Announcing: The Dissertation

The Intro. 👏🏾

I’ve decided to do a project to close out a rough chapter of my life where I’ve been facing abusers.

The Background.

About 5 years ago I had my heart broken by a company I worked for due to being tokenized racially. I won them awards, I founded a brand new department, and my existence there made them seem like they promoted a safe space for diverse types of people. And for all the good I did, I was kept in a place where they could use me as a display piece without me knowing they were cutting off my access to any forward movement. Like other similar moments in my life, I’ll never know what opportunities were lost.

Since that experience I’ve been dissecting what that meant for me and I’ve changed in both the way I see things & how I respond to them as well.

I began realizing the mechanics similar to what I experienced at that job were present throughout many of my personal & peripheral relationships. I also realize those troublesome mechanics were just as prominent in times before— just in ways I felt but couldn’t fully recognize. And I recognize they are likely waiting for me in the times ahead.

I also began to see how my experience connected to other people’s that were both like me and not— as we’ve all survived the way abusive entities target aspects of our identities which they deem as vulnerabilities.

And though the way I’ve been target is primarily racial, I’m finding that abuser tactics are the same or similar across the many parallels where they choose to victimize people for certain unique characteristics that may make up their identities.

As I’ve traced my finger along these parallel lines, I’ve slowly came to see a malicious intention embedded in those lines with the growing realization that I’ve been looking at a blueprint all along.

A blueprint to a large & greatly unfair System.

Survivor.

About 3 years ago I let my guard down. I was tired of my brain trying to crack those philosophical questions. People relentlessly told me ‘therapy’ because I was thinking too much about things that weren’t adding to my happiness. But therapy as a solution just didn’t feel right. I’d later realize that standard western psychotherapy methods don’t work well against issues systemic.

If a system runs continuous, with an output of that system being harm, western psychotherapy solutions of coping & compromise still permit a continuous onslaught of abuse. And what type of twisted world is that?

One day in late 2019 I was encouraged to stop focusing on these things so much. And I finally folded. I made a choice to just maybe ignore all the things bothering me and lower my guard.

“Maybe I just forget about it all and take it easy. Maybe it’s not that big of a deal.”

Soon after I met and dated an abuser from 2020 until 2022. This past January I left them. After walking away from them, while my back was turned, they attacked me. I survived though.

And like that, I’m now a survivor.

The Academia Analogy.

The instance of abuse I’ve experienced is like the cumulation of abuses I’ve experienced over the timeline of my life. If this were academia that relationship would be like my PhD years.

It was only after being attacked by this person that all those philosophical questions I had chewed on for years began to unpack.

So this project is like my dissertation. And in my dissertation I’m addressing topics I’ve observed the entirety of my life. This project hopefully results in my graduation.

But don’t worry!

Fortunately I have no plans on graduating from life anytime soon 😅, and unfortunately I’m not graduating from being subject to systemic racism— but I am graduating to a place where I’m seeing the world in a way that I hope can affect some change for people coming up behind me.

So what is this project about?

Everything, really.

And I know that’s not a poor descriptor but the way these systems affects our lives permeates through everything. I think it’s valuable to turn an eye towards that aspect. I’m choosing to do that personally in both creative and scientific ways to honor to the sides of myself that I’ve cultivated during my life.

What is the project?

The name of this project is:

“The Dissertation”

It’ll be represented in 2 parts.

( • ) writing

A set of written pieces that will live on the web (maybe Medium), with editorial art and animations attached to the pieces. While there are certain art/animation tasks I can finish myself I’ll be commissioning out to others to help bring this .

( • • ) voice & community

Fixed episode podcast speaking on the topics I’ve written about with guests speaking on their truths as well. It will likely go for 10-15 eps,

launching in the next 6 weeks.

black focused.

Though the project is Black focused, it will pull in a focus that is not only Black.

Because the abuse of Black people is a deeply rooted abuse within the western world, there will be a shocking many parallels to the experiences of anyone who has faced abuse. And so, this project will act as a cipher.

And with that cipher, anyone will be able to peer through a lens to reveal some unseen things about society— a society which contains all of us from any race or background. Abuse happens across many parallels.

commission work.

We’re commissioning artists for editorial art and a few more surprise things!

For commission artists— No effort is needed to put anything in a perspective where it will be commonly seen as “Black art”— or speak in a voice widely deemed and commonly recognized as “Black”. And this can mean a range that goes from feeling like your art isn’t Black enough to worrying “oh shit is this too Black for everyone else to get?”. Create realness, and speak realness. That’s all.

