A failure by the courts doesn’t negate the truth of what happened. Police not pressing charges doesn’t mean someone is innocent. Proving abuse and assault happened in the court of law is extremely challenging with such a very high burden of proof. These types of cases are famously under-prosecuted.

Just because a case gets dismissed or a jury find an accused abuser, not guilty, does not always mean they were in fact not guilty. Not guilty is not the same as innocent.

Please don’t weaponize yet another failure of the courts to frame incorrect narratives for content. It comes at the expense of survivors and our communities.

For folks sharing trial updates, reminder these woman were never on trial. Combs being acquitted of several charges does not mean these brave victims were lying or that he is in fact, not guilty. Our systems are not set up to support survivors, especially Black survivors.

Our survival is political when many of the avenues to justice and support have a long history of abusing, pathologizing, and criminalizing our very existence. As advocates and trauma support specialist we don't acknowledge it, we are complicit in that harm.

The world we live in is political. Racist, misogynist, classist, homophobic, ableist systems don't just magic themselves into our cultures. People both knowingly and unknowingly uphold these systems of oppression.

Survivors aren't less than for having been subjected to all they have been. Creating room for a survivor's agency to thrive is so important. They need to be heard, validated, given access to ways that feel healing to them. Supporting survivors means respecting survivors.

We tell survivors to speak up and share what they need but when they do, survivors are often shamed and blamed, made to feel like they're asking too much, wrong, or not trying hard enough. Each survivor is the expert on themselves and their wants, needs, and unique experiences.

Society & those around us act as self-nominated-quite-partial arbitrators to our lived experiences, to our grief, to our growth. When survivors choose their own path or don't reform to the impossible, they're punished by those around them holding their invisible measuring sticks.