Who We Are
As societies’ failures continue and show themselves more openly, and as we in RC continue to offer what we have developed in order to aid minds in developing new and equitable solutions, each of us needs to be able to proudly talk about our theory and the tools we have developed. We each need to do this in our own voice from our own mind. This will take facing and discharging some of the distresses that have kept us small and kept us from being proud of the important work we have done so far.
K Webster (Regional Reference Person in Manhattan, New York, USA) and I spent a good deal of time working on a version of this (see below). Would you please work on yours?
Tim Jackins
We are a grassroots global organization of peer co-counselors within locally led communities, each community composed of people seeking to build better lives.
We are focused primarily on one-to-one peer assistance: listening and allowing each other to find our own thinking about everything that affects us.
We are increasingly confident in our belief that all people are inherently good, have a caring and cooperative nature, have a sense of connection, enjoy life, and are flexibly intelligent.
This is true of all of us except when we are under the effects of unresolved past harms that have become etched in our minds.
There is real damage in the world, and much of it is done by people. We do not excuse it away. Instead, we look at it, try to illuminate it, and work to heal the individual damage and lay bare the structures and institutions that ensure such damage continues.
We do not blame or shame or punish people for the damage they carry. Instead, we offer an effective means to work to repair it.
We try to care openly and unreservedly for one another in theory and, as we are able, in practice.
We do not seek to limit the care and respect we extend to one another or to anyone else.
We do good, interesting, dynamic things. We keep thinking and working, without let-up, to remove our own confusions; to get smarter, more alive, happier, and more effective in ending anything that harms others or ourselves.
We have moved against racism, sexism, the oppression of young people, and every other oppression we’ve learned of in order to free ourselves and everyone else from the effects of those oppressions and the internalizing of the messages of those oppressions. We have done this work for decades and will continue until it is done.
OUR THEORY AND PRACTICE
RC theory was developed from direct observations of what works in everyday life to help people be more themselves. We use the inborn human processes connected to laughing, yawning, crying, and so on, that allow the release of painful feelings and resolve the rigid behaviors left from hurtful incidents. We’ve come to be confident that it is these innate processes that resolve those hurts. We share our individual gains from using these processes to continue to develop our theory and offer it to others who are interested.
We make room for the release of painful emotion. In short: people cry, and we let them.
Our long experience has been that this “room” allows someone to recover from whatever harsh things happened to them.
Without opportunities to recover, those harsh incidents accumulate in our minds, and we become more easily “set off” by a larger variety of incidents. As many others have noticed, it can become harder to differentiate what’s happening in the present from feelings we’ve had many times before.
We have developed policies on liberation that serve as a starting point to continue thinking on many liberation issues. These policies are always draft policies, because we assume that we will think more clearly as we work through confusions and misinformation and as we become more diverse globally. This has been borne out in practice.
Though people find us primarily through one-to-one communication, we have been accessible to the general public—with a website and projects online that are available to anyone with access to the Internet.
We make allowance for the great variations in what is tolerated regarding personal or political expressions, both on the Internet and in public life in the different countries and societies of our members.
We freely offer what we’ve developed to anyone who has interest. People use what they choose.
People use it in various facets of their lives, including while they are active in other groups that they are a part of, in the same way that any good idea from any source is shared.
Many people choose to use in their work and in their lives various pieces of our theory and practice (such as taking turns in listening pairs). RC’s interest is in providing tools to groups and individuals that could be useful for achieving their own goals.
We find that these ideas are used most effectively in an RC community setting where we have common commitments and understandings.
Not everyone wishes to make such commitments, nor is it necessary in order for them to benefit from the perspectives and practices of RC.
We don’t assume the RC community is a good fit for everyone.
THE CURRENT CONDITIONS
Brutal systemic mistreatment, carried out by individuals, themselves soaked in early mistreatment, has been an ongoing feature of the harsh systems we live in. To help cloak this brutality, society offers compelling distractions, such as addictions to drugs, sex, food, and so on. Those distractions can only offer to temporarily obscure the hurts. Many of us become so worn down by oppressions and other hurts that in order to tolerate our existence we rely on the distractions and become numb to life.
Almost everyone has been a target of or witnessed mistreatment (as a child if at no other time). This can deeply affect us and can lead to our mistreating others or going passive in the presence of mistreatment.