And I say this especially cause some of who I’ll reach out to for the purpose of commissions aren’t Black. But you have a voice that speaks realness. And that’s all that’s needed for this part.

. . . . . . .

There’s a few of overarching topics that won’t be the main focus of this work, but will at moments take a focus. Think of these as floating sub-topics that will be woven into that full body of work. I call them “focuses”.

The Focuses.

There’s a few of overarching topics that won’t be the main focus of this work, but will at moments take a focus. Think of these as floating sub-topics that will be woven into that full body of work. I call them “focuses”.

Black women. Even though nullstep the character (covered below) represents me and we will be writing these pieces, it is imperative to note that we are not the heroes of my story. The heroes of my story are Black women. Because it was the Black women around me that had my back at the worst times of this situation. And it is black women who will receive their due from the time and effort they kindly took to support me. If nothing else I wanna keep shouting them out in various way during this project.

Trans folks are currently under attack by some really sneaky laws and legislation being passed. Erin Reed has been covering much of it. My abuser attacked me in a way that stripped away my agency and identity which left me feeling like I was tumbling from March until July. There are people hard at work to rip away identity from trans folks in a similar way. I wanna shine light on what’s occurring because these pieces speak on identity and some were inspired by trans activism. As I’m not trans I won’t center my voice but I’ll find some folks to speak on it.

parallel lines across survivor nations. Besides the Black women who supported me, I got a lot of amazing support from some friends with roots from nations that have faced large bullies and been abused for standing up. There’s a deeper story there I haven’t found yet, but I’d like to nod towards it. It’s really made me think.

nullstep.

Everytime I’d make an account on a social platform I’d make a throwaway account called “nullstep”. I just grabbed two programmer-y type of words and threw them together.

And weirdly enough, the word I came up with has come to make a funny type of sense during this challenge. “Null” being a value that represents nothing, and “step” meaning a movement forward along the scale of time.

Through surviving, I’m moving forward from a incident where someone tried to erase who I am.

Fig 1: nullstep aka nullington stepperson jr. aka the nullsteppa

And so, these throwaway accounts became useful through this experience. I’ve been using the Instagram account of nullstep to just create art through the character of nullstep (full name: nullington stepperson jr.)— most of it sensical, but some of it just a place to express myself without borders. A canvas to throw paint on. A sketchbook.

The narrative around this character that I’m currently building mirrors my own story. For the most part, I am nullstep and nullstep is me— partially. But to be exact, nullstep is me in that they are an instance of me. On top of what the fictional character of nullstep inherits as an instance, they have their own identity and experiences separate of me.

nullstep accounts have been sketchbooks to express my trauma journey so far— so think of this dissertation like me pulling what I’ve learned from my sketches into something I’m confident to show in a public gallery.

The Point & Expected Outcomes

While I plan to promote this project, and the subject matter is provocative with the chance of going viral, that’s not the plan nor the point of this.

The point is to speak up against some specific abusers who ignore consent, think they can do no wrong, target with intention, and assault using racism and other horrible things in covert ways.

How I choose to speak up will highlight that there are abusers that go unseen and victims that go unheard. Along with that point I want to share the hard-earned knowledge I found going through something terrible which enlightened me. So maybe the next person either doesn’t have to go through that, or if they do, they have some info to guide them.

The expected outcomes are to have a short podcast series, and some hopefully thought provoking writing and art that resolves the points above.

In all, a full body of work that takes the appropriate time to speak on topics, then exits. This is not meant to be a forever project.

I’m hoping to release the writing in December as I premiere the first episode of the podcast, with the series set to conclude in Feb ‘23 most likely.

And that’s really that.

Anything else this produces will hopefully be unintended bonuses and hell, maybe even challenges.

Donation.

We’ll be setting up a donation service link around when the podcast launches. Funds will primarily go to allies who took time for me after I was subject to a vicious attack. There’s a handful of folks, of which over half are Black women.

Some of these folks took time to support me while they faced challenges like homelessness. I want their kindness honored.

nullstep insta

nullstep instagram — had about 30ish posts before. I nuked those and am re-adding for cohesion. It’s good to note that insta account will always take on a bit of “sketchbook” aspect to it that will allow room to be experimental.

Extra Stuff.

thoughts on the nullsteppa— In my mind, the character of nullstep was born on March 7– same day as the inciting incident of trauma. The early life of this imaginary character is a representation of me getting through the attack and trauma. As I finish this dissertation, consider nullstep the character to be finishing college. And we’re both getting ready to go back out with this final project to show the world.