It’s been several years now, and I still don’t know how I should have handled The Falling Out. I also still don’t know what I could have done better, other than to have cut and run sooner and more quietly, instead of trying to save friendships with people I care about.

I wish I hadn’t had to flee my community to prevent it from fracturing. I wish I hadn’t been a target. And I wish people understood how damn hard that is, when it seemed best to keep people happy.

Most of all, I don’t think this should have been my sacrifice to bear. The fact it was and still is is why I’ve pulled back so hard from communities I care about, and I’m still struggling with the damage that’s done to me.

The cost of community harmony should not be annihilation and exile. I know I tried to be stoic in the face of all that, but I still feel and hurt and bleed like anyone else.

Be better, and be good to one another, okay? Don’t do this to anyone else. Please.

@Goldkin I've been going through similar, over a breakup. The community I was supporting is not the space I thought it was. That was a hard lesson to learn, but one I needed to learn eventually. It isn't anyone else's fault, to be sure, but the mismatch between expected and actual caught me short.

I take it as a personal lesson more than cause for exhortation of others. Just one more note for the frontispiece of the Tome.

@orrery I guess, for me, I wish it wasn’t a constant struggle against cynicism at how people act in groups. I know that most of community crashes are elaborate games of telephone by primarily good faith actors, but it still surprises me how single actors acting in bad faith can erode and destroy community.

I know the best answer isn’t to pull back and be cynical, but I’ve been struggling for a better answer. Especially considering the long tail of harm that followed.