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We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice
Cancel culture addresses real harm...and sometimes causes more. It’s time to think this through.
“Cancel” or “call-out” culture is a source of much tension and debate in American society. The infamous "Harper’s Letter,” signed by public intellectuals of both the left and right, sought to settle the matter and only caused greater division. Originating as a way for marginalized and disempowered people to address harm and take down powerful abusers, often with the help of social media, call outs are seen by some as having gone too far. But what is “too far” when you’re talking about imbalances of power and patterns of harm? And what happens when people in social justice movements direct their righteous anger inward at one another?
In We Will Not Cancel Us, movement mediator Adrienne Maree Brown reframes the discussion for us, in a way that points to possible paths beyond this impasse. Most critiques of cancel culture come from outside the milieus that produce it, sometimes even from from its targets. However, Brown explores the question from a Black, queer, and feminist viewpoint that gently asks, how well does this practice serve us? Does it prefigure the sort of world we want to live in? And, if it doesn’t, how do we seek accountability and redress for harm in ways that reflect our values?
“Cancel” or “call-out” culture is a source of much tension and debate in American society. The infamous "Harper’s Letter,” signed by public intellectuals of both the left and right, sought to settle the matter and only caused greater division. Originating as a way for marginalized and disempowered people to address harm and take down powerful abusers, often with the help of social media, call outs are seen by some as having gone too far. But what is “too far” when you’re talking about imbalances of power and patterns of harm? And what happens when people in social justice movements direct their righteous anger inward at one another?
In We Will Not Cancel Us, movement mediator Adrienne Maree Brown reframes the discussion for us, in a way that points to possible paths beyond this impasse. Most critiques of cancel culture come from outside the milieus that produce it, sometimes even from from its targets. However, Brown explores the question from a Black, queer, and feminist viewpoint that gently asks, how well does this practice serve us? Does it prefigure the sort of world we want to live in? And, if it doesn’t, how do we seek accountability and redress for harm in ways that reflect our values?
88 pages, Paperback
First published November 17, 2020
361 people are currently reading
11162 people want to read
About the author
Adrienne Maree Brown
29 books2,659 followersadrienne maree brown is the author of Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good, Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds and the co-editor of Octavia’s Brood: Science Fiction from Social Justice Movements. She is the cohost of the How to Survive the End of the World and Octavia’s Parables podcasts. adrienne is rooted in Detroit.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 381 reviews
October 6, 2020
What can this lead to in an imperfect world full of sloppy, complex humans? Is it possible we will call each other out until there's no one left beside us?
This little book felt like a healing balm. I hope so very much that others will listen to Brown, even if they don't necessarily agree with her beliefs on everything.
What I like most about Adrienne Maree Brown is her love and empathy for other humans, and it comes across in everything she writes and does. Here, she asks us to question what we are really achieving when we "cancel" a person, especially when we do it quickly, gleefully, without asking any questions. She points out the contradiction between activists fighting to abolish or reform the way we punish criminals in society, while simultaneously dealing out unquestioned, unrestrained public shamings online.
often things are turned into public campaigns of shaming and humiliation before it is even clear if the thing is a misunderstanding, mistake, contradiction, conflict, harm, or abuse.
Many of her observations here are a huge part of the reason I have been drifting away from social media and Goodreads over the last couple of years. I've gotten so tired of it, guys. So tired of this wonderful open-minded liberal pro-LGBTQ+ pro-BLM community just fucking eating itself over a desire to be perceived as the most moral. Salivating with excitement over the latest call-out, often of queer bloggers, or those of colour. Performing for a crowd, basking in the shares and likes as we take down a fellow blogger or reviewer.
Is it improving our lives? Is it making us happy? I truly wonder.
Brown is not the first person to critique cancel culture, but her perspective on this is especially important because it comes from a "Black biracial queer fat survivor". She understands the necessity of call-outs. She acknowledges the importance of using your voice online to hold someone accountable when society's justice has failed you. BUT.
I have felt us losing our capacity to distinguish between comrade and opponent, losing our capacity to generate belonging.
***
Right now, call outs are being used not just as a necessary consequence for those wielding power to cause harm or enact abuse, but to shame and humiliate people in the wake of misunderstandings, contradictions, conflicts, and mistakes.
Brown wonders, as do I, why we seem to be enjoying it so much. When it gets to a stage where we are reveling in a takedown, enjoying seeing another person humiliated, are we really in the right? She spoke with many people who admitted they avoid speaking up or defending someone out of an unspoken fear: "when will y'all come for me?" And nobody should be afraid of speaking up for what's right, or asking questions, out of fear for themselves. That's not liberation.
Who knows if Brown's words will penetrate the din? I hope so, but for now it was enough to hear such a prominent amazing black woman echo some of the thoughts giving me anxiety each day, in a far more eloquent way, of course.
January 8, 2021
I appreciate the author's stated intention to work through and reflect on criticisms from survivors of abuse that came in response to the essay as it was initially posted in July; I won't rehash those criticisms here. However, the rush to publish without taking time to deeply consider and incorporate those criticisms made this book unhelpful at best and actively harmful at worst. Including lines like "I am not speaking of survivors naming their abusers" isn't the same as integrating our experiences into the analysis, and if anything, it created many new contradictions in the book. The use of "we" ("we are afraid and we think it will assuage our fears," "we love obsessing over and punishing villains" -- we who?) leads to many projections and assumptions about the experiences and goals of survivors and others who have used callouts to organize for accountability.
One of the most triggering parts of this book is when the author compares those who use callouts as a strategy to organize for accountability to COINTELPRO. This is particularly painful when reflecting on the fact that multiple leftist organizations doxxed survivors this year in retaliation. Doxxing organizers feeds the state and harms our movements, and it seems worthy of condemnation and more comparable to COINTELPRO than people speaking about their experiences of abuse. And yet survivors' organizing work toward building safer, more accountable movement spaces is not seen as valuable and impactful. Instead, the same trope ("but they do good work!") is used to excuse patterns of oppressive behaviors by organizers with large platforms and more established organizations. The book contains no specific examples of situations that escalated to callouts and demonstrates no curiosity about the reasons why or the outcomes sought.
For survivors who might stumble upon this review: There are many resources that I found helpful in navigating healing, safety and accountability after abuse. Some are anarchist zines like "What about the rapists?" and "Betrayal." I also worked with comrades to create the zine "Learning to Exhale." All of these zines are available for free online. Some books that I found helpful are: The Revolution Starts at Home and Beyond Survival -- both anthologies that gather different experiences, strategies, reflections, and considerations in navigating interpersonal violence in organizing spaces. For more resources specifically about finding our own agency, which comes up as a theme throughout this book, I recommend Shannon Perez Darby's work and writing on self-accountability.
One of the most triggering parts of this book is when the author compares those who use callouts as a strategy to organize for accountability to COINTELPRO. This is particularly painful when reflecting on the fact that multiple leftist organizations doxxed survivors this year in retaliation. Doxxing organizers feeds the state and harms our movements, and it seems worthy of condemnation and more comparable to COINTELPRO than people speaking about their experiences of abuse. And yet survivors' organizing work toward building safer, more accountable movement spaces is not seen as valuable and impactful. Instead, the same trope ("but they do good work!") is used to excuse patterns of oppressive behaviors by organizers with large platforms and more established organizations. The book contains no specific examples of situations that escalated to callouts and demonstrates no curiosity about the reasons why or the outcomes sought.
For survivors who might stumble upon this review: There are many resources that I found helpful in navigating healing, safety and accountability after abuse. Some are anarchist zines like "What about the rapists?" and "Betrayal." I also worked with comrades to create the zine "Learning to Exhale." All of these zines are available for free online. Some books that I found helpful are: The Revolution Starts at Home and Beyond Survival -- both anthologies that gather different experiences, strategies, reflections, and considerations in navigating interpersonal violence in organizing spaces. For more resources specifically about finding our own agency, which comes up as a theme throughout this book, I recommend Shannon Perez Darby's work and writing on self-accountability.
November 13, 2024
‘Can we release our binary ways of thinking of good and bad in order to collectively grow from mistakes?’
For those who strive for a more just society, the move away from punitive retribution towards restorative and transformative justice is often a major talking point. ‘How can we meet and respond to harm, redesign consequence, move away from punitiveness, and engage in a practice that does not perpetuate harm?’ adrienne maree brown asks us in her brief book We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice. A Detroit-based social justice facilitator and doula centering on Black liberation, brown offers thoughts and self-reflections on the ways she feels social media fosters a sense of callout actions that perpetuates capitalist beliefs around people as disposable and centers retribution over healing and transformative justice. Having responded to criticisms of her own works, she also seeks to address her own mistakes as an opportunity for us all to learn and grow in order to push towards a more just society. It is a brief book and imperfect, but imperfection is an aspect it focuses on as opportunities for learning and We Will Not Cancel Us has a wealth of ideas to consider and hopefully better inform our actions as we try to discuss, disagree and operate within fraught political landscapes and online communities.
‘How do we, in movements, become responsible for each other, accountable to a vision beyond the carceral system that will only come to pass if we practice it in the present?’
