Please keep the context in mind when posting in threads in this area of the board. This part of the boards is expressly for those seeking or giving emotional support.
This area isn't a place for intellectual or political rants or venting, or anything else that doesn't bear in mind that people in this area are often here in a delicate emotional state and take that into consideration. It's a place for sensitive care, in a word.
Please bring other ways of posting and other kinds of posts and responses to other areas of the boards. Thank you.
Can you record a brief video of yourself talking about how Scarleteen has helped you? We're looking for clips for a fundraising video in the new year, and we'd love to have you involved! You can find out more, including how and where to upload your video, here: Scarleteen’s Project For Awesome 2025 submission! Our deadline for these is December 23rd 2024!
A reminder about this area
Forum rules
We ask that users looking for general, ongoing emotional support post in this area of the boards, and that you use this space to both ask for, give and receive that support primarily from each other, rather than from our staff and volunteers. As a staff, we simply are often too overextended with all we need to do in running the organization and its services to do that for extended periods of time, and one of our main aims of our community at the boards has always been to facilitate peers to better be there for each other.
Users often report that they have no in-person peers they can talk to or seek support from: we want this to be a space for online peer support and somewhere everyone can get some practice asking for, getting and giving support so that doing it with people in your lives feels more doable.
Please remember that neither staff, volunteers nor your fellow users can provide or replace mental healthcare when that is something you need. Users struggling with issues like anxiety, depression, abuse or physical health issues are strongly encouraged to seek out qualified, in-person help with those issues in addition to peer or staff support.
We ask that users looking for general, ongoing emotional support post in this area of the boards, and that you use this space to both ask for, give and receive that support primarily from each other, rather than from our staff and volunteers. As a staff, we simply are often too overextended with all we need to do in running the organization and its services to do that for extended periods of time, and one of our main aims of our community at the boards has always been to facilitate peers to better be there for each other.
Users often report that they have no in-person peers they can talk to or seek support from: we want this to be a space for online peer support and somewhere everyone can get some practice asking for, getting and giving support so that doing it with people in your lives feels more doable.
Please remember that neither staff, volunteers nor your fellow users can provide or replace mental healthcare when that is something you need. Users struggling with issues like anxiety, depression, abuse or physical health issues are strongly encouraged to seek out qualified, in-person help with those issues in addition to peer or staff support.
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Heather
- scarleteen founder & director
- Posts: 9731
- Joined: Sun Jul 27, 2014 11:43 am
- Age: 54
- Awesomeness Quotient: I have been a sex educator for over 25 years!
- Primary language: english
- Pronouns: they/them
- Sexual identity: queery-queer-queer
- Location: Chicago
A reminder about this area
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead
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cityofthedead
- not a newbie
- Posts: 80
- Joined: Sat Nov 26, 2016 2:21 pm
- Pronouns: he/him
- Location: United States
Re: A reminder about this area
Thanks for telling us, but whatever happened to that discussion you, I and Sam wrote in? Did you delete it?
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Heather
- scarleteen founder & director
- Posts: 9731
- Joined: Sun Jul 27, 2014 11:43 am
- Age: 54
- Awesomeness Quotient: I have been a sex educator for over 25 years!
- Primary language: english
- Pronouns: they/them
- Sexual identity: queery-queer-queer
- Location: Chicago
Re: A reminder about this area
I took it down.
I felt some of the responses in that thread were more likely to cue trauma (and I say this as someone who has themselves had that kind of violence directly in and around my life) than they were to be felt as supportive to someone feeling scared or who had survived that kind of violence. Effectively, I felt the responses in that thread made the thread I had started not just likely not useful, but counterproductive as an avenue of emotional support, which is what I intended the thread for.
I felt some of the responses in that thread were more likely to cue trauma (and I say this as someone who has themselves had that kind of violence directly in and around my life) than they were to be felt as supportive to someone feeling scared or who had survived that kind of violence. Effectively, I felt the responses in that thread made the thread I had started not just likely not useful, but counterproductive as an avenue of emotional support, which is what I intended the thread for.
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead
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cityofthedead
- not a newbie
- Posts: 80
- Joined: Sat Nov 26, 2016 2:21 pm
- Pronouns: he/him
- Location: United States
Re: A reminder about this area
I'm very sorry. Thinking of what I wrote to that forum, I was quite pessimistic. If you were (and it seems you have been) seeking out optimism after tragedies like the Vegas concert shooting, I'm not a good source of it. I'm sorry. I should never have even touched that discussion.
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Heather
- scarleteen founder & director
- Posts: 9731
- Joined: Sun Jul 27, 2014 11:43 am
- Age: 54
- Awesomeness Quotient: I have been a sex educator for over 25 years!
- Primary language: english
- Pronouns: they/them
- Sexual identity: queery-queer-queer
- Location: Chicago
Re: A reminder about this area
I appreciate that. It wasn't about seeking out optimism, but about emotional support (rather than intellectual debate or political venting). That doesn't have to be optimistic, but there were some elements in the whole thread (not just your own responses) that just felt counter to support to me.
But I do personally always appreciate statements of changed awareness about how any of us responds to delicate situations. All the same, no one actually used that thread for its intended purpose anyway, so it wasn't that huge a loss. Sometimes threads need to go poof here sometimes, It happens. Also: everyone doesn't have to be their A+ self here all of the time, either: that's kind of the point. No need to beat yourself up about this: this is just part of managing the space.
But I do personally always appreciate statements of changed awareness about how any of us responds to delicate situations. All the same, no one actually used that thread for its intended purpose anyway, so it wasn't that huge a loss. Sometimes threads need to go poof here sometimes, It happens. Also: everyone doesn't have to be their A+ self here all of the time, either: that's kind of the point. No need to beat yourself up about this: this is just part of managing the space.
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead
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cityofthedead
- not a newbie
- Posts: 80
- Joined: Sat Nov 26, 2016 2:21 pm
- Pronouns: he/him
- Location: United States
Re: A reminder about this area
Thanks again. The support and counter support is what I meant with optimism and pessimism respectively. I can't doubt myself for being unsupportively pessimistic on that thread no matter what you or anyone else may say.
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Heather
- scarleteen founder & director
- Posts: 9731
- Joined: Sun Jul 27, 2014 11:43 am
- Age: 54
- Awesomeness Quotient: I have been a sex educator for over 25 years!
- Primary language: english
- Pronouns: they/them
- Sexual identity: queery-queer-queer
- Location: Chicago
Re: A reminder about this area
Just FYI, between this and your post the other day (where I didn't want to respond and derail the thread), I'm concerned about you, cityofthedead. If you'd like to talk some about how you've been feeling and what you've been struggling with, please feel free to start a thread for that, and know I'll be on the lookout for it to offer some support if I can.
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. - Margaret Mead
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cityofthedead
- not a newbie
- Posts: 80
- Joined: Sat Nov 26, 2016 2:21 pm
- Pronouns: he/him
- Location: United States
Re: A reminder about this area
Thank you Heather. I'm totally alright. I'm in a very safe place where, from my knowledge, there has never been a terrorist attack or mass shooting. I've just been owning up and saying that I made a mistake in responding to that thread you would soon delete because I wasn't being supportive. I didn't realize how full of pessimism I was. I will be more careful of my point of view whenever I use these boards again.