How does Self governance end?

[undergroundpanther]

long before the OWS movement.. there were self governing communities full of unlikely people governing themselves.. Some ex psych patients created a place they,themselves governed. There was no hierarchy,all people there were part of the peer community took part in running the place.

There was such a place in my county. 5 years ago around thee weeks before halloween was when I first darkened the door .It was a place like no other.Suddenly I found I was part of something,precious,a piece of a self governing network of communities all over the state.


Peer run drop ins,for psych survivors run by by their peers with no state, corporate,professional (therapists etc.) or religious interference in how it runs itself.

It was very different than anything I had known before. I was involved before I knew it,the people were.I loved being part of it. The drop ins I went to were tribal psych survivors finding strength by being part of a spontaneous,genuine community, politically aware and fighting against stigma,defending, supporting and advocating people with mental illness or psychiatric injury some were for GLBT people with psych issues.Sometimes fighting for the human rights of people inside the psych system and for our rights everywhere else.We educated people so they were not scared of us,we told cops what NOT to do when handling a crisis..Used to be it was part talking group,venting,sharing issues,good or shitty,socializing, maybe another peer group would come over,or we celebrated birthdays and holidays, listened to tunes, shot pool,we cooked our own food,taught each other how to cook,we kept clean and took care of the physical building the group rented or owned ,we made it comfy,and inviting. At one drop in for psych survivors who were GLBT I put together the newsletter,painted murals on the walls did banners for pride,and tons other stuff not because I was told to,I wanted to give back....We went on trips,conferences,fought the county and state boards of mental health.Educated psych students in classes. Each drop in was without any authoritarian structure.It was a self organizing process that was changing,and moved with the people who attended there and it was unlike anything else for psych survivors maybe except for soteria house.

I felt like I could help and change things while involved with the ex-psych,psych rights/ peer run drop in movement...

It was a healthy organization.. once..
How these changes happened was not all of a sudden.As soon as the old director who was an authoritarian personality who was also director of a corporate psychosocial program who was pretty disengaged from the drop in. Another peer did a significant amount the day to day business part of it as peers who did this were hired on to do it,but they were seen as peers like everyone else.

This process was started by the old director who didn't want the job, installing her handpicked truly toxic replacement who also being an authoritarian personality.

When this tyrant felt like she had adequate trust and she knew her job was secure,She withdrew from participating with the peers. Her first rules were who had access to things,things were not open anymore..The paid peers began to appear more like staff.One day the peer staff and the director carried keys,openly like psych hospital staff do on a wristband or lanyard .Originally the peer hires kept the door key in the pocket among the car keys.But this change would insert a sign of hierarchical control& changes being imposed to further create atmosphere of repression in a community used to governing itself. The new director was so fucking evil in how she did this she knew what keys on display means to ex patients,staff holds the keys to the an inpatient's freedoms or rules and the keys signal force as in if you resist too much they have power over you they can use against you.

The other office peer had to stop delegating work to peers so she was very busy out among people and busting her hump doing this director's job too.Than she separated the offices from open peer access,she began requiring peers to ask permission to enter to talk to the peers yelling up from downstairs! We used to tap and ask,most the time the doors were open. Suddenly the community had three tiers, the tyrant,and the paid peer staff as the chain of 'command, and the rest of us peons.More petty rules started appearing outta nowhere without peer consent..The peer counselor started looking tired stressed,I asked her what was getting at her She told it all while driving me home,her car was private...The paid peer hid this resentment and anger from the authoritarian director,scared to confront her.I .Next the groups were made up,formalized,a sharp signal of begin and ending as tyrant patronizingly talked down to us.People started resenting her and saying they didn't like her,and said hilariously sarcastic comments when she was out of earshot. Then there was talk of a new hire.Peers got to meet potential hires and decide together who'd be a fit.One lady candidate was so awesome everyone liked her and wanted her hired.But the problem was this potential hire was community oriented and had a will of her own. She was the peers choice.But unlike before all the peers votes were negated,a person from outside was hired who stuck around like 5 minutes so very few peers met her.I got to,her handshake was cold like wiggling a dead wet fish.She was really introverted and passive.I think she was hired because she was obedient,easily intimidated and was ok being tyrants ears and eyes who reported back to her.

Peers figured out why her the first day she was there.She was lazy did nothing but sit around at the table,eat the food that was there for everyone.play on the laptop.Telling peers to do this in such a patronizing tone it pissed me off,and I told her are you a peer? I handed her a broom and said hop to it hunny in the same patronizing voice she was using.. Then she let it slip she was not a peer.(later she became one saw her in the therapists wait room)

So In a span of around 3 months a self governing community was asking permission,to get stuff in the fridge,to go in the office,to get napkins,scared to openly speak in our own building, and accepted order from the laziest staff evar, a smoldering resentment and disgust was present in everyone and people didn't like what was happening and They told me all about it,what was pulled on the other hire staff and on the peers..I decided to get people to write all the incidents down, I collected them.Tyrant was becoming abusive to peer & peer staff.She was pushy,intimidating,mean,rude callous to peers,she even bullied some,and let her bigotry of overweight people show and her homophobia.I observed her saying cruel shit myself.The place was tense . Fewer came in but spent more time hanging out at the park.She was a cuss nanny and had favorites among peers the fundamentalist christians,like herself. and because the fundies got subtle preferential treatment.They started harassing other peers over religion.Before tyrant we all knew their religion but the community didn't let these peers get obnoxiously in your face.