In July of 2020, adrienne maree brown published the essay unthinkable thoughts: call out culture in the age of covid-19 (you can read it in full
HERE) discussing her thoughts on social media pushing abolitionist spaces towards harmful acts and viewing many of the ‘feeding frenzies’—as she terms it—of callouts that she finds unproductive in terms of actual transformative justice. She also discusses moving away from binaries of good and bad to move forward as a more just society where we as communities are more discerning in movement conflict as institutions are threatened and crumbling. The article, however, found most of its criticisms from those also working within abolition and justice theories. We Will Not Cancel Us is brown’s attempts to learn from the criticisms, which she responds to in order to better address her ideas and hopefully set things right.
She discusses being clearer in distinctions between harm and abuse, the necessity of applying content and trigger warnings, but mainly to be more accountable and productive with language and metaphor. Criticisms of this book, however, have pointed out that the use of cancer as a metaphor for callouts may be a misstep. ‘If you believe — as I do — that no one is disposable, then we have to ask ourselves questions when we feel tempted to dispose of others,’ brown said in an interview with Shondaland
‘I don't want to feel too scared to learn in public,’ she adds, and what makes this book an important read is not only the reminder that we are all learning and—if we wish to move towards a more just world—should help facilitate space for others to learn from mistakes, but also that we, too can make mistakes and would want the grace to learn from them without being shunned forever and uses this book as an example of taking the time to learn, grow and respond productively. As she told Shondaland:
Within the book, brown writes that ‘we are fearful of taking the time to be discerning, because then we may have to recognize that we aren’t as skilled at conflict as we want and need to be, and/or that any of us could be seen as harm-doers,’ and much of her work centers moving from responding to life from a space of fear to one of love.
‘What can this lead to in an imperfect world full of sloppy, complex humans? Is it possible we will call each other out until there's no one left beside us?’
We Will Not Cancel Us is a bit introduction heavy but the heart of the book is about looking at better ways to productive address harm, abuse, and conduct ourselves as communities. She notes that ‘often things are turned into public campaigns of shaming and humiliation before it is even clear if the thing is a misunderstanding, mistake, contradiction, conflict, harm, or abuse,’ and how this becomes more of a spectacle than an actual aim at mitigating harm and applying justice. ‘Which isn’t to say that a public accounting of harm, and consequences, isn’t necessarily the correct move,’ she adds, citing cases of sexual violence and abuse as times where ‘the callout can be the only move that stops the immediate harm without engaging the state.’ This last aspect, about not engaging the State, is a large part of abolitionist practice, something Mariame Kaba discusses at length in the book We Do This 'til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice. Transformative justice as described by Kaba as well as abolitionists like Angela Y. Davis—her book Are Prisons Obsolete? is a cornerstone of abolition texts—involves community healing and opportunities for growth and redemption instead of incarceration and retribution that is done in ways that give the carceral State power over the bodies and futures of people.
‘How do I hold a systemic analysis and approach when each system I am critical of is peopled, in part, by the same flawed and complex individuals that I love?’
Abolition theorist Ruth Wilson Gilmore wrote that ‘abolition is about presence, not absence, it’s about building life-affirming institutions,’ and as brown writes, we should be looking to build communities that have a presence towards justice and not retribution. A big part of this is releasing ourself from ideas of people being either good or bad. This idea has long been a part of Hanif Abdurraqib’s ideas in his own writing, such as when he says ‘I have not always been good, but I have always been worthy of living and fighting to become better.’ Abolition and transformative justice is about holding that space to become better because we all deserve that chance. ‘We’re all connected in a network of human relationships all the time which sustain us,’ author Sally Rooney says in her interview with Louisiana Channel, and she discusses how the capitalist idea of applying value like good or bad or better or worse is at the heart of human suffering and that we should be looking to support each other as community instead of isolate from each other. These are central ideas here as well and brown offers three major practices to better conduct life in movements in community:
Listening with why as a framework to better understand and give space for growth instead of demonizing.
Asking ourselves “what can we learn from this?”
Asking ‘How can my real-time actions contribute to transforming this situation (versus making it worse)?’
The biggest aspect though, is that we should be supporting survivors and centering victims. This is an aspect I wish the book took more time to discuss but it is certainly a major aspect informing the discussions:
I do appreciate how she discusses looking towards approaching issues by ensuring the safety and needs of the victims and survivors are centered, but also by asking if a conversation or process is already happening, if callout will end a cycle of harm or offer a way forward or will be merely performative, or if accountability is already being taken. There’s a lot of good thoughts here, though I’d recommend reading the more critical reviews as well because reviewers have done an excellent job engaging with this text that will be more useful than I have.
‘Destroying a person doesn’t destroy all of the systems that allow harmful people to do harm.’
While this is not a perfect book, it is an excellent source of ideas to consider while we all work on ourselves to bring abolitionist practices into our lives and communities. We Will Not Cancel Us is small and does have some issues with language that have rightfully been critiqued, even after having been in conversations about that very issue, but the efforts towards doing better are felt and appreciated. A quick read, but one that will hopefully stick with you.
3.5/5
‘Movements tend to become the practice ground for what we are healing towards, co-creating. Movements are responsible for embodying what we are inviting our people into. We need the people within our movements, all socialized into and by unjust systems, to be on liberators paths. Not already free, but practicing freedom every day. Not already beyond harm, but accountable for doing our individual and internal work to end harm and engage in generative conflict, which includes actively working to gain awareness of the ways we can and have harmed each other, where we have significant political differences, and where we can end cycles of harm and unprincipled struggles in ourselves and our communities.’
For those who strive for a more just society, the move away from punitive retribution towards restorative and transformative justice is often a major talking point. ‘How can we meet and respond to harm, redesign consequence, move away from punitiveness, and engage in a practice that does not perpetuate harm?’ adrienne maree brown asks us in her brief book We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice. A Detroit-based social justice facilitator and doula centering on Black liberation, brown offers thoughts and self-reflections on the ways she feels social media fosters a sense of callout actions that perpetuates capitalist beliefs around people as disposable and centers retribution over healing and transformative justice. Having responded to criticisms of her own works, she also seeks to address her own mistakes as an opportunity for us all to learn and grow in order to push towards a more just society. It is a brief book and imperfect, but imperfection is an aspect it focuses on as opportunities for learning and We Will Not Cancel Us has a wealth of ideas to consider and hopefully better inform our actions as we try to discuss, disagree and operate within fraught political landscapes and online communities.
‘How do we, in movements, become responsible for each other, accountable to a vision beyond the carceral system that will only come to pass if we practice it in the present?’
In July of 2020, adrienne maree brown published the essay unthinkable thoughts: call out culture in the age of covid-19 (you can read it in full
HERE) discussing her thoughts on social media pushing abolitionist spaces towards harmful acts and viewing many of the ‘feeding frenzies’—as she terms it—of callouts that she finds unproductive in terms of actual transformative justice. She also discusses moving away from binaries of good and bad to move forward as a more just society where we as communities are more discerning in movement conflict as institutions are threatened and crumbling. The article, however, found most of its criticisms from those also working within abolition and justice theories. We Will Not Cancel Us is brown’s attempts to learn from the criticisms, which she responds to in order to better address her ideas and hopefully set things right.
‘If I can see the ways I am perpetuating systemic oppressions, if I can see where I learned the behavior and how hard it is to unlearn it, I start to have more humility as I see the messiness of the communities I am part of, the world I live in.’
She discusses being clearer in distinctions between harm and abuse, the necessity of applying content and trigger warnings, but mainly to be more accountable and productive with language and metaphor. Criticisms of this book, however, have pointed out that the use of cancer as a metaphor for callouts may be a misstep. ‘If you believe — as I do — that no one is disposable, then we have to ask ourselves questions when we feel tempted to dispose of others,’ brown said in an interview with Shondaland
‘I don't want to feel too scared to learn in public,’ she adds, and what makes this book an important read is not only the reminder that we are all learning and—if we wish to move towards a more just world—should help facilitate space for others to learn from mistakes, but also that we, too can make mistakes and would want the grace to learn from them without being shunned forever and uses this book as an example of taking the time to learn, grow and respond productively. As she told Shondaland:
‘I want people to see that even if you put someone on a pedestal, that person is still a student of how to be a good human, and is still trying to figure it out. I know I'm a person who can cause harm. If I accept that, if I harness that, if I turn and look at my shadows, that I can be someone who's like a fully integrated human being. Not a perfect human being, but I can be accountable for harm that I've caused because I accept that it's possible for me to cause harm.’
Within the book, brown writes that ‘we are fearful of taking the time to be discerning, because then we may have to recognize that we aren’t as skilled at conflict as we want and need to be, and/or that any of us could be seen as harm-doers,’ and much of her work centers moving from responding to life from a space of fear to one of love.
‘What can this lead to in an imperfect world full of sloppy, complex humans? Is it possible we will call each other out until there's no one left beside us?’
