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deanspade.bsky.social
Dean Spade
@deanspade.bsky.social
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Dean Spade @deanspade.bsky.social · Jun 11
I am so excited to announce Love in a F*cked Up World, the podcast! The first episode is out today — a conversation with adrienne maree brown — and I'll be releasing new episodes every two weeks for the next few months.

youtu.be/m-a1yDmReGQ?...
Introducing: Love in a F*cked Up World | Podcast with Dean Spade
YouTube video by Dean Spade
youtu.be
deanspade.bsky.social
Wrote about what happens when conflict appears in our movement spaces and how to move through it instead of abandoning our work in @npquarterly.bsky.social !

nonprofitquarterly.org/navigating-c...
Disappointment, Conflict, and Burnout in Care and Resistance Work People often experience a special kind of disappointment in resistance work. We join groups to do something that we really care about. Often, we are relieved to finally find people who see things the way we do, excited to be understood and have accompaniment and solidarity. We have high expectations for each other. And then we find out that we're all very human and imperfect. I have found that burnout is not usually just a result of being tired. Most people I've talked to who feel burned out and leave movement work, during the laset 28 years that I have been in these movements, are actually in pain because of unresolved conflict. They joined work they really cared about, something went wrong that made them feel betrayed or left out or disappointed, and that is the pain of the burnout. It wasn't just the hard work; it was the loss of trust, the feeling of being blamed or stigmatized, or not being listened to. Abolitionism and Transformative Justice I've spent the last decades in the movement for police, prison, and border abolition. I believe we shouldn't have of those structures. Abolitionists use a concept called "transformative justice" to describe the work we do to address conflict without using police. There is a lot of conflict, harm, and violence in our communities, we know the police don't help and only make it worse. Transformative justice practices do three things: 1. Work to figure out and provide what the person or people who have been harmed need to heal and participate in community, to not be isolated by what happened to them, and to be listened to, even though we can't undo what happened. 2. Work to figure out and provide what the person or people who did the harm need to stop doing it. 3. Work to figure out what the community surrounding the harm could do to make it less likely--how did we all set up a situation that made this more likely? When Big Reactions Happen One thing that is surprising and challenging about the emotional dynamics of conflict is that we do the most harm to others when we are feeling aggrieved, victimized, left out, and/or resentful. It's counterintuitive because these are the moments when we are focused on what others did wrong and how we are hurting. But those are the times we are most likely to do something harmful, like go and write the really messed up email to somebody, treat somebody with the cold shoulder, gossip negatively about people in our group or about another group in town, post a bunch of stuff on Instagram that's really inflammatory, or violate someone's privacy. As strange as it might seem, it's when I'm feeling like the victim that I should ask for help from a friend to figure out what the right-sized response is, or to figure out if I'm still too upset to decide how to respond and need more time. It's not that we aren't legitimately sometimes victimized, but the victim narrative in our heads can cause us to skip our value assessment and then do stuff that later we wish we hadn't done. It's not bad to feel this way, but we should consider what to do with these feelings since they are inevitably going to come up in our groups and in ourselves. Centering Belonging I was recently talking to somebody who's doing a conflict support process with a group that's had a major difficult conflict. And one of the things the person is doing is individually reaching out to the 40 or 50 people who all were involved in the group over these many years where these hard things were happening. The people from the group have been telling the conflict support person, who's not even in the group, "It just means so much to me that you're listening to me." We live in societies that minimize our experiences of pain and harm. And so, we join movement groups and we hope we're finally going to be part of something where we're heard and seen. And then we have a bad experience where people don't hear us or see us at some point. And then we wreak havoc. We're like, I have to tear down everybody in this group, and this group itself, because I'm feeling all of my historical cumulative pain of being dismissed. If we could catch each other in the moment of pain and listen, I think it could be a huge change in the likelihood of those conflicts escalating to the most disorganizing behaviors between us.
December 29, 2025 at 7:41 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
In this episode, Morgan Bassichis and I talk about giving and receiving feedback directly as a way to build relationships, and prevent conflict from escalating to destructive and disorganizing levels.
December 24, 2025 at 5:33 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Grateful to Ciro for animating this clip from the recent episode where Morgan Bassichis and I talk about how to deescalate a crush. You can watch the episode on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts.
December 23, 2025 at 3:57 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
The second edition of Mutual Aid is coming out on March 31 from @versobooks.bsky.social
December 19, 2025 at 11:21 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Thrilled to share this conversation with Shira Hassan, a brilliant writer, organizer, facilitator, and friend who has influenced harm reduction and transformative justice work, and my own thinking and practice, for decades.
December 11, 2025 at 9:19 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Preorder the second edition of Mutual Aid, out March 31st. I wrote a new section about what I learned about mutual aid since 2020 and updated various sections of the book.

