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[sonia]

I sent out a newsletter yesterday. As always, I got a handful of unsubscribes afterwards, most without giving a reason.

One person said, "Because you referenced politics in this email. This is not the forum to voice your political opinion." My internal response was, "Uh, it's my forum." And, "Of course trauma is political!" I understand that they meant they don't want to hear about politics at this stage of their healing, and of course I'm not going to say anything back to them.

It reminded me of something I read a long time ago (and can't find a reference for now) about the stages of healing from trauma.

1. Crisis - focus on the inner world.
   
2. Coping - focus on the immediate situation of job, relationships, etc.
   
3. Activism - focus on community and the wider world.

I can see how someone in the first two stages would find talk of politics intrusive.

Another one said, "Trauma is resolved." My first response was, "Go you!" I'm so pleased for that person, and at the same time, my body can't really imagine something so complete and definite around my complex trauma. There have been times in my life where it was quiescent, maybe because I had firmly shut the door on it, but it has always arisen again. Each time a little less sharp, more rounded, worn down like an old mountain range but still there, still part of my inner landscape.

While I was digging for the stages of healing quote, I ran across this great therapist site, Liberation Healing in Seattle. Looks like he's on break until January, but he does online sessions for people living in Washington and California, in case anyone is looking.

Comments

[thistleingrey]

Hmm, to me, "Trauma is resolved" means the topic has gone dormant and I can pause working actively on it, not that it's away and gone. I wonder how it feels/felt to that person.

[sonia]

Your interpretation is more like what I've experienced, so maybe that is what they meant.

[sabotabby]

Huh, that actually makes a lot of sense with my students. I always find they're so inward-looking despite identifying more or less the same problems in the world that I do.

[sonia]

Interesting that you're seeing that. Lots of traumatized kids out there, sadly. I'm always impressed by people like Greta Thunberg who are looking outward at a young age.

[sabotabby]

I'm not sure that's ever been a significant percentage of kids (which is why Greta stands out so much), but I definitely see it as worse. Though, to be fair, I work in a school where nearly every kid has mental health issues and that's why they're there.

There was a concerted effort to kill student activism when I started teaching that was extremely successful until the downfall of Me to We. Now it's coming back, especially around issues like Palestine or Black Lives Matter. But we have a whole generation that has forgotten how to self-organize.

[sonia]

There was a concerted effort to kill student activism
D: I mean, of course there was, but I hadn't thought about it that way.

[sabotabby]

I can go on a lengthy rant about this but yeah, at least here when I was growing up, student activism was a very organic thing. Certainly there were Amnesty clubs and Model UN for the kids headed from the uni-to-NGO pipeline, but there were also more informal student protests and walkouts. With us, there were multiple in-school student groups that served to educate and radicalize us, and while they were official in the sense that they had club status and a teacher advisor, it was very self-directed.

By the time I started teaching, those tended to be replaced by a single social justice club and multiple ethnic/cultural student groups, the latter focused on multicultural events and the arts over activism. The former were completely colonized by Free the Children/Me To We, which provided clubs and teacher advisors with thick, glossy binders full of sanctioned activities and sent kids to exciting stadium events and trips to the Global South. It was made worse by the degree to which these kinds of activities could be used for the 40 mandatory volunteer hours (it's harder to get those going to a protest). This essentially neutered not just the kids who'd have gone the NGO route but also a lot of the ones who might have gone harder left.

Me To We's spectacular implosion has revived a lot of student activism. In particular, the Black and Muslim student associations in my building are doing tremendous work.

[sonia]

Thanks for this info! I'm glad you had that growing up, and sad that a whole generation of students missed out, for them and for our wider world. Good to hear that the students are returning to activism.