We Will Not Cancel Us is a bit introduction heavy but the heart of the book is about looking at better ways to productive address harm, abuse, and conduct ourselves as communities. She notes that ‘often things are turned into public campaigns of shaming and humiliation before it is even clear if the thing is a misunderstanding, mistake, contradiction, conflict, harm, or abuse,’ and how this becomes more of a spectacle than an actual aim at mitigating harm and applying justice. ‘Which isn’t to say that a public accounting of harm, and consequences, isn’t necessarily the correct move,’ she adds, citing cases of sexual violence and abuse as times where ‘the callout can be the only move that stops the immediate harm without engaging the state.’ This last aspect, about not engaging the State, is a large part of abolitionist practice, something Mariame Kaba discusses at length in the book We Do This 'til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice. Transformative justice as described by Kaba as well as abolitionists like Angela Y. Davis—her book Are Prisons Obsolete? is a cornerstone of abolition texts—involves community healing and opportunities for growth and redemption instead of incarceration and retribution that is done in ways that give the carceral State power over the bodies and futures of people.
‘How do I hold a systemic analysis and approach when each system I am critical of is peopled, in part, by the same flawed and complex individuals that I love?’
Abolition theorist Ruth Wilson Gilmore wrote that ‘abolition is about presence, not absence, it’s about building life-affirming institutions,’ and as brown writes, we should be looking to build communities that have a presence towards justice and not retribution. A big part of this is releasing ourself from ideas of people being either good or bad. This idea has long been a part of Hanif Abdurraqib’s ideas in his own writing, such as when he says ‘I have not always been good, but I have always been worthy of living and fighting to become better.’ Abolition and transformative justice is about holding that space to become better because we all deserve that chance. ‘We’re all connected in a network of human relationships all the time which sustain us,’ author Sally Rooney says in her interview with Louisiana Channel, and she discusses how the capitalist idea of applying value like good or bad or better or worse is at the heart of human suffering and that we should be looking to support each other as community instead of isolate from each other. These are central ideas here as well and brown offers three major practices to better conduct life in movements in community:
Listening with why as a framework to better understand and give space for growth instead of demonizing.
Asking ourselves “what can we learn from this?”
Asking ‘How can my real-time actions contribute to transforming this situation (versus making it worse)?’
The biggest aspect though, is that we should be supporting survivors and centering victims. This is an aspect I wish the book took more time to discuss but it is certainly a major aspect informing the discussions:
‘We end up putting more of our collective attention on punishing those accused of causing harm than supporting and centering the healing of survivors, and/or building pathways for those who are in cycles of causing harm to change’
I do appreciate how she discusses looking towards approaching issues by ensuring the safety and needs of the victims and survivors are centered, but also by asking if a conversation or process is already happening, if callout will end a cycle of harm or offer a way forward or will be merely performative, or if accountability is already being taken. There’s a lot of good thoughts here, though I’d recommend reading the more critical reviews as well because reviewers have done an excellent job engaging with this text that will be more useful than I have.
‘Destroying a person doesn’t destroy all of the systems that allow harmful people to do harm.’
While this is not a perfect book, it is an excellent source of ideas to consider while we all work on ourselves to bring abolitionist practices into our lives and communities. We Will Not Cancel Us is small and does have some issues with language that have rightfully been critiqued, even after having been in conversations about that very issue, but the efforts towards doing better are felt and appreciated. A quick read, but one that will hopefully stick with you.
3.5/5
‘Movements tend to become the practice ground for what we are healing towards, co-creating. Movements are responsible for embodying what we are inviting our people into. We need the people within our movements, all socialized into and by unjust systems, to be on liberators paths. Not already free, but practicing freedom every day. Not already beyond harm, but accountable for doing our individual and internal work to end harm and engage in generative conflict, which includes actively working to gain awareness of the ways we can and have harmed each other, where we have significant political differences, and where we can end cycles of harm and unprincipled struggles in ourselves and our communities.’
March 8, 2021
I decided to read this book finally so I could really see if my thoughts aligned with AMB. I feel conflicted because I do think we are experiencing a crisis on the left with how we handle conflict. I don’t see callouts as inherently bad or good, I see them as a strategy that organizers and oppressed people use to get them closer to their goals. But I also can’t lie and say when I see a callout my first worry is, will I be next? I think that has to deal with being part of a harassment campaign this summer that was framed as a “callout” by a stranger online. Anyways I have a lot to think about in regards to this book, and I don’t think it was poorly written. The reason I’m giving it three stars is because I’m confused as to why this is a book.
The bulk of the “book” is the ending written by another person, an intro, than an intro to an okay-ish essay filled with a lot of disclaimers. The book doesn’t define terms like transformative justice for the reader or make the connection between TJ and abolition. This is an easy connection for me to make, but not for others. Also there isn’t really an explanation for how RJ is not TJ which I think is what leads to watering down these movements. For most people new to this work they will have no idea what is being discussed within this book. I also didn’t like the analogies to disability, “x is like a cancer” “y is like a disease.” And I’m troubled by people throwing around capitalism without it meaning anything for example what does it mean to acknowledge the horrors of the US and capitalism then provide trainings to people within the Obama foundation?
This book is basically like “I’m worried about callouts, but not with instances of actual abuse.” “Damn.” What happens next? AMB admits she doesn’t have all the answers which is fine, but again why wasn’t this a series on a blog instead of a book/booklet?
I have more to think through and will as I research for my book and talk to other abolitionist survivors but for right now it’s 3 stars.
The bulk of the “book” is the ending written by another person, an intro, than an intro to an okay-ish essay filled with a lot of disclaimers. The book doesn’t define terms like transformative justice for the reader or make the connection between TJ and abolition. This is an easy connection for me to make, but not for others. Also there isn’t really an explanation for how RJ is not TJ which I think is what leads to watering down these movements. For most people new to this work they will have no idea what is being discussed within this book. I also didn’t like the analogies to disability, “x is like a cancer” “y is like a disease.” And I’m troubled by people throwing around capitalism without it meaning anything for example what does it mean to acknowledge the horrors of the US and capitalism then provide trainings to people within the Obama foundation?
This book is basically like “I’m worried about callouts, but not with instances of actual abuse.” “Damn.” What happens next? AMB admits she doesn’t have all the answers which is fine, but again why wasn’t this a series on a blog instead of a book/booklet?
I have more to think through and will as I research for my book and talk to other abolitionist survivors but for right now it’s 3 stars.
December 29, 2020
"We Will Not Cancel Us" is an argument for trying other things before we call one another out about our missteps, especially publicly. The theme of this book is extremely welcome in this cultural moment, for obvious reasons I won't even bother itemizing.
The author is a conflict mediator who works within social movements to help people get through interpersonal problems among peers. Though she doesn't list the exact movements in which she works, she makes it clear that we are talking about left-wing movements broadly. It is comforting and reassuring to read the words of someone who has chosen this specific role, of building up instead of tearing down. There are some very quotable moments in this little booklet, which started out as a viral blog post. Brown is talented with words and -- I suspect -- talented at spotting where conflict can turn to compassion.
Where the book is limited, its limits seem intentionally self-imposed. The author happily labels herself many times over, often reminding us that she is liberal; an "abolitionist" (in this context, that appears to mean she believes in abolishing the formal legal-justice system); a "Witch" (I'm not certain what that means here, but it's brought up a few times) and "a survivor" (again, I am not certain of-what she survived, and I don't assume a right to know, but the word is mentioned many times, and without that clarity, I wasn't sure what I was supposed to take from it).
I always worry about labels. When movements label themselves, they limit themselves. Each label is just another axis against which you might judge me as someone-other-than-what-you-are, which just gives you more ingrained biases for me to work against. I eat vegan food, but would rather not call myself vegan. I don't believe in God, but derive no identity from the word "atheist." I think critical thinking is the central driving force of a more-moral world, but I hate the word "skeptic." I find these conversations are infinitely harder to have when someone views me as a member of some group of people already taking a stance with which they don't already agree. I would rather the guy next to me at Subway try the veggie patty because a girl he relates to is also trying it, rather than put him off by a VEGAN hoodie.
Why do we feel this need to name our movements and the people within them? I don't get it, and maybe that's just me. But as I am the one reading the book and writing the review, just me is what you get.
From a writing analysis standpoint, this little tome lacks the kind of specifics and examples that could really drive the points home. She speaks almost exclusively in broad generalizations, bordering on philosophy, while rarely giving a specific example and breaking it down. I fear everyone could read this book and say they basically agree with the principle, then go about doing all the same things they did before, because there are no particularly challenging examples to stack ourselves against.
A bigger problem is that small asides and exceptions are peppered throughout the text. Asides and exceptions which seem to undo the bravest parts of this book. And it is clearly intended to be brave. The author calls her thoughts "unthinkable," and expresses the harrowing fear of being publicly shunned by your movement peers (a feeling I and many of my friends know well). She essentially tells us she is being brave, and so I believe her that she is (what is courage accept overcoming your own internal fears no one else can really know?). But that courage seems undone when she spends a sentence or two nodding to the times when (she says) social outcasting is a perfetctly legitimate way to handle things.
In particular, she states that publicly acknowledging your abuser or rapist is a perfectly legitimate way to handle having been raped or abused, and that circumventing the legal apparatus is not a bug, but a feature, of this approach. This is offered as such a quick aside, it reads as a given: "of COURSE we all know THIS kind of call-out is fine." But do we? One of the lessons of the last several years seems to be not just that rape and abuse are everywhere (I am of the mind that these things are, indeed, extremely common) but also that they can be extremely grey areas of human interaction, wherein a rapist may not know they are a rapist, and an abuser may not know they are an abuser.
Likewise, human memory is notoriously horrible, and a single person's word can't be taken and "believed" with no outside corroboration. Yet this author says we should "believe survivors." How will I identify them? How will I spot survivors of abuse without knowing they were abused, so that I might then believe them? Doesn't that just set us back where we started?
The only way I see to support survivors -- at least the ones who want to name their attackers -- is to help them document what happened. Blindly believing them seems, at best, condescending. I recall once sharing something that had happened to me, and receiving a chorus of "I believe you"s in response. I felt not held or supported, but sinking. I didn't want to be believed because I had spoken; I wanted to be asked, to be understood, to be questioned, so that we could figure out together what is really happening in this society in which we can harm one another so easily. Blind belief made me feel invisible.
I don't have a solution for this quicksand of a situation. But as I finished up this book, I felt that the author didn't either. To her credit, she says as much somewhere in the beginning. That she is about asking questions more than answering them. With this, I identify more than anything else in the book. Questions are often more useful than answers, especially in the early stages of figuring things out. But the way those questions are written, at least here, makes them sound like answers. And that's its major downfall.
The author is a conflict mediator who works within social movements to help people get through interpersonal problems among peers. Though she doesn't list the exact movements in which she works, she makes it clear that we are talking about left-wing movements broadly. It is comforting and reassuring to read the words of someone who has chosen this specific role, of building up instead of tearing down. There are some very quotable moments in this little booklet, which started out as a viral blog post. Brown is talented with words and -- I suspect -- talented at spotting where conflict can turn to compassion.
Where the book is limited, its limits seem intentionally self-imposed. The author happily labels herself many times over, often reminding us that she is liberal; an "abolitionist" (in this context, that appears to mean she believes in abolishing the formal legal-justice system); a "Witch" (I'm not certain what that means here, but it's brought up a few times) and "a survivor" (again, I am not certain of-what she survived, and I don't assume a right to know, but the word is mentioned many times, and without that clarity, I wasn't sure what I was supposed to take from it).
I always worry about labels. When movements label themselves, they limit themselves. Each label is just another axis against which you might judge me as someone-other-than-what-you-are, which just gives you more ingrained biases for me to work against. I eat vegan food, but would rather not call myself vegan. I don't believe in God, but derive no identity from the word "atheist." I think critical thinking is the central driving force of a more-moral world, but I hate the word "skeptic." I find these conversations are infinitely harder to have when someone views me as a member of some group of people already taking a stance with which they don't already agree. I would rather the guy next to me at Subway try the veggie patty because a girl he relates to is also trying it, rather than put him off by a VEGAN hoodie.
Why do we feel this need to name our movements and the people within them? I don't get it, and maybe that's just me. But as I am the one reading the book and writing the review, just me is what you get.
From a writing analysis standpoint, this little tome lacks the kind of specifics and examples that could really drive the points home. She speaks almost exclusively in broad generalizations, bordering on philosophy, while rarely giving a specific example and breaking it down. I fear everyone could read this book and say they basically agree with the principle, then go about doing all the same things they did before, because there are no particularly challenging examples to stack ourselves against.
A bigger problem is that small asides and exceptions are peppered throughout the text. Asides and exceptions which seem to undo the bravest parts of this book. And it is clearly intended to be brave. The author calls her thoughts "unthinkable," and expresses the harrowing fear of being publicly shunned by your movement peers (a feeling I and many of my friends know well). She essentially tells us she is being brave, and so I believe her that she is (what is courage accept overcoming your own internal fears no one else can really know?). But that courage seems undone when she spends a sentence or two nodding to the times when (she says) social outcasting is a perfetctly legitimate way to handle things.
In particular, she states that publicly acknowledging your abuser or rapist is a perfectly legitimate way to handle having been raped or abused, and that circumventing the legal apparatus is not a bug, but a feature, of this approach. This is offered as such a quick aside, it reads as a given: "of COURSE we all know THIS kind of call-out is fine." But do we? One of the lessons of the last several years seems to be not just that rape and abuse are everywhere (I am of the mind that these things are, indeed, extremely common) but also that they can be extremely grey areas of human interaction, wherein a rapist may not know they are a rapist, and an abuser may not know they are an abuser.
Likewise, human memory is notoriously horrible, and a single person's word can't be taken and "believed" with no outside corroboration. Yet this author says we should "believe survivors." How will I identify them? How will I spot survivors of abuse without knowing they were abused, so that I might then believe them? Doesn't that just set us back where we started?
The only way I see to support survivors -- at least the ones who want to name their attackers -- is to help them document what happened. Blindly believing them seems, at best, condescending. I recall once sharing something that had happened to me, and receiving a chorus of "I believe you"s in response. I felt not held or supported, but sinking. I didn't want to be believed because I had spoken; I wanted to be asked, to be understood, to be questioned, so that we could figure out together what is really happening in this society in which we can harm one another so easily. Blind belief made me feel invisible.
I don't have a solution for this quicksand of a situation. But as I finished up this book, I felt that the author didn't either. To her credit, she says as much somewhere in the beginning. That she is about asking questions more than answering them. With this, I identify more than anything else in the book. Questions are often more useful than answers, especially in the early stages of figuring things out. But the way those questions are written, at least here, makes them sound like answers. And that's its major downfall.
December 22, 2023
“If I can see the ways I am perpetuating systemic oppressions, if I can see where I learned the behavior and how hard it is to unlearn it, I start to have more humility as I see the messiness of the communities I am part of, the world I live in.”
We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice
I did not realize how short this was w hen I went to read it.
This book was a Christmas present. I had been wanting to read it. As you may have guessed, it is about today's "cancel culture". And how damaging it can be.
I really do not want to do a long review on this one until I have read it a second time. I want to mull it over a bit.
I am sure most people who are internet users have laughed at or even participated in memes or jokes about various hapless victims of this culture. I freely admit I have.As a never Trumper I have been a bit wicked about it too.
But this short book is more about the pervasive nature of cancel culture in regards to how we , as a society, allow ourselves to enjoy or even revel in, someone else's misfortune. And how the whole herd mentality and group think behavior can turn us into people we'd perhaps rather not be.
As someone who loathes sheeplike behavior I can say with confidence, that does not negate the fact that I too have participated in some of these behaviors. I thi nk this book is quite educational and though it is short, one can really get much from it . I will add on to this review when I have read it for a second time.
But I do want to strongly recommend it. You do not have to identify with everything in it. I didn't. But it is fascinating and not only pushes the reader to look at othe rs but also themselves. Excellent read.
We Will Not Cancel Us: And Other Dreams of Transformative Justice
I did not realize how short this was w hen I went to read it.
This book was a Christmas present. I had been wanting to read it. As you may have guessed, it is about today's "cancel culture". And how damaging it can be.
I really do not want to do a long review on this one until I have read it a second time. I want to mull it over a bit.
I am sure most people who are internet users have laughed at or even participated in memes or jokes about various hapless victims of this culture. I freely admit I have.As a never Trumper I have been a bit wicked about it too.
But this short book is more about the pervasive nature of cancel culture in regards to how we , as a society, allow ourselves to enjoy or even revel in, someone else's misfortune. And how the whole herd mentality and group think behavior can turn us into people we'd perhaps rather not be.
As someone who loathes sheeplike behavior I can say with confidence, that does not negate the fact that I too have participated in some of these behaviors. I thi nk this book is quite educational and though it is short, one can really get much from it . I will add on to this review when I have read it for a second time.
But I do want to strongly recommend it. You do not have to identify with everything in it. I didn't. But it is fascinating and not only pushes the reader to look at othe rs but also themselves. Excellent read.
January 1, 2025
INCREDIBLE book to start off 2025! this book is such a quick read i think anyone could benefit from it! as someone who struggles with many of the examples in this book, it was a good call out for me, and a possible new years resolution to be more understanding and forgiving of different points of view.
February 13, 2021
Really suffers from a lack of examples. We're told call out culture and cancel culture is reasonable sometimes but not others and the confines are terribly unclear as to which is which.
A single example of this happening and what should have happened instead would have elucidated the argument a lot but instead it was so general as to not make a big impact on me.
A single example of this happening and what should have happened instead would have elucidated the argument a lot but instead it was so general as to not make a big impact on me.
November 16, 2020
There are some for whom a book like this will feel like a hug. My sense is there are certainly a lot more conversations on this topic along these lines than were happening five years ago, but I'm sure there are people out there who have not yet come across them. The basic premise of the book, which I align with, and might provide that hug, is that if we are interested in building a better world we have to be better with each other. We have to understand that the world we want to change is a world whose abuses have infected us, and if we don't work through our shit and get more skilled at addressing interpersonal conflict, our visions won't become realities.