All of us have this happen to us.
In addition, some groups are also viciously and relentlessly the focal point of institutionalized and structural systems of oppression that are constant and overt. Some oppressions are still accepted as “normal” or “right.” Oppressions can also be covert and wait in the wings [wait until they’re “needed”]. Those oppressions are ready to be hauled out to distract people from the real causes of difficulty in our societies.
We think that trying to create a hierarchy of “better or worse” oppression is pointless and diversionary. Any oppression is inhuman and not to be tolerated, though different oppressions serve different purposes in the continuation of the oppression of everyone.
We believe every oppression is wrong and is to be opposed.
Ongoing systems of mistreatment leave everyone fearful of further injury, terrified enough to attack others, hopeful of redirecting mistreatment by assailing others, or quaking on the sidelines hoping not to be the next victim.
Our unjust societies not only ensure that people get hurt, but they also try to make sure that no one can “get up” again.
We can be made to feel “small” and petty and jealous and fearful and insignificant and wrong and vengeful and insecure and watchful and mistrustful.
Among the worst of the effects is that almost all of us can begin to feel utterly alone, can be left with the feeling that there is no one who cares enough about us or our people to help.
Our insecurity is wrought from the damage done by large systems of oppression as well as by individuals (this includes all of us) who themselves have been crushed by the oppression. This insecurity has made it difficult to achieve a unity of purpose even in battles that threaten all of us and life as we know it.
Our experience has convinced us that this damage we have suffered obscures the natural understanding and common wish of people for friendship across barriers—the same wish for connection and relationship to others that we can see in unhurt infants.
These systems of mistreatment must be ended and mechanisms found to heal the damage from the mistreatment. Attempts to shift these systems matter. Attempts to heal from them matter. As have many others, we have joined with those attempts for decades.
MOVING FORWARD IN DIFFICULT TIMES
We live in societies that oppress people, and we are all affected. The effects shape us and lead us to make mistakes. We are all challenged to not pass on the damage from abuse, oppression, and other hurts that we’ve absorbed. When any of us do so, it is counter to our deepest wishes and goals. Using the theory and practice of RC has shown itself to be a way to stop the passing on of hurts.
ADDRESSING SOCIETAL OPPRESSIONS
We have a history of meeting in different groups, each a target of a particular oppression, to share experiences, do the counseling work to resolve the hurts that have come from the oppression, refute the misinformation contained in the oppression, and reclaim ourselves. Out of these gatherings, policies are created to provide accurate information to the RC communities and to others. These policies affirm who we are and what our expectations are of one another.
We also meet as allies to those targeted by an oppression: to strengthen our ability to listen respectfully and without defensiveness, to become more solid in the role of ally, and to learn to act on behalf of ending oppressions.
ADDRESSING AND SAFEGUARDING OUR PERSONAL INTERACTIONS
RC has clear guidelines to help people avoid unaware behaviors that could cause hurt to others in RC. These guidelines include: requirements to be certified to teach, no use of alcohol or drugs by certified RC teachers, prohibiting alcohol or drugs in any counseling setting, no tolerance of sexual exploitation, not expanding relationships begun in co-counseling to anything other than the co-counseling relationship, staying in good communication, and offering feedback to one another.
Guidelines on reaching decisions and handling disagreement, criticism, and upset are available to everyone. We encourage direct conversation with one another before a situation deteriorates.
Paired commitments: Before a difficulty appears, two community members may promise each other that they will assertively intercede if one of them is ever in need of intervention. This clarifies, ahead of time, that they have permission and are expected to get involved if one of them is in difficulty.
If a mistake is found or suspected, it is RC practice to offer counseling to the community members involved. A person having made a mistake needs, where possible, to admit the mistake openly, apologize for it, and offer to remedy any harm.
A mistake, when handled well, can be an opening for everyone’s growth, similar to how mistakes are handled using a restorative justice model.
Because of the role they play, RC leaders are expected to be especially rigorous in their RC practice, to continually reassess their work, to be attentive to RC guidelines, and to use RC tools to grow in their job. There are counseling formats and self-estimation formats specifically to give a leader’s constituency chances to directly address any difficulties.
Safeguards can provide guardrails to reduce the likelihood of errors, provide chances to continually improve our functioning, and, in the event a mistake occurs, offer us a chance to understand why it was a mistake in order to prevent future ones.
