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Cw sexual harassment and sexual assault
My heart goes out to those survivors of Ben& #39;s actions and the victims of his ignorance of consent and abuse of power. His actions were unacceptable and I believe his remorse is genuine, so I hope his continued actions will be genuine.+ https://twitter.com/SwordsnFlowers/status/1279140213114015744">https://twitter.com/SwordsnFl...
My heart goes out to those survivors of Ben& #39;s actions and the victims of his ignorance of consent and abuse of power. His actions were unacceptable and I believe his remorse is genuine, so I hope his continued actions will be genuine.+ https://twitter.com/SwordsnFlowers/status/1279140213114015744">https://twitter.com/SwordsnFl...
Full disclosure: as a friend of Ben and someone who believes in rehabilitation, I& #39;m keeping in contact with him as he continues therapy and steps down from his positions of power in hopes that I can act as a positive force to encourage him to keep to rehabilitation.+
I am NOT forgiving his actions or saying those actions are acceptable. I am not standing by him as someone who thinks he is free of error. I just believe in rehabilitation and want him to change and stay on a path where he makes every effort to be better and make reparations.+
I understand some people will not understand how I can keep in touch with someone who has done terrible things, especially as a survivor, but I believe Ben is & has been taking actions to make amends for what he& #39;s done. Consider me his Jiminy Cricket, reminding him to be better.+
If he continues to offend, I absolutely will cut ties & I think he is very clear on the boundaries there. But I wanted to be honest that my continued contact is in hopes he can be rehabilitated, since I believe in that model. Again, this is not forgiveness. It& #39;s hope for change.
(Note that we are on opposite sides of the world so I can only be in contact & influence him via messaging, but I can at least try to be a positive influence in Ben& #39;s path. I don& #39;t know how long I will maintain it but I told him I would at least try to support him fixing things.)
I wanted to be honest about this but I know that is going to cause a rift with me and many people. I just don& #39;t know how I can speak about rehabilitation and preach that people can change and be angry over people abandoning me when I made mistakes and not at least try.