If that sounds like "wow," then you'll probably enjoy the book. If that sounds like "yup, been thinking that for a while now" and you've already engaged with resources and in conversations on the topic, this might not have much new to offer you.
An exciting trajectory in transformative justice and other types of movement work is that there are more and more resources becoming widely available that address not just the "why" of these movements but the "how." For many, it is abundantly clear that the criminal legal system needs to be abolished, that our social order creates many forms of institutional and interpersonal violence which are unnecessary features of human life that we must change, and we don't need to hear any additional arguments convincing us of that. Where we are inevitably in need of more resources concerns a task that is much bigger than being individually convinced, which is building collective power to be able to change these conditions.
I first came across adrienne marie brown through Emergent Strategy, a very how-oriented book that was so exciting to me in 2017 in part because it offered an out from the way left politics/social justice frameworks were most commonly practiced in the community I was closest with at the time, which was that of a tiny liberal arts college. For the most part, we did a lot of talking about capitalism, racism, police, patriarchy etc. and why all these things are awful, and didn't do too much else about it. On occasion someone might get added to a shitlist because they said the wrong thing about one of those topics.
In that context, Emergent Strategy was an explosive experience for me. Its offering of a framework that not only negated "call out culture" or "cancel culture" or whatever but presented an expansive alternative, weaving together Octavia Butler's science fiction, the teachings of non-human species, Taosim, was deeply exciting. The concrete details about meetings, facilitation and so on pointed to a world much more action-oriented and compelling than the go-nowhere conversations I was accustomed to and tiring of. Other work from around the same time, like Dean Spade's stuff on movement culture and Frances Lee's work on the ethics of activism, made me feel held, in a shared understanding of the limitations of activism as the greatest number of people are called to practice it.
Since then, I've found transformative justice, which helps us think about what we need to do to keep each other safe without courts, cops and jails, to be an urgently crucial framework. And I have been very grateful for other offerings that address the "how" of it--this year's Beyond Survival anthology is a huge example. Meanwhile, I'm out of my little college community now and doing actual movement work around prison abolition. So the stakes are different. And I have certainly noticed after doing that work for a couple years and change that conflict in those spaces is tricky, it easy to let it go unaddressed or have it be addressed poorly.
So when this book starts out talking about the trouble with conflict in our movements, I thought "huh--maybe this will actually be really useful for me right now." But overall, I think this writing is a bit of a backstep from Emergent Strategy, from the how back to the why. There aren't many resources in it that I find helpful at this point for navigating conflict.
Of course, I am not the primary audience for anything, and others not sure how to address this issue might find this short book approachable and grounding on the subject.
Some resources it does include are a list of questions to ask yourself when you are being invited to engage in a callout, and a list of other books and things at the end, many of which are great: work from the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective (especially pod-mapping tools), resources on the Critical Resistance website, the aforementioned Beyond Survival, Angela Davis's Are Prisons Obsolete?, Just Practice's Mixtape on Transformative Justice, Mariame Kaba and Shira Hassan's Stumbling Toward Repair workbook, and Steven Universe gets a shout. transformharm.org is another good one if you're curious. Dean Spade's new book Mutual Aid is another one that I have not yet read, but I have heard multiple conversations about and it includes a lot of material on thoughtfully navigating relationships within social movements.
So, in sum, this is maybe more valuable for others than for me. I will say, though, that as vital as this kind of argument felt 3 years ago, at this point part of me feels the urge to trouble it a bit. I will say that one odd thing that emerged when I was first engaging with Emergent Strategy and all that stuff is that, in some ways rather than pushing me to engage in all relationships with openness, respect, and commitment to acting as if others have the capacity to change, what it did was make me redirect my idea of "who is bad" from "the usual suspects" to people who participate in callout/cancel culture/the types of gleeful punishment described here. It wasn't until I heard Dean Spade talking about meeting people where they're at even when they're really angry that I started thinking oh--obviously these arguments also have to apply to the people who feel pulled to cancel others, or whatever. We have to hold space for everyone. I have also seen these kinds of arguments get misappropriated and used to justify harm through redirecting all attention to how the harm is being addressed. I mean, think of the whole fucking JK Rowling "cancel culture" debacle. Obviously this book talks about COINTELPRO and prison abolition and all this left-movement-specific stuff, but still I think "cancel culture is bad" arguments are a little too easy to co-opt at this point.
If that sounds like "wow," then you'll probably enjoy the book. If that sounds like "yup, been thinking that for a while now" and you've already engaged with resources and in conversations on the topic, this might not have much new to offer you.
An exciting trajectory in transformative justice and other types of movement work is that there are more and more resources becoming widely available that address not just the "why" of these movements but the "how." For many, it is abundantly clear that the criminal legal system needs to be abolished, that our social order creates many forms of institutional and interpersonal violence which are unnecessary features of human life that we must change, and we don't need to hear any additional arguments convincing us of that. Where we are inevitably in need of more resources concerns a task that is much bigger than being individually convinced, which is building collective power to be able to change these conditions.
I first came across adrienne marie brown through Emergent Strategy, a very how-oriented book that was so exciting to me in 2017 in part because it offered an out from the way left politics/social justice frameworks were most commonly practiced in the community I was closest with at the time, which was that of a tiny liberal arts college. For the most part, we did a lot of talking about capitalism, racism, police, patriarchy etc. and why all these things are awful, and didn't do too much else about it. On occasion someone might get added to a shitlist because they said the wrong thing about one of those topics.
In that context, Emergent Strategy was an explosive experience for me. Its offering of a framework that not only negated "call out culture" or "cancel culture" or whatever but presented an expansive alternative, weaving together Octavia Butler's science fiction, the teachings of non-human species, Taosim, was deeply exciting. The concrete details about meetings, facilitation and so on pointed to a world much more action-oriented and compelling than the go-nowhere conversations I was accustomed to and tiring of. Other work from around the same time, like Dean Spade's stuff on movement culture and Frances Lee's work on the ethics of activism, made me feel held, in a shared understanding of the limitations of activism as the greatest number of people are called to practice it.
Since then, I've found transformative justice, which helps us think about what we need to do to keep each other safe without courts, cops and jails, to be an urgently crucial framework. And I have been very grateful for other offerings that address the "how" of it--this year's Beyond Survival anthology is a huge example. Meanwhile, I'm out of my little college community now and doing actual movement work around prison abolition. So the stakes are different. And I have certainly noticed after doing that work for a couple years and change that conflict in those spaces is tricky, it easy to let it go unaddressed or have it be addressed poorly.
So when this book starts out talking about the trouble with conflict in our movements, I thought "huh--maybe this will actually be really useful for me right now." But overall, I think this writing is a bit of a backstep from Emergent Strategy, from the how back to the why. There aren't many resources in it that I find helpful at this point for navigating conflict.
Of course, I am not the primary audience for anything, and others not sure how to address this issue might find this short book approachable and grounding on the subject.
Some resources it does include are a list of questions to ask yourself when you are being invited to engage in a callout, and a list of other books and things at the end, many of which are great: work from the Bay Area Transformative Justice Collective (especially pod-mapping tools), resources on the Critical Resistance website, the aforementioned Beyond Survival, Angela Davis's Are Prisons Obsolete?, Just Practice's Mixtape on Transformative Justice, Mariame Kaba and Shira Hassan's Stumbling Toward Repair workbook, and Steven Universe gets a shout. transformharm.org is another good one if you're curious. Dean Spade's new book Mutual Aid is another one that I have not yet read, but I have heard multiple conversations about and it includes a lot of material on thoughtfully navigating relationships within social movements.
So, in sum, this is maybe more valuable for others than for me. I will say, though, that as vital as this kind of argument felt 3 years ago, at this point part of me feels the urge to trouble it a bit. I will say that one odd thing that emerged when I was first engaging with Emergent Strategy and all that stuff is that, in some ways rather than pushing me to engage in all relationships with openness, respect, and commitment to acting as if others have the capacity to change, what it did was make me redirect my idea of "who is bad" from "the usual suspects" to people who participate in callout/cancel culture/the types of gleeful punishment described here. It wasn't until I heard Dean Spade talking about meeting people where they're at even when they're really angry that I started thinking oh--obviously these arguments also have to apply to the people who feel pulled to cancel others, or whatever. We have to hold space for everyone. I have also seen these kinds of arguments get misappropriated and used to justify harm through redirecting all attention to how the harm is being addressed. I mean, think of the whole fucking JK Rowling "cancel culture" debacle. Obviously this book talks about COINTELPRO and prison abolition and all this left-movement-specific stuff, but still I think "cancel culture is bad" arguments are a little too easy to co-opt at this point.
November 6, 2020
This book could heal our communities and the left and bring us together to fight for collective liberation! I couldn't recommend it more!
February 26, 2022
This was a great, quick and informative read! By no means comprehensive nor claiming to be, but great musings on accountability and abolition. I really appreciated the distinctions made between abuse, harm, conflict, misunderstandings, mistakes, differences, and contradictions - super helpful for conceptualizing a variety of difficult situations that sometimes get collapsed. Also appreciate the description of when call-outs can be effective, as well as explaining when, why, and how they can be harmful.
