Protocol and procedures highlighting expectations and boundaries of any empowering work glaccnet does with any group:
We believe survivors, and we are advocates for survivor-centred, non-carceral approaches
towards transformative justice. We encourage abusers to take authentic action and steps towards accountability. We advocate the wider music community to develop and uphold sustainable values and practices that support and empower marginalised voices within the community.
Ultimately, accountability and transformative justice include the well-being of the abuser, as those who cause harm to others are often in pain or survivors of abuse themselves. However, transformative justice centres on the well-being of the survivor as their well-being has been severely impacted by the abuser in the first place. This is a conscious action to restore the survivor’s personhood. Transformative justice encourages abusers to take responsibility for themselves and look into what pain they’ve experienced in life has caused them to inflict harm on others and to seek professional avenues to resolve that pain with the aim that they will no longer harm others with their actions in the future. When abusers refuse to engage with a process of accountability, the safety of the community at large is prioritised.
Accountability, to GAN, can look something like acknowledgment of harm, authentic apology with no excuses or self-pity and action through commitment to change. However, GAN acknowledges that accountability is subjective and one survivor’s wishes may be different from others. What the survivor(s) want and feel validated by is the most important part of this process.
Accountability is the responsibility of the abuser to those who are and were harmed by their behaviour. If the survivor(s) aren’t being listened to, are having their request for accountability left unacknowledged or are being subjected to further abuse, we believe it is up to the community to take further action to interject and remove the abuser.
When all other avenues of accountability fail, we support survivors in amplifying their voice and experience. Call outs are often emotionally freeing for the survivor(s). However, the impact and labour involved post-call out can last for weeks and months. Hence, we encourage larger community involvement, education and raised consciousness moving forward - call-outs are often a last resort of survivor(s) when calling in on abusers has fallen on deaf ears and hasn’t led to any actions towards accountability.
GAN cannot enact immediate/initial call-outs for individuals. GAN can assist in guiding individuals and smaller communities in taking their initial steps towards transformative justice. We encourage calling-in abusers initially if it’s safe to do so and the survivor(s) are well-supported and there are avenues to do this without putting the survivor(s) at further risk.
If a situation escalates or has already escalated to a public call-out, GAN supports smaller community groups with their actions. We can use glaccnet to amplify this call-out. We respect and support victims of abuse through their self-determined means of seeking accountability and transformative justice.
We ask for groups/individuals to consider the impact and labour that comes with calling out alongside their personal well-being before taking action. GAN can signpost individuals and communities towards the appropriate resources to support them during this time. We recognise for all parties involved that this work can be detrimental to everyone’s health, particularly when abusers refuse to engage with transformative justice or hold themselves accountable. We believe a lack of individual accountability leads to further harm for both the individual and all those impacted by them.
We hope that through education on accountability and transformative justice, that we can normalise accountability, checking in and calling in with each other within our communities; to encourage everyone to consider how their actions impact one another and hopefully avoid their laborious, emotionally draining conflicts in the future. We encourage that calling up your friends on their harmful behaviour is an action of compassion and care.
How to stand with/support survivors:
GAN’s long-term aim currently is to provide education to the community regarding accountability and transformative justice. We aim to support smaller community groups with their own interventions and actions towards transformative justice with harm-doers within their groups before things escalate towards a larger community call out. This includes signposting individuals to the appropriate services, organisations and practitioners to support them through their situation. If things escalate to a call out, GAN will amplify these actions and stand in solidarity with that community.
Ultimately, we hope to set an example that abusers and their negative behaviour will no longer be tolerated or welcome within music communities. Hopefully, through setting this example, abusers and those who enact harm will begin to seek professional help of their own accord and begin to hold themselves accountable for their harmful actions in private or through intervention from friends before harm is caused in the future.
We hope our presence reminds survivors, who may not have processed their own experiences yet, that they’re not alone and that we believe them unequivocally. We hope for survivors who feel dismissed or deprived of justice that there’s people willing to come together to support them, empower them and achieve justice on their terms.
How to stand with/support survivors: