussion about it, to which LT said that she had gotten “quite a different version outlined in the post linked and corroborated by a third party” and “felt uncomfortable” making a value judgement, insinuating that I was not being truthful about my side of the story.

I messaged LT off-anon and said that I was not lying nor over-exaggerating about what had happened in the server or about the following discussion about trying to broker a conversation with LR, and was immediately blocked by her. I am also not the only Jew who has sent her messages about this topic, only to have their messages ignored.

Now, am I surprised that I was immediately blocked after voicing my issues with what LT had said in that post? No.

She has a history of making antisemitic comments, most of which happened during the brunt of the Israel/Palestine discussion happening, which included statements such as “You cannot be considered indigenous if you hold a position of power”, that, despite having been displaced for 2,000 years, the Jewish diaspora was “integrated” into their respective communities (a wholly untrue statement), as well as linked to and promoted a website with extremely antisemitic articles including one about “Spartan Jews” and how Israeli Jews are violent to “send messages to their deprived self-esteem” that they won’t be victims again. Half of the comments on the site’s front page included such hits as “Death to all Jews” and “Wow, I had no idea this was happening—I guess it is true that Jews control the world and the mass media.” This website was repeated in multiple posts as “unbiased” and “a good resource” for other people to truly know what was going on.

Jewish dissent on the content of some posts and that website went unacknowledged and dismissed.

Being that LT is a relatively big user in the TOG fandom, her posts got circulated frequently. Seeing things like that touted as unbiased was extremely triggering for me and multiple Jews in this fandom that I’ve spoken to.

Now, the reason I made this post in particular was because I have seen a lot of echoing of the sentiment: “no matter how much you disagree with their sentiment, aligning yourself with racists is...well aligning yourself with racists.”

This statement NEEDS to become intersectional. If we are criticizing the work of people because of who they hold company with, why does that end at racism? If we are going to have a discussion about racism in this fandom, why are we letting it come from people who have openly said antisemitic things, people who have stood by them and supported them in silence, and people who have silenced Jewish voices speaking up about this issue.

These are not separate issues. This is a really good post regarding the white washing of Jews in social justice discussion and it comes full circle into the medical experimentation discussion. Jews were not seen as white during the Holocaust. The Nazis were trying to cleanse the Aryan race because they did not view Jews as white. They experimented on them because they did not view them as white and, thus, disposable.

Every Jewish diasporic community is still vulnerable. Even though the US has half the world’s Jews, over 50% of the religiously based hate crimes are consistently anti-Jewish even though Jews make up 2% of the population. Chinese Jews are still holding their holiday celebrations in secret due to government crackdowns. The attempted genocide of Beta Israel was less than 50 years ago. Across the Middle East and North Africa, Jewish communities are barely hanging on after centuries of attempted destruction. These are not just Jewish issues but racial issues as well because when people make the sweeping generalization of “Jew” and they only mean white-passing Ashkenazi Jews, it erases so much of our community.

I absolutely agree that this fandom needs to have a discussion about race and portrayal in fic and what we can do better moving forward—and I want to see that done—but we also need to acknowledge what so many people starting this discussion have said and the marginalized groups they have hurt along the way. I see these posts come across my dashboard and know exactly who they're coming from and what they think of people like me. If we are going to say, “No matter how much you disagree with their sentiment, aligning yourself with racists is aligning yourself with racists,” then we NEED to be saying, “If you are aligning yourself with antisemites, you’re aligning yourself with antisemites.”

We all need to move forward. But that means moving forward together. Jews included.

[aaronhart93]

text || alison & aaron

Discord text thread featuring: aaron & @alison-haynes

When: december 16

Mentions: @quentindelancret​ @ronnieroy @wtf-eden @lemonkiaiyo

Description: aaron spills his guts about quentin to alison and alison asks aaron for advice about lemon 

TW: -

Alison.

I know you’re spending the night Christmas Eve, so we can do Christmas morning together. Do you want to stay for Christmas dinner? Or are you heading to your moms?