January 1, 2021
I really enjoyed this book. It gave me lots to think about. I need to discuss with a person and work through the ideas. Really good though slightly self conscious.
December 10, 2020
WE WILL NOT CANCEL US is a small booklet borne out of adrienne maree brown's essay over the summer grappling with cancel culture and abolition dreams. I love seeing how thinkers think, learning their process, their missteps and edits, and so I appreciated the way she tackled this book as her thoughts and language surrounding cancel culture are emergent. I'll say firstly, I don't believe cancel culture actually exists in the way that the right talks about it, but I have seen internet and intrapersonal criticism taken very far, in ways that brown and I share a discomfort with. She writes that if no one is actually disposable, we have to ensure that folks are held ACCOUNTABLE for their actions while not feeding into carceral attitudes.
As a white woman reading this, it resonated a lot with the way I see white people tackle racism on social media - esp the past summer. I think its good and its our job as white ppl to call out others who we see engaging in harmful behaviors AND it's also our responsibility to collect our white people, so how we "call out" matters. I've seen a lot of what I call "white on white crime," where white ppl get REALLY INVESTED into fights with other white ppl on what they've determined is and isn't racist. Now, it's good & necessary to call out other white people. But what I see in some of these online examples is a white person, the person doing the call out, who has not grappled with their own internalized whiteness. Perhaps they are feeling shame that they see, in the actions of the problematic white, something they would have done 3 years ago. brown writes about the "am I next?" fear that comes from call outs online. This also prevents people from actually engaging in a dialouge where they could learn because they're so scared of saying the wrong thing. I see a vitriol level that is really rooted in trying to "look like one of the good ones" but to me like someone who doesn't actually critique or engage in dialogue with the white people in their own life. I'm not saying don't call out racism that you see online if you are white. I'm saying, engage in dialogue and ensure your learning and work happens offline too. It is a lot easier to call out strangers for a racist or problematic post than it is to call out your own family. WE WILL NOT CANCEL US looks at the complexities of community call outs and accountability. I loved reading this book and discussing with @angiesreading and @suzyreadsbooks.
As a white woman reading this, it resonated a lot with the way I see white people tackle racism on social media - esp the past summer. I think its good and its our job as white ppl to call out others who we see engaging in harmful behaviors AND it's also our responsibility to collect our white people, so how we "call out" matters. I've seen a lot of what I call "white on white crime," where white ppl get REALLY INVESTED into fights with other white ppl on what they've determined is and isn't racist. Now, it's good & necessary to call out other white people. But what I see in some of these online examples is a white person, the person doing the call out, who has not grappled with their own internalized whiteness. Perhaps they are feeling shame that they see, in the actions of the problematic white, something they would have done 3 years ago. brown writes about the "am I next?" fear that comes from call outs online. This also prevents people from actually engaging in a dialouge where they could learn because they're so scared of saying the wrong thing. I see a vitriol level that is really rooted in trying to "look like one of the good ones" but to me like someone who doesn't actually critique or engage in dialogue with the white people in their own life. I'm not saying don't call out racism that you see online if you are white. I'm saying, engage in dialogue and ensure your learning and work happens offline too. It is a lot easier to call out strangers for a racist or problematic post than it is to call out your own family. WE WILL NOT CANCEL US looks at the complexities of community call outs and accountability. I loved reading this book and discussing with @angiesreading and @suzyreadsbooks.
June 13, 2021
This book is a huge disappointment. It basically says nothing of substance other than that sometimes call out culture goes too far. No examples are given. No concrete scenarios are described. For these reasons, I think the book is kind of cowardly as well as useless. If you want serious analysis of the ideas of call out culture or cancel culture, this is not the book for it. The author talks about censoring herself as she originally used metaphors that others found triggering; alas it appears that she may have censored herself to the point that she is saying almost nothing substantive.
January 7, 2021
There are some very welcome framings of transformation in this text, and the intentions at the beginning of the work were beautiful and helpful. A lot of this writing felt more like it was for adrienne than for the public, and there was too much explaining motivations for the piece, definitely in an effort to be accountable. I’m grateful for adrienne’s work as a mediator and author, but I was hoping for less generalizations about transformation work + the left, and more specifics about the mechanizations of practicing transformation in community.
November 20, 2020
What started off as thumbing through the pages ended up with me spending the whole morning reading this book. She spoke with such clarity and thoughtfulness that I couldn't put it down. In fact I will read it again, and again, reminding myself of the call she put forth.
I worry about call out culture. I am often disappointed with how it materializes both in myself and in others. So, reading this books is a breath of fresh air.
I worry about call out culture. I am often disappointed with how it materializes both in myself and in others. So, reading this books is a breath of fresh air.
December 16, 2020
Summary: A plea to those within the modern abolitionist movement to not use “cancelling” or “call outs” against one another.
I picked up this book online, intrigued by the title. On reading the book, I discovered that I was overhearing a conversation among an “us” of which I am not a part. I say this at the outset to explain my approach in this review. It is simply to listen and, hopefully, learn, and reflect in my description of this book an accurate rendering of its message. adrienne maree brown is a leader of the modern abolitionist movement. One description of this movement states, in part:
Modern abolitionists see it as our mission to provide the models of community safety, security, mutual aid, and harm reduction that are needed, and to do the political education, relationship-building, and movement work to bring others into demanding transformative economic and social change for abolition.
The author self-identifies as “a Black biracial queer fat survivor, witch, movement facilitator and mediator.” I am a white, cisgender male, straight, Christian, and (hopefully) recovering racist. It is a certainty that I don’t understand everything in this small book. I am learning that often, I don’t even know what I don’t know. So, unlike some reviews, I do not want to engage or critique but try to listen and reflect what I am hearing. Too often, we have critiqued and judge what we don’t even begin to understand.
The book is an enlargement on a blog post titled “Unthinkable Thoughts: Call-Out Culture in the Age of Covid-19.” The first part of the book describes the response, both positive and critical to the blog post and what the author learned. She learned she needed to make distinctions between harm and abuse, in general more clearly define terms and ideas, and offer appropriate content and trigger warnings. She goes on to offer definitions of terms: abuse, conflict, harm, contradiction, misunderstanding, and mistakes.
The central chapter, a revision of the blog post, speaks from our current time, amid the pandemic and a pervasive sense of fear, both of the pandemic, and the wider pandemic of white supremacy. It speaks out of the observation of cancelling or “call outs” being used in conflict situations within the abolitionist movement. She warns of the danger of “no one left to call out, or call we, or call us.” She does not disavow the use of call outs in the wider culture with those whose status, power, and unresponsiveness warrant the use of this technique (often by widespread social media campaigns focused on a statement or act causing harm). She notes the personal impacts of a cancel–job loss, status loss, harm to family and emotional distress. She expresses concern that within movement, other, prior steps need to be taken to pursue harm reduction, including, where possible, personal conversation. She also notes that the use of call outs may become cathartic and make the use of this tool more tempting.
In a follow-up essay, she speaks about the aim of movement being transformative justice. Yet she questions the ways some people have been eviscerated because small, as well as larger transgressions. In turn, she proposes three questions to open up conversations leading to transformative justice:
1. Why? Listen with “Why?” as a framework.
2. Ask yourself/selves: What can I/we learn from this?
3. How can my real-time actions contribute to transforming this situation (versus making it worse)?
One concern the author expresses is that her honest processing in this book of her “unthinkable thoughts” will be weaponized by those outside the abolitionist movement. The truth is, any of us who have been involved in any movement have experienced the same phenomenon. We are often each other’s harshest critics and if we are not careful, we can self-destruct. I would hope that no one would use this review as a weapon, because rather recognize the authenticity, aspirations, and growth as a movement leader it reflects.
I picked up this book online, intrigued by the title. On reading the book, I discovered that I was overhearing a conversation among an “us” of which I am not a part. I say this at the outset to explain my approach in this review. It is simply to listen and, hopefully, learn, and reflect in my description of this book an accurate rendering of its message. adrienne maree brown is a leader of the modern abolitionist movement. One description of this movement states, in part:
Modern abolitionists see it as our mission to provide the models of community safety, security, mutual aid, and harm reduction that are needed, and to do the political education, relationship-building, and movement work to bring others into demanding transformative economic and social change for abolition.
The author self-identifies as “a Black biracial queer fat survivor, witch, movement facilitator and mediator.” I am a white, cisgender male, straight, Christian, and (hopefully) recovering racist. It is a certainty that I don’t understand everything in this small book. I am learning that often, I don’t even know what I don’t know. So, unlike some reviews, I do not want to engage or critique but try to listen and reflect what I am hearing. Too often, we have critiqued and judge what we don’t even begin to understand.
The book is an enlargement on a blog post titled “Unthinkable Thoughts: Call-Out Culture in the Age of Covid-19.” The first part of the book describes the response, both positive and critical to the blog post and what the author learned. She learned she needed to make distinctions between harm and abuse, in general more clearly define terms and ideas, and offer appropriate content and trigger warnings. She goes on to offer definitions of terms: abuse, conflict, harm, contradiction, misunderstanding, and mistakes.
