Coda on blog weirdness

"I think that the protocols of disagreement, how do we disagree and press our ideas, even press our ideas powerfully and yet not turn opposition into enmity...We need to find a way to struggle with one another and not make enemies of one another...what's so bad about the sell-out indictment, it alienates people who might otherwise be allies.  And that's yet another bad feature of the sell-out indictment.  You and I could argue strenuously and after a period of time could say 'let's carry our argument out over dinner' but if during our argument you called me a sell-out we're not going to go to dinner.  In fact, we're probably not going to talk anymore. Because even entering into a disagreement requires a certain level of trust and if you use that language of sell-out you destroy the basis of any trust." (Randall Kennedy on NPR's Talk of the Nation 7 Feb 2008)

When I heard this quote, I had an epiphany.  First, some backfill.  About a week after I posted on my Dreaded Memes blog about leaving BF.com one woman posted something rather, let us say harsh.  The original post was:

Well, well, well. Things sure do look different when the shoe is on the
other foot. I personally saw you sit silently by when another woman of
color was blatantly bashed. And no, it wasn't me, though I am a Black
woman. Don't think the other WOC don't notice your double standards.
You disavow other POC because they don't share your perspective or
privilege. That woman's comments to you were not racist and shame on
you for casting them as such. By the way, I've yet to see you admit
when you are wrong. It's too bad because your general assessment of BF
is accurate, it's just that you only seem to see it when it applies to
you.

Now, I had left BF.com but still had an account there.  If this woman had wanted to say something to me, she could have done so privately either there or sent me an email since there is an email link on this blog.  But she posted it as a comment (and I pulled it and my responses down).  It was meant to a bit of schaudenfreude in my own house, if you will.  I reacted.  I didn't think, I just reacted and for perhaps a day or so, got pulled into the very kind of discussion I dislike where it is about the person and not the ideas.  I try to step back and really think things through so responding like this was somewhat out of character, certainly how I interact online.  But listening to Randall Kennedy discuss his book, Sell Out, I realize why this whole thing bothered me so deeply and profoundly. This was an attack that was meant to hurt.  This wasn't about sisterhood or anything noble.  This was just trying to get a dig in because there was a dig to be had.  Thus the necessity of doing so publicly and playing the cheeky game of not even telling me which incident (this woman had an incident in mind) she was talking about.  It was about shaming, not dialog.  And my reaction to this and subsequent posts, which I will spare you reading, makes a lot more sense to me.

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