Aaron.

maybe I’ll ask my mom and Ireland to your place?

by the way. Eden and Ronnie are staying with me for a bit. Just so you know who’s here when Des is here. Ronnie’s apartment was broken into and Eden needs some space from her boyfriend

Alison.

yes, that’s fine with me! I’d love to have them here.

I love Eden and Ronnie. Thanks for letting me know though. Are they both doing okay?

Aaron.

Ronnie is shaken up and Eden is just stressed. I think it’s good for them to be together though lol they’re something else when they’re together

Alison.

Well they are lucky to have you helping them out

Aaron.

also

I have another thing to tell you

like get off my chest

don’t judge me plz

Alison.

oh boy

go for it

Aaron.

so I um

remember when I told you about Quentin and how I wanted him to meet Des and you told me to figure out how I feel about him

well

it unfortunately hit me up side the head after the holiday party. I know he’s in love with me and I’m pretty sure I’m in love with him. Thing is...last night I took him out for his birthday at throuple. Some of our friends were there including Roman and I snuck off to get drunk and flirt with Roman AT Q’S BDAY PARTY. And I feel soooo terrible about it

Alison.

*ugh emoji*

if you’re in love with him, do you want it to turn into something,

Aaron.

hey I told you you couldn’t judge me

I’m not sure.

no I like being single

Alison.

I’m not judging

How do you love someone and not want to do something about it?

Aaron.

a lot of reasons

I love my freedom and being single

and I don’t want to hurt him. I think it might be better for us to just stay the way we are and not put any restrictive label on it

Alison.

I don’t know. If I loved someone, i think it’d probably hurt more to not be together.

but it’s a relationship between you guys, you know what’s best for your two

Aaron.

i don’t know. But I haven’t exactly told him how I feel

and at the holiday party...we were getting really intimate. Like. We’ve had sex before obviously but it felt so much more intense this time

and then I pushed him off of me like a dick because I couldn’t handle it

Alison.

are you going to tell him how you feel?

Yikes...that’s tough. Have you been intimate with him since?

Aaron.

if you count drunk sex as intimacy then yes

and no. i mean...i dont know...if i do things will change with us

Alison.

I feel like things are going to change either way

Aaron.

explaiiinnn

Alison.

with what happened at the holiday party, I feel like that could happen again. If you love him, sex is going to be intense and what if you just can’t have sex with him anymore?  Maybe if your feelings are out there it will make things easier

Aaron.

i cant imagine a world where i can't have sex with him lmao

Alison.

well it’s happened once before, it could just get more intense

Aaron.

https://media.tenor.co/videos/0d5495d03063a544f7f621e8c6a978e6/mp4

Alison. 

just trying to be honest with you

Aaron.

i know

thats why im coming to you with this

Alison.

ultimately it’s your decision, I just feel like if your feelings are on the table it might be better.

Aaron.

im afraid of admitting that to him though

Alison.

are you afraid of it destroying everything? Or afraid of what might come of it?

Aaron.

both

Alison.

I think you should think about it. Like truly think about it. Telling him might have a better outcome than you think it will

Aaron.

ugh okay i hear you

doesnt mean im gonan do it though

Alison.

at least think about it

Aaron.

i hear you, respectfully disagree, but hear you

loll

Alison.

you were scared to start a relationship with Eden when that started up, and that went well. So just remember, relationships aren’t terrible.

Aaron.

it went well bc we acted more like best friends than lovers

Alison.

think about it

Aaron.B

but you're right it wasn't a terrible relationship

okay

ellie is gonna take Des to piano today btw. am i picking her up or are you

Alison.

I can pick her up

also can we talk about that weather on Sunday? Did you know it was supposed to snow?

Aaron.

no clue

hope you stayed warm lmfao

Alison.

I did

I was not expecting to be locked in all day on my birthday though

Aaron.

yeah but im sure you loved an excuse to stay in

im just glad the babysitter was able to keep Des for longer

Alison.