The central chapter, a revision of the blog post, speaks from our current time, amid the pandemic and a pervasive sense of fear, both of the pandemic, and the wider pandemic of white supremacy. It speaks out of the observation of cancelling or “call outs” being used in conflict situations within the abolitionist movement. She warns of the danger of “no one left to call out, or call we, or call us.” She does not disavow the use of call outs in the wider culture with those whose status, power, and unresponsiveness warrant the use of this technique (often by widespread social media campaigns focused on a statement or act causing harm). She notes the personal impacts of a cancel–job loss, status loss, harm to family and emotional distress. She expresses concern that within movement, other, prior steps need to be taken to pursue harm reduction, including, where possible, personal conversation. She also notes that the use of call outs may become cathartic and make the use of this tool more tempting.
In a follow-up essay, she speaks about the aim of movement being transformative justice. Yet she questions the ways some people have been eviscerated because small, as well as larger transgressions. In turn, she proposes three questions to open up conversations leading to transformative justice:
1. Why? Listen with “Why?” as a framework.
2. Ask yourself/selves: What can I/we learn from this?
3. How can my real-time actions contribute to transforming this situation (versus making it worse)?
One concern the author expresses is that her honest processing in this book of her “unthinkable thoughts” will be weaponized by those outside the abolitionist movement. The truth is, any of us who have been involved in any movement have experienced the same phenomenon. We are often each other’s harshest critics and if we are not careful, we can self-destruct. I would hope that no one would use this review as a weapon, because rather recognize the authenticity, aspirations, and growth as a movement leader it reflects.
February 18, 2021
I found this really difficult to read. The author speaks in "we" and I was left wondering who that "we" is. In some places, it felt relatable. In many others, it didn't. The argument is presented in broad generalizations rather than based on personal experience and opinion.
The writing is also very repetitive. There are some powerful points at the beginning and I took lots of notes, then it devolves into a repeated (but not very deep) argument for transformative justice and against call-outs. The argument for the former is clear (though not very nuanced), the one for the latter rather vague.
Why the author constantly calls her thoughts "unthinkable" remained a mystery to me - the basic argument appears straightforward and not very problematic to me.
As someone already acquainted with Transformative Justice, I resonated with the intensely articulated desire for community accountability and against perpetuating further violence. There is a place for call-outs and "cancelling" though (and much more to say about the role of trauma), and while the book touches on this in a few side sentences, I never dives into the argument. It left me feeling very dissatisfied.
The use of "we" ("we are afraid and we think it will assuage our fears," "we love obsessing over and punishing villains" -- we who?) leads to many projections and assumptions about the experiences and goals of survivors and others who have used callouts to organize for accountability. (Review by Leila)
The writing is also very repetitive. There are some powerful points at the beginning and I took lots of notes, then it devolves into a repeated (but not very deep) argument for transformative justice and against call-outs. The argument for the former is clear (though not very nuanced), the one for the latter rather vague.
The book contains no specific examples of situations that escalated to callouts and demonstrates no curiosity about the reasons why or the outcomes sought. (Review by Leila)
From a writing analysis standpoint, this little tome lacks the kind of specifics and examples that could really drive the points home. She speaks almost exclusively in broad generalizations, bordering on philosophy, while rarely giving a specific example and breaking it down. (Review by Carrie Poppy)
Why the author constantly calls her thoughts "unthinkable" remained a mystery to me - the basic argument appears straightforward and not very problematic to me.
There are some very welcome framings of transformation in this text (...) A lot of this writing felt more like it was for adrienne than for the public(...). I was hoping for less generalizations about transformation work + the left, and more specifics about the mechanizations of practicing transformation in community. (Review by Luca Suede)
The basic premise of the book (...) is that if we are interested in building a better world we have to be better with each other. We have to understand that the world we want to change is a world whose abuses have infected us, and if we don't work through our shit and get more skilled at addressing interpersonal conflict, our visions won't become realities. If that sounds like "wow," then you'll probably enjoy the book. If that sounds like "yup, been thinking that for a while now" and you've already engaged with resources and in conversations on the topic, this might not have much new to offer you. (Review by Scout)
As someone already acquainted with Transformative Justice, I resonated with the intensely articulated desire for community accountability and against perpetuating further violence. There is a place for call-outs and "cancelling" though (and much more to say about the role of trauma), and while the book touches on this in a few side sentences, I never dives into the argument. It left me feeling very dissatisfied.
August 11, 2021
a lovely lovely book.
i think one of the things that was new to me in this book was the idea of hopelessness being something that the oppressor wants. like it’s very intuitive but i has never thought about it. our despair and our nihilism about our oppression is something the oppressor wants. they don’t want us to challenge these systems they want us to give up.
i am so happy that transformative justice entered my life when it did. brown talked specifically about emergent strategy and how we should use these big ideas we have , like abolition and TJ, in our daily lives. we have to create the world we want to see at an interpersonal level and on a small scale before we are capable of expanding these systems.
this book made me think a lot about call out culture and how we operate within our communities.
i also like that this book took the time to define abuse, harm, and conflict as three distinct but related things. i think a lot of the time we attempt to respond to these things in the same way but it’s important to understand that they are different & we should respond to them based on the context of each situation.
i think everyone should read this. it’s a very quick read that supplemented a lot of the ideas i already had after being exposed to transformative justice.
i think one of the things that was new to me in this book was the idea of hopelessness being something that the oppressor wants. like it’s very intuitive but i has never thought about it. our despair and our nihilism about our oppression is something the oppressor wants. they don’t want us to challenge these systems they want us to give up.
i am so happy that transformative justice entered my life when it did. brown talked specifically about emergent strategy and how we should use these big ideas we have , like abolition and TJ, in our daily lives. we have to create the world we want to see at an interpersonal level and on a small scale before we are capable of expanding these systems.
this book made me think a lot about call out culture and how we operate within our communities.
i also like that this book took the time to define abuse, harm, and conflict as three distinct but related things. i think a lot of the time we attempt to respond to these things in the same way but it’s important to understand that they are different & we should respond to them based on the context of each situation.
i think everyone should read this. it’s a very quick read that supplemented a lot of the ideas i already had after being exposed to transformative justice.
January 3, 2022
“We hurt people.
Of course we did, we are human.
We were traumatized/socialized away from interdependence. We learned to hide everything real, everything messy, weak, complex. We learned that fake shit hurts, but it’s acceptable (...) We disappointed each other, at the level of race, gender, species…in a vast way we longed for more from us. But we will not cancel us (...)
We will not cancel us. But we must earn our place on this earth.”
A powerful book which acknowledges the flaws and ongoing problems with humanity, yet it encourages readers not to lose complete faith and hope in the people. The right way to go, according to Adrienne Maree Brown, is constant co-learning and mutual understanding.
”Conflict, and growing community that can hold political difference, are actually healthy, generative, necessary moves for vibrant visions to be actualized.”
Of course we did, we are human.
We were traumatized/socialized away from interdependence. We learned to hide everything real, everything messy, weak, complex. We learned that fake shit hurts, but it’s acceptable (...) We disappointed each other, at the level of race, gender, species…in a vast way we longed for more from us. But we will not cancel us (...)
We will not cancel us. But we must earn our place on this earth.”
A powerful book which acknowledges the flaws and ongoing problems with humanity, yet it encourages readers not to lose complete faith and hope in the people. The right way to go, according to Adrienne Maree Brown, is constant co-learning and mutual understanding.
”Conflict, and growing community that can hold political difference, are actually healthy, generative, necessary moves for vibrant visions to be actualized.”
January 10, 2021
Absolutely transformational. This summer I had several experiences that convinced me that cancel culture is not the way to go when airing grievances. I have been following the writing that has started to spring up, from Kai Cheng Thom, Tada Hozemi, and Clementine Morrigan about how we can be more effective and simply more human in our conflicts with each other. This booklet by adrienne maree brown is vital to those efforts. She creates a lot of definitions, which is very helpful in a world where everything is conflated and nebulous. She gives people a road map for call outs without punishment, and also humanizes our desire for revenge. I felt seen on all sides (and the up and down) of her writing. Mandatory reading for being a person on the internet, or in any community.
November 29, 2020
I got a ride from adrienne maree brown (name drop!) back in 2008. Although I don't remember much of our conversation from the two and a half hour drive, I do remember how comfortable I felt around them and how easy it was to have a conversation. It's twelve years later and I've read every book she's published; like our conversation, I appreciate the way she tackles tough topics using language that just about anyone can understand. Many other folks have spent hundreds of pages trying to get across what amb accomplishes in under a hundred.
March 28, 2021
3.5 stars? An expanded on blog post, which I think makes sense to have as a book to capture and highlight the widespread cancel culture we’re experiencing right now. The bullet pt questions on what to ask when asked to engage in a call out, and list of questions to think about steps going forward are very helpful. As are the 3 questions she uses in mediation and facilitation.
July 14, 2023
I liked this book more than I expected to. It has some great nuggets, and especially a couple of the essays, “We Are Still Beginning” and the Afterword by Malkia Devich Cyril, were very compelling.