MISTAKES
None of our safeguards mean there will be no mistakes. One of the effects of living in societies containing oppression is that merely growing up in them means we will absorb some of their misinformation. This ensures our conditioning will lead us to make mistakes with one another.
And yet, new and unproven efforts are necessary. If no one is allowed to try, to dare to be mistaken, and to learn from mistakes, then we have little ability to learn.
If we have no mechanisms that allow for recovery from mistakes, both for those who were hurt by mistakes and for those who committed error, we have no way to create a workable and just society. Because really, that is all of us.
Mistakes can be made because we may not know enough or because we carry unresolved hurt. They can be made by our eagerness to help without an adequate assessment of our capabilities or by our lack of understanding a context. They can be extremely hurtful and confusing.
Those of us who are organizing for a more human-centered world will do so imperfectly. We will make mistakes.
Mistakes due to ignorance or upset or confusion are different than those made with deliberate, malicious intent. That distinction matters.
HARM CAN OCCUR OR BE FELT “INTENTIONALLY” OR "INADVERTENTLY"
Painfully experienced past harms may cause someone to feel “justified,” even “righteous,” in acting out damaging behavior from their past at someone else. This acting out can include an intense desire to be “winning” or dominating and can appear to be deliberate. It can also include the feeling of obtaining revenge or of “righting a wrong.”
Painful harms can also happen “inadvertently” while trying to think about and care for someone. Parents can inflict harsh experiences on their children with well-meant attempts to “protect” or “help” them, inadvertently dominating instead of helping. This can happen when the parents’ minds are lost in feelings similar to feelings from their own confusing childhoods. It can leave a young person feeling alone and uncared for, and even feeling that the hurt was intentionally inflicted.
It can also be true that no harm may have happened but instead something was too reminiscent of real harms in the past, causing a surge of memories and feelings from the past. This can deeply confuse us about what is happening in the present.
Malicious acting out is done with the apparent “intention” of causing harm. Our experience has led us to believe that even those who commit malicious harms are not inherently evil—they are reenacting the cruel mistreatment that they themselves suffered in the past.
Our experience leads us to believe that every human being would want to be prevented from harming others if their mind were not driven by the mistreatment they had suffered.
WITHIN RC, WHAT WE UNDERSTAND ABOUT HOW TO MOVE FORWARD WHEN HARMS HAPPEN OR APPEAR TO HAPPEN
When harm has happened, the first requirement is to end that harm immediately.
Any healing of harm must begin with the ending of that harm and anything that perpetuates it.
The redress of past harms (whether systemic or individual) can be sought with a focus on changing the present and the future.
Punishment or revenge perpetuates the ongoing cycle of passing on harm rather than healing harm.
Acting out the painful emotions from a past or present hurt cannot resolve past mistakes.
We cannot change or fix the past. We can acknowledge it, learn from it, and do the work to resolve any pulls to act out similar harm. Often, though not always, we can repair the damage, and keep the past damage from being carried into the future. We can significantly and proactively shift resources to alter the present and the future.
Feelings from past hurts can cloud or confuse our judgment in the present. Trying to cope with and think about a hurt in the present is made more difficult because the past interferes with our judgment. But harsh things that happened and were not handled long ago can become accessible to our minds to be dealt with. They can eventually be sorted to a clear resolution.
Sometimes we are trying to process an upsetting incident when there was no actual harm done in the present. At these times the incident can bring up a chain of times when there was harm done. We need help to remove the confusion between the past and present instances in order to find our own clear thinking.
The punishment, blame, or isolation of someone who has harmed others drives that person deeper into confusion.
Malicious acting out (destructive acts done with every appearance of intention to cause harm) requires many more resources to resolve and needs thoughtful and firm procedures to keep individuals from doing harm to others.
The RC community recognizes that it does not possess the resources to offer help to people saddled with malicious patterns of behavior. Some individuals in RC have chosen to use their personal commitment to help free individuals they care about from these patterns, using our theory and practice.
INTERNAL PRACTICES IN THE AFTERMATH OF ANY MISTAKES OR HARMS
For the person harmed, our practice is to listen intensively with caring, kindness, confidence, and compassion. We will offer suggestions to encourage the person to express any feelings of grief, anger, fear, hopelessness about recovery, and so on.