It was a nice day for sure. Best birthday I’ve had in a while

I thought the same thing about the twins. I was stresssing over the thought of the nanny bringing them home in the storm

Aaron.

im glad they're okay

were you alone....or

Alison.

no I wasn’t alone

Aaron.

explainnn

Alison.

Lemon wanted to walk me home from the party, and when we got back I invited him up for coffee and we just talked.....and talked and talked. Next thing I knew it was morning and we were snowed in together

Aaron.

ya'll had cofffffeeeeeeee after a party at a bar?? lmao

Alison.

yes yes we did

no judgement Aaron

Aaron.

hey.

No judgement

just a questionnnnnn

Alison.

it was a great cup of coffee

but speaking about lemon, I need your advice on something

Aaron.

hahaha okay hit me!!

Alison.

1. Do you think I should make a move and ask him to maybe be official? Or should I wait to see if he makes that move?

2. I should keep Christmas gifts for him not too crazy, right? You know I love to spoil people at Christmas

Aaron.

you just met this man like two weeks ago. Less than that. Are you sure you’ve gotten to know him well enough to make it official? What if hes like a murdered or something?

definitely don’t make it crazy. Especially since you’re well off and he’s not. But you could probably buy him some nice things!!

Alison.BOTToday at 3:00 PM

Has it really only been a couple weeks? It feels like it has been longer than that. I can’t explain it Aaron, but something feels right about him. Like, there is something there that I didn’t even feel with the twins father. I know it’s fast, but I just have these feelings that I know I won’t be able to shake anytime soon. Also, he’s too sweet to be a murderer so I’ve ruled that option out. Plus, the world already thinks we’re together, someone shared a photo online of us kissing at the holiday party and paps caught lemon coming into my pent that night

I’m struggling to come up with good ideas for him. I’ve written something for him, and he was telling me about this flower from his native island,  I was thinking about doing research and trying to get him some of those flowers. Is that weird? It’s probably weird.

I don’t want to weird him out

Aaron.

okay well you can't really fairly compare him to the twins' father. he sucks. for like 2345 different reasons. so that not really a great comparison. the pap photos don't surprise me though. have u talked to him about that? like...ngl getting papped for being alison haynes' life takes a lot of getting used to. even for me, and i already had some exposure with rich kids. what did you write for him???? i wanna hear. i think the song and the flower would suffice as a christmas gift, especially considering he might make something for you too ya know?? the flower thing isnt weird, it's really really thoughtful.

Alison.

but I didn’t think he was a tool when I dated him. I thought he was the person I’d spend my entire life with. We all know the truth behind him now. But there is just something I feel for Lemon that I need to explore. We talked a little bit about it at the holiday party after he kissed me, but I did text him today about all of it. Because we’re trending on Twitter. I told him I’d make a public statement and shut it down if that is what he wants. But I’m waiting to hear back from him. I really hope it doesn’t scare him off, but I do know we need to talk about it because it is a lot. I haven’t recorded it yet, but I’ll play it for you next time I see you. You think so? I just don’t want to seem weird.

Aaron.

i think you need to see how he feels about that honestly...because that could be a big thing for him. especially since he grew up so modestly...hes so not used to that

the flower is probably way more thoughtful of a gift that i would ever think of

Alison.

I know. Of course I am going to talk to him about it before I do anything crazy. I'm just nervous it's too much, its too much for a lot of people.

Aaron.

it is, yeah. but i really hope it works out

im gonna have to have a stern talking to him though

Alison.

i do too

oh boy, not the big bad aaron stern talk

Aaron.

tell him to be afraid lmao

Alison.

i'll warn him

[drivelikeaminister]

Partnership with Disagreement

As part of my ministry, I am a board member for an international church partnership organization.  The organization I serve helps promote relationships between congregations and individuals spanning geography.  I specifically have experience in traveling to and having deep friendships with Unitarians in Transylvania and Hungary.  My faith, Unitarian Universalism, has its roots in Transylvania and the ethnic Hungarians who live there.  The fact that our religions have the same history does not, however, mean that they are the same faith.  Unitarian Universalists in the United States and Unitarians in Transylvania and and Hungary are each the product of our cultures and our own unique history and experiences.  There is much we have in common, and there is much we don’t agree on.