At the same time, this is not the first (or second or third) book on transformative justice and social movement spaces I would recommend. As with any discussion of accountability or harm, the strategies and ways of thinking presented sometimes brilliantly here are really only fruitful when grounded firmly within a survivor-centered approach and framework. When some of these discussions are presented absent a knowledge or an experience or a practice that believes and centers survivors, it can sometimes come off sounding quite similar to right-wing discourse on “woke culture”. I do not believe that has anything to do with the author(s) of this booklet, to be clear. But I do think that a limitation of this tiny book is that it really requires more of the stories, experiences, and lessons from numerous efforts and experiments in transformative justice over decades in order to be properly contextualized. Mariame Kaba’s books, or Beyond Survival, or The Revolution Starts at Home, are all very rich in these insights and I have found them useful to go back to many times.
This little book does have some remarkable and poetic moments though, and it’s definitely worth reading for those. In particular, a.m.b. and Cyril both articulate a gracious and farsighted responsibility for the future and the new worlds we must create, inventing and co-creating a path through the the many traditions we have inherited and the many movement sources as they exist today.
This podcast from May 2023 is really excellent at distilling some of the best of the book from the author herself.
At the same time, this is not the first (or second or third) book on transformative justice and social movement spaces I would recommend. As with any discussion of accountability or harm, the strategies and ways of thinking presented sometimes brilliantly here are really only fruitful when grounded firmly within a survivor-centered approach and framework. When some of these discussions are presented absent a knowledge or an experience or a practice that believes and centers survivors, it can sometimes come off sounding quite similar to right-wing discourse on “woke culture”. I do not believe that has anything to do with the author(s) of this booklet, to be clear. But I do think that a limitation of this tiny book is that it really requires more of the stories, experiences, and lessons from numerous efforts and experiments in transformative justice over decades in order to be properly contextualized. Mariame Kaba’s books, or Beyond Survival, or The Revolution Starts at Home, are all very rich in these insights and I have found them useful to go back to many times.
This little book does have some remarkable and poetic moments though, and it’s definitely worth reading for those. In particular, a.m.b. and Cyril both articulate a gracious and farsighted responsibility for the future and the new worlds we must create, inventing and co-creating a path through the the many traditions we have inherited and the many movement sources as they exist today.
I want us to do better. I want to feel like we are responsible for each other’s transformation. Not the transformation from vibrant flawed humans to bits of ash, but rather the transformation from broken people and communities to whole ones. I believe transformative justice could yield deeper trust, resilience, and interdependence. All these mass and intimate punishments keep us small and fragile. And right now our movements and the people within them need to be massive and complex and strong.
This podcast from May 2023 is really excellent at distilling some of the best of the book from the author herself.
January 17, 2025
So, the introduction feels like much more of a drawback than a set-up. In a piece that is so tightly focused on the negatives of call-out culture, the first 14 pages read very strongly like a plea to not be called-out or cancelled instead of a proper introduction. I'd recommend skipping it, which, in a book that's only 88 pages, is a pretty serious detriment to its quality.
Still, there are many excellent points and quotes contained in this. I don't currently have the time or energy to cite them all, but a few highlights include:
"But being loud is different from being whole, or even being heard, being cared for, being comforted, being healed."
"[...] is this what we're here for? To cultivate a fear-based adherence to reductive common values? What can this lead to in an imperfect world full of sloppy, complex humans?"
Still, there are many excellent points and quotes contained in this. I don't currently have the time or energy to cite them all, but a few highlights include:
"But being loud is different from being whole, or even being heard, being cared for, being comforted, being healed."
"[...] is this what we're here for? To cultivate a fear-based adherence to reductive common values? What can this lead to in an imperfect world full of sloppy, complex humans?"
February 2, 2025
Everyone should read this… the words resonate so well with the body and acknowledge fears… I think this book is a really good starting place for a lot of things, especially solving conflict. Telling someone that this is your framework for your life would make future interactions so much easier.
February 18, 2024
lots of people feel lots of ways about this book, but i thought it was a helpful reminder of the goal of transformative justice. very david dark robot soft exorcism vibes
November 5, 2024
As usual, I loved everything about this book. Adrienne maree brown does such a beautiful and eloquent job of not telling others how to be, but being that way herself in a way that is irresistible and makes you want to join her. I’ve long struggled with cancel culture — even if it were effective, it’s not the world I want to live in or create. This book gently describes the alternatives to that and feels like the world and movements I do want to live in.
Read
July 3, 2022Dear Vancouver,
February 18, 2023
Like many people drawn to this book, I suspect I picked it up having seen how petty feuds mixed with power use online platforms and captive audiences to enact the same power structures people claim to be fighting against. In this case, it wasn’t me, but three people I love all taken down by a figure in the local queer scene for reasons that can all be chalked up to misunderstandings, or at worst, hurt that could have been ameliorated. In the aftermath I was alerted to Schulman’s “Conflict is Not Abuse”, which I believe has had a somewhat polarized reception. Admittedly, I haven’t read it.
I’m the kind of person who scoffs at the word comrade, and I don’t believe that twitter can serve to enact justice. I do care about an end to police brutality, a corrupt justice system, and I am highly committed to climate issues. In short - I’m not exactly the audience this book is intended for, at least not anymore, even if I am committed to the same objectives. I often find myself seeking community, having abandoned it for what I felt was hypocrisy and cruelty.
I admire the author’s decision to define many of the terms that are often misused or misrepresented. I found her list of questions around callouts to be extremely useful. Having witnessed the phenomenon she describes, I don’t see controversy in what she is addressing, although I suspect that she has edited aspects of the text to reflect the initial feedback that prompted this book.
But having seen this harm done, this book does not address what one can do to recover from or address the damage that unfair callouts have caused. Within this abolitionist framework, I am curious how the author would address seeking resolutions in the wake, current or distant, of the problem she is addressing. Is this possible? I don’t know, and I appreciate that the author is able to express doubt. One review mentioned that this book can “heal communities” but truthfully I think this serves better simply to mitigate future damage - a worthy goal, but perhaps unsatisfying to those who are still impacted.
At the beginning of this book, the author describes the mounting pressures of not being able to always provide answers to issues she does not see as being within her expertise, especially as she gains attention. I value her honesty here, as good answers are seldom easy to come by. HOWEVER, I truly do not envy her being in a position in which she feels she needs to couch her essay in an introduction that takes up a third of this book to explain this. As someone who has mostly abandoned social media (Goodreads as an exception lol) I feel much more free not being caught in the discourse of the moment. Truthfully, I have felt that popular social media serves as an extension of capitalism that trades in currencies of attention and followers, and that social movement within those spaces is undermined by its very foundation.
For platforms like Twitter to exist, conflict is prioritized, and the author seems entrenched in that system. Having left it, I feel a clarity of mind and an ability to process conflict at a tolerable clip. This book, or essay, is inextricable from social justice within the attention economy. I admire what she has written, but in many ways reading this has made me feel joy from having left all of this behind. It’s worth reading, but my reaction is, as you can see, a personal one that makes me want to keep distancing myself from virtual space that I no longer feel is manageable.
I’m the kind of person who scoffs at the word comrade, and I don’t believe that twitter can serve to enact justice. I do care about an end to police brutality, a corrupt justice system, and I am highly committed to climate issues. In short - I’m not exactly the audience this book is intended for, at least not anymore, even if I am committed to the same objectives. I often find myself seeking community, having abandoned it for what I felt was hypocrisy and cruelty.
I admire the author’s decision to define many of the terms that are often misused or misrepresented. I found her list of questions around callouts to be extremely useful. Having witnessed the phenomenon she describes, I don’t see controversy in what she is addressing, although I suspect that she has edited aspects of the text to reflect the initial feedback that prompted this book.
But having seen this harm done, this book does not address what one can do to recover from or address the damage that unfair callouts have caused. Within this abolitionist framework, I am curious how the author would address seeking resolutions in the wake, current or distant, of the problem she is addressing. Is this possible? I don’t know, and I appreciate that the author is able to express doubt. One review mentioned that this book can “heal communities” but truthfully I think this serves better simply to mitigate future damage - a worthy goal, but perhaps unsatisfying to those who are still impacted.
At the beginning of this book, the author describes the mounting pressures of not being able to always provide answers to issues she does not see as being within her expertise, especially as she gains attention. I value her honesty here, as good answers are seldom easy to come by. HOWEVER, I truly do not envy her being in a position in which she feels she needs to couch her essay in an introduction that takes up a third of this book to explain this. As someone who has mostly abandoned social media (Goodreads as an exception lol) I feel much more free not being caught in the discourse of the moment. Truthfully, I have felt that popular social media serves as an extension of capitalism that trades in currencies of attention and followers, and that social movement within those spaces is undermined by its very foundation.
For platforms like Twitter to exist, conflict is prioritized, and the author seems entrenched in that system. Having left it, I feel a clarity of mind and an ability to process conflict at a tolerable clip. This book, or essay, is inextricable from social justice within the attention economy. I admire what she has written, but in many ways reading this has made me feel joy from having left all of this behind. It’s worth reading, but my reaction is, as you can see, a personal one that makes me want to keep distancing myself from virtual space that I no longer feel is manageable.
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