Preorder here: store.deanspade.net

We also have shirts, hoodies, mugs, and totes! All proceeds go to support the podcast.
Dean Spade's Store
Dean Spade's Store
store.deanspade.net
December 11, 2025 at 3:12 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
A new review of LIAFUW is coming out in Daughters!

Daughters is a magazine featuring over 35 incarcerated voices speaking to conditions of confinement with interviews, essays, poetry, legal news, legislative updates, and art! To support their work, subscribe here:

docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...
"Prisons are designed to keep us isolated. When we connect with our dear ones, every second is precious and the stakes are high. This added pressure means we have to strive to be as intentional as possible to make each moment count." - Endjah S. (SCI Cambridge Springs) "As a longtime prison abolitionist, Dean Spade is offering all of us insight on how to live, f*ck, be present, and survive with contextualized compassion for ourselves and others." - Endjah S. (SCI Cambridge Springs) Daughters cover image: beautiful illustration of two Black women on the top and bottom of the page with interconnecting braid hair and daffodils over their chests. They are over top a bright red border which as the words "Daughters" and "#13" and "Fall 2024" and "Let's Get Free's Magazine" over top with a bright yellow border. "Daughters is a faith-based, political publication founded by Sarita Miller (SCI Muncy) that aims to illuminate issues and perspectives, specifically those of women, pertaining to the crisis of mass incarceration."
December 10, 2025 at 2:51 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Crushes can be fun and enlivening, but sometimes they are ill-timed or ill-suited, and it can be hard to shake them off. In this episode, Morgan Bassichis and I discuss one of the most popular tools from Love in a F*cked Up World the book: 7 Steps for De-escalating a Crush.
November 26, 2025 at 10:57 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Here are a few thoughts about confidentiality and conflict, and in other news, I'm teaching a class about romcoms, consent, and the romance myth with Mia Schacter (@consent.wizardry) Wednesdays and Sundays, December 3-14, 11am-1pm PT / 2–4pm ET. Sign up at consentwizardry.com/guiltypleasure
November 23, 2025 at 11:17 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
How do you know if you should leave an organizing group or collaboration you are part of? Morgan Bassichis and I talk this through in this video, and you can watch the whole episode on youtube or listen wherever you get podcasts.
November 19, 2025 at 5:57 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Kelly Hayes’ writing and her Movement Memos Podcast episodes about AI have been immensely useful to me and I recommend them. In this clip from our recent conversation, Kelly talks about how AI is emerging in a context of alienation and dehumanization.
November 18, 2025 at 3:22 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
In this excerpt from my interview with Mariame Kaba, I talk about how avoidance is a reasonable response to a coercive society, but also can get in our way when it becomes a habit.

Watch the whole episode on Youtube or listen wherever you get your podcasts.
November 17, 2025 at 4:33 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
@jessicalanyadoo.bsky.social is back answering more listener questions on Part 2 of this AMA episode!

Listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch the full episode on YouTube.
November 13, 2025 at 2:32 AM
deanspade.bsky.social
In this clip from my recent conversation with David Palumbo-Liu, we talk about the difference between identifying behavior in others and identifying it in ourselves.

Listen to the whole episode of Speaking Out of Place wherever you get your podcasts.
November 11, 2025 at 5:17 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Thank you to @zahrastardust.bsky.social for this beautiful review of Love in a F*cked-Up World in @overlandjournal.bsky.social.

"Soft and fierce, utopian and practical, inscribed with beauty and strength, Love in a F*cked Up World is both an intervention and a guidebook."
“Revolutionary promiscuity”: loving one another in a f*cked up world - Overland literary journal
Soft and fierce, utopian and practical, inscribed with beauty and strength, Love in a F*cked Up World is both an intervention and a guidebook, offering real pathways towards collective, abundant and m...
overland.org.au
November 3, 2025 at 6:19 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Episode 10 is out! In this episode, I talk to Kelly Hayes, the brilliant journalist and organizer whose writing and podcast so many of us rely on to make sense of the world.

Watch on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts.
October 22, 2025 at 4:51 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Join me in Linz, Austria for a mutual aid workshop tomorrow 12-6pm with maiz! Attendance is free and you can register at their website: www.maiz.at/de/bereiche/...
Kultur | maiz
Aus unserem Widerstand gegenüber unsere eigenen Prekarität entwickeln sich Kunst- und Kulturproduktionen bis hin zum progressiven Aktivismus.
www.maiz.at
October 21, 2025 at 1:45 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
In this clip from Episode 9 of Love in a F*cked Up World, the podcast, the brilliant Weyam Ghadbian talks about whether the prevalence of insecure attachment might stem from the widespread forced displacement generations of people have experience because of colonialism, war, and ecological crisis.
October 15, 2025 at 7:23 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
The Berlin Poly Meetup is hosting me for a discussion of Love in a F*cked-Up World on Oct 26. Please join as at 5pm at Lovelite! ❤️
Pink, red, and yellow diagonal striped background with a cover of Love in a F*cked-Up World and text that reads, "Book Launch + Q&A with Author, October 26 5pm Lovelite, Organized by Berlin Internationals Polyamory Group"
October 15, 2025 at 7:04 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Morgan Bassichis introduced me to the idea that intentionally generating bad ideas for impossible actions, bad poetry, bad writing can loosen the rigid, critical mind that impedes our creativity.

Find more content like this and join the conversation on patreon.com/deanspade.
October 14, 2025 at 1:30 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Shuli Branson recently invited me on The Breakup Theory podcast to talk about a listener letter from someone who had a difficult experience with a community accountability process and was left feeling isolated and defeated.

You can listen to the whole episode wherever you get podcasts.
October 10, 2025 at 5:41 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
Often times, when we’re having heightened feelings in a group or relationship, on some level it feels like life-or-death, even if we logically know its just the dishes or the money or the jealousy or the disagreement in the meeting.
October 7, 2025 at 5:33 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
I'll be with @interruptcrim.bsky.social for a conversation about how to advance narratives that undermine authoritarianism and increase solidarity. Join me, @dreanyc123.bsky.social and Lewis Wallen on October 15th, 3pm est! ❤️ ❤️
Fighting Copaganda Under Authoritarianism — Interrupting Criminalization
A discussion of how to advance narratives that undermine authoritarianism and increase solidarity, featuring Interrupting Criminalization's Andrea Ritchie, Abolition Journalism Fellow Lewis Raven Wall...
www.interruptingcriminalization.com
October 6, 2025 at 3:02 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
If you are not in London but want to attend, there is an online/livestream option. Please still register at the link below to get the link! Tickets are free :)
October 3, 2025 at 3:59 PM
deanspade.bsky.social
How can you tell when it's time to leave a relationship with a person, project, job, or group? How can you tell if you have a tendency to walk away too fast or to stay too long in relationships?
September 29, 2025 at 7:59 PM