I contacted people that could help this situation.I was witnessing peers provoked to tears by the queen bitch.And I began to hate and I was out to get her out..

In the original location the rooms were large and open, there was a big room with a huge table people sat at to talk,and a living room was open to the big room .The house itself fostered a feeling of community and connection.There was a deck out back for people to smoke and sit down that non smokers could sit there also without choking. up the stars was the bathroom for everyone's use and offices of the peer managers doing admin shit like the newsletter .
Tyrant decided the drop in had to move next door.The peer staff told me she didn't like the new place, she snuck me in to help her measure rooms and windows and stuff. The rooms were very closed off lots of room divisions, all the rooms were lined up along one main hallway. The kitchen was designed by idiots.There were two bedrooms upstairs that would become two separated offices,the large table barely fit in the second largest room so gone was the table full of people sharing meals, and stuff. there wasen't enough room so people ate in different rooms balancing plates on knees.Gone was the open floor plan,and the deck,There was a stoop in front and on the side.The yard was full of prickly grass and stunted trees.Near the side porch was a fucking big ass wide based holly bush and some kind of nasty prickly ornamental vine,dangling from the maple tree and a hornet nest too high up to remove,all surrounding the stoop that would hold at most 3 people,more and people were standing in the sidewalk. The rain would drip off the edge of the roof above. It was a nightmare in winter.It Limited how many people could be together outside. Coincidentally the side porch was right under the window of tyrants office. Well there was a peer push back some wanted me on the board.So I went to be considered as a board peer.Used to be a rotating job.I was shocked at the lack of a written agenda,or no paper with the budget or even the written down minutes from last meeting. I was rather horrified at the incompetent cavalier attitude about the agenda the budget ,no writing down,that bothered me..


One day when She figured out I went over her head in the network, called the watchdogs on her. So she tried to get the peer staff who looked as if she was crying, to say stuff,she didn't say anything and tyrant kicked her out like a dog as she closed the door .Tyrant got in my face demanding I only talk to her about issues with the drop in.I told her I will go wherever I need to go to get what the drop in needs to be done and I don't care if you don't like it.I made it crystal clear she could not ever hope to control me. I went downstairs, she slammed the door behind me.It got so bad this bully director made it a rule to not speak my name when I was not there.(I couldn't believe she was THAT petty,but she really WAS).Eventually she and her pet were forced out using the bullies own bigotries against her.(She refused to have a peer especially an overweight female peer as her her boss,we found a loophole in the bylaws and it was so,and tyrant could not do anything ..)that was what pushed her out the door. As we cleaned out the mess left in her office We noticed she robbed the fund for running the drop in,she had a shit load of propaganda in the closet,brochures selling"miracle water"We saved the papers she had a peer unknowingly fill out for her falsifying her income to SS, Weirdest of all she had my phone number in BIG letters on a neon pink post it note inside the cabinet door directly over her desk,all the others were yellow. When the Open house party was thrown for that spring,The old director funning the psychosocial program I would later be kicked out of for no reason given,was throwing homophobic slurs at my boyfriend and I the whole time.I had to go.It was disgusting.I was exhausted fighting these nasty assholes anyway.

Recently I stopped by the drop in,I was gone for over a year it had changed for the worse.The state has occupied the board, to get funds it is now a miserable place.Addicts who are high,drunks who are drunk were making it unsafe and pointless.(actual physical fights in the living room,abuse,sexual threats,all kinds of drama shit.) Fundie churches have invaded they try to covert peers under the guise of 'helping out' and free food,Corporate agendas pushing bio psych models as the only valid treatment,pharma presentations with free pens n shit,doing 'buzz' marketing as 'medication education'.I wonder if the place might,endanger peers,with all the drunk and high people inside and outside fighting & fucking in the woods and being a bunch of assholes, who can't be kicked out apparently.Or the board a bunch of "professional"Suits who ensure peers disengaged from the decision process of a place that was once everyone's.All the mutual expectations & community obligations and connections the give and take and sharing and looking out for each other that made the place so precious to me didn't recover,it just died.

One good place in a bad world gone .Now,the kitchen is sealed off with a chain and the fridge has this crazy lock contraption covering half the doors .The loss is tragic in a lonely county for most people out here with mental illness psychiatric injuries. Just 1 authoritarian personality was all it took to kill a thriving community that more than once,saved my life and they never knew it. Fighting for it was the only thing I could do,even though it failed.

So Any self governing community should be aware very few authoritarian/sociopath/narcissistic can bring it all down,if there is no hierarchy,they'll make one.and Even tho this situation is very different the tyrants tactics will have the same result.I dunno How many OWS are aware of the dangers bad personalities pose,but I hope this story is useful.

[knowbody0]

1. sadly, this is human behavior.

power corupts. period.

[Marazinia]

2. That's horrible

I'm sorry for what you went through and what you and everyone else lost.

[canetoad]

3. If there is no hierarchy, they'll make one

Of course they will. For every twenty peaceful citizens who just want to exist, there will be one greedy bastard who thinks they deserve more than the rest.

This individual will exploit kindness, civility and the general good will of the community s/he lives in. And guess what; they will succeed, because genuine peace loving people are not prepared to tackle them on their own perverted selfish terms. It's simply beyond the scope of their experience.