I just meant to use the same language as the OP, but that is a reasonable point. If someone writes a more polished guide for this kind of thing, different wording could be used.
I think parts of this could be turned into a list of general advice for people who initiate romantic/sexual relationships. And then there could be a sublist within that for people who think they may have caused harm. Does that sound better? (Glad to hear other feedback on this!)
I think you explained this really well! Thanks for writing this.
I agree: Detailed feedback from survivors is not the only way for perpetrators to improve their behavior. (I think this also applies more broadly with social skills; direct feedback from people you've hurt is definitely not the only way to get better.)
You already provided some good ideas in your post, but here are more ideas on how non-survivors can improve the situation.
Here are things that perpetrators could do besides soliciting direct feedback from those they’ve harmed:
These ideas could also be helpful for people who are concerned they’ve caused harm but aren’t sure of it. Or for people who are concerned they might cause harm.
Here’s an anecdote: I’m female and I used to organize local EA events. One time, one of my attendees made a weird flirty comment towards me, and it seemed suspicious, but not that bad on its own. But it inspired me to contact CEA about this attendee. I heard other (worse!) reports about him. So I banned him.
Oftentimes, when I’ve gotten sketchy vibes from a guy, later info has revealed that he treats women poorly. Sketchy vibes aren’t sufficient for a ban, but they are a good indication that you should pay attention and ask around.
I agree with this post. Given that we react more leniently towards selfish behavior when people appear to have good intentions, it seems clear to me that we are incentivizing everyone to convince themselves that they really do have good intentions. Regardless of whether they’re actually doing morally good behavior.
I don’t think this is isolated to “having good intentions.” I think it affects many other internal states and ways-of-seeing-oneself. e.g. If we give people more slack for missing deadlines when they have ADHD, that incentivizes people to convince themselves they have ADHD (whether or not they truly meet the criteria). If we give people whatever they want when they throw a tantrum, that incentivizes them to avoid learning how to regulate their emotions.
(Of course, all of these examples involve trade-offs, and the answer isn’t clearly “stop giving any special treatment towards people who have some sympathetic internal state.”)
There’s a related concept in medicine called “secondary gain.” Basically, a patient may be subconsciously motivated to stay sick because their illness resulted in some indirect benefit, e.g. their spouse started helping more with housework.
This idea has been called the Petrie multiplier. I agree that this probably makes things worse for women in EA.
Thanks for sharing. It’s interesting to hear about this from the perspective of someone in this community. I’d be happy to see more posts like this on EA forum.
This was the most interesting part to me:
This is kind of relatable. My own past abuse — and the effects it has had on me — both do not fit existing narratives very well at all. People (including therapists) don’t seem to get it, and that makes it harder to figure things out and make progress.