Sometimes a person has no “proof” of what happened in the past or the present. This doesn’t automatically impede their ability to work on the incident and how it affected them. They don’t have to be certain about what is “true” in order to work on harm or upset. We can know that the person’s mind is working and needs space to work. They will sort through whatever occurred, given enough time and resources. Our job when counselor is to remember that they are whole, good, intelligent, and powerful. We can hold out that they can overcome the effects of any hurt.
With resource and support, we can strive to rid ourselves of any vestiges of past mistreatment.
Each of us can face, feel, and express fully in our sessions any harsh and negative feelings from past experiences. This allows us to gain a clearer perspective, which will assist us in recovering from harms inflicted in the present.
We do not want our existence to be determined by past harms forever.
For those who have caused harm, the practice is much the same but with additional practical and concrete requirements—beginning with a requirement to end harming others and firm guidelines for what needs to happen if the person is to continue in the RC communities.
An internal and individual healing process is different from what is needed to secure an end to institutional and structural harms. A transition to more rational structures for our societies will require organized, persistent, large, and unified efforts. It will necessitate an immediate end to egregious practices to stop generating more harm.
Many of us believe that achieving more human societies will happen sooner if we can operate from positions of our own innate power of decision, intelligence, and unity with all people.
We believe this will happen most quickly if people can recover from their own individual hurts.
CHALLENGING MISTAKES OR DAMAGE OUTSIDE OF AN RC CONTEXT
We know how badly hurt people can become. We never want to excuse away damaging behavior. We want to try to address it with all the tools and resources at our disposal.
We are not naïve about how in most current legal systems, such as the ones most of us in the world live in, “. . . legal or other punitive consequences [hang] over the heads of [the accused].”(Quote by sujatha baliga) Such systems do not provide the possibility of the accused taking responsibility, admitting culpability, and expressing remorse without subjecting themselves to punitive actions within the legal system. Nor do they encourage a process to repair the effects of harm and allow for resolutions that lead to ending the root causes of harm. “The stakes remain too high for the truth to come out, and restorative justice’s core work—recognizing harm, taking responsibility for it, and beginning to repair it—cannot happen under these circumstances.”(Quote by sujatha baliga)
We currently live in systems that do not permit a “restorative justice” ethos. Where that model has been used and where sufficient resources are in place, it can help create the safety necessary to end the cycle of retribution and move us forward in recovering from injury.
We understand that we cannot change the past—but we can help determine a better future.
CLOSING
As societal unworkability is more and more exposed, we see increasing and sometimes deliberate attempts to disrupt the functioning of any organized effort to rebuild our world towards a workable, humane, and life-sustaining one.
Organizations effectively fighting for individual or structural progress have always had their leadership and their work targeted. History is rife with examples. And if using a chosen target fails to do damage, a next target will be found, and so on.
Attacks may seek to isolate organizations from potential allies, or distract the population from current inequities and increasing crises. Some will aim simply to raise ad revenue or site traffic, and some will just arise from opportunistic personal career or financial motivations.
Whatever the means—whether careless and blunt destructive force, gross misrepresentation, vindictive punishment, biased and mechanical legal maneuvers, or fear-mongering through unanswerable smears—oppressive systems, along with their supporters (be they champions or unwitting enablers) act to keep struggling societal systems in place.
These campaigns and their tactics are never an attempt to give redress to a wrong, or to provide more resources to end harm or build foundations for a future public good, though they may camouflage themselves as such. Instead, they leave more damage in their wake.
This “poisoned bait” is intended to distract us in this disintegrating and unjust world. It seeks to undermine the already challenging effort to build the unity needed to end the oppressive nature of our societies.
Right now, “divide and conquer” appears to be the key challenge to solve in order to end the destruction of people and planet.
We believe there is a need to unify on common principles. Unity on everything can’t happen all at once, but we don’t need full agreement to be able to begin.
****
In relation specifically to Re-evaluation Counseling, please see this website for further explanation of our work and some rebuttals to the attempts to disparage our leaders, our work, and our members.
We invite you to learn about who we are from our point of view, and then arrive at your own conclusions.
We will continue the work to build a truly grassroots organization towards the goal of creating a better world, no matter what.
Thank you for reading.
(Present Time 206, January 2022)