The goal of partnerships then, is not to come to agreement on everything.  The goal is to create and foster relationships - both institutional and personal - so that we might all grow in our faith, while supporting and learning from each other.  I give this background because my thoughts on our international relationship have been troubled recently.

A few weeks ago the Hungarian Unitarian Church (HUC) - the body which oversees Unitarian congregations in Hungary and Transylvania - issued a formal statement that defines marriage as a relationship restricted to a man and a woman.  This definition of marriage is in stark contrast to the Unitarian Universalist view, that “We respect the worth and dignity of every person, and that applies equally to people of all sexual orientations and gender identities.”

Here is the full text of a letter sent out to the global community about this decision: link

The reason I am reflecting on the HUC’s decision here is that it has been on my mind.  I feel hurt, betrayed, angry and confused.  And I think that my experience - and my religion’s experience - is one which is shared by many, although around different issues.  We all have disagreements in our relationships.  And we are all faced with the broad question: What does a relationship look like with disagreements?  In this specific case, the relationship is between both institutes and individuals.  And the disagreement is one which feels very hurtful, disrespectful and brings up concerns of safety and welcome.

I don’t want to diminish the specific concerns and feelings coming out of my faith.  But I want to address that larger question: What do we do in a relationship when there are disagreements?  And there will be disagreements.  In a marriage, between colleagues, friends, family members, coworkers, classmates... because we are all individuals, we will have different views on things.  Some of those differences will be small and some will be enormous.  As we are all in relationships all of our lives, be them individual, corporate or a mix, and as we will all come up with times we disagree... we all need to think about what to do when those disagreements crop up.

One possible way to respond is to ignore the disagreement.  For small issues that have no deep bearing this may make sense.  Maybe your classmate likes blue pens and you prefer black.  Nothing to even really discuss, although an interesting difference to note.  For my global partners, this might be the fact that social hour after church service in Transylvania generally includes more sweets than in the US.  Small enough that it doesn’t require conversation.  As we can imagine, an approach of ignoring isn’t healthy when the differences get larger, as discord can easily settle in and grow when we aren’t talking.

A second approach - at the other extreme - is to disengage and end the relationship.  We can’t ignore it, we can’t work through it, so we end our relationship.  Divorce is what this looks like in marital relations, there is some difference or differences so deep that it is better for us if we end the relationship.  The recent decision of the Hungarian Unitarian Church may have this outcome with some North American partners, that the divide is so great that the relationship must end.  Ending a relationship is a drastic measure, and involves much pain.  But this can be the best response at times when the divide is deep enough that a relationship is impossible.

A third way is one which spans the large spectrum between ignoring the difference to breaking the relationship.  This is the difficult task of recommitting to the partnership, staying in relationship and talking through disagreement(s).  The key is that the relationship and the care of each other is larger than the differences.  When couples decide to live together but find they have different eating habits, or different ideas of cleanliness... this is when the commitment to the relationship is (hopefully) more important than a possible dispute.  In Transylvanian and Hungarian Unitarianism the theology holds that God exists and Jesus was a prophet.  This is a pretty big difference to North American Unitarian Universalism, which holds that there are many paths to truth and doesn’t make a statement for or against existence of God.  Even though this is an enormous difference in belief, it is not one which precludes a relationship.  As the differences are more deeply ingrained and repercussions more personal and sensitive, the conversations get more difficult and the commitment to the relationship must be stronger.

So the question for my siblings in faith, the question for all of us when we encounter different views than ours... Can our commitment to a relationship be strong enough to walk together with our disagreements?  I sincerely hope that it can.