Being excellent to each other means practicing consent and holding kindness as a value. This is a time of great change socially. The ground rules are changing and many of us are racing to catch up. It’s important to be gentle with each other as we are all in this learning curve together. We all have friends that we are in consent with to joke and kid with in certain ways, but it’s important to make sure we are in consent in these actions, and that everyone around us is getting the joke – that it’s not at another’s expense. It’s important to be aware that one person’s joke can become, to another, shaming, or if persisted over time, harassment.
Being excellent to each other must include being intolerant of bullying, harassment or shaming related to gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, or religion. This is how we build a community that is safe for all.
Be Excellent to Yourself!
This means knowing your limits and honoring them. Practicing Self Compassion, humor, and honoring your basic goodness. It means being good to your Body. You only get one in this lifetime and it is the vessel for the God/dess. So, Be excellent to it!!!
Honor Diversity!
Find the edges where you are challenged with diversity. Here is your work. Humans have a long and sad history of doing the opposite. Putting that which is “different” outside the ”us” and persecuting it. Again, when you find these places of prejudice (we all have them), come back to practicing Consent, holding kindness as a value, being intolerant of bullying, harassment or shaming related to gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, or religion even within yourself. Grow your capacity for and love of Diversity. We are Stronger Together.
Take Personal Responsibility!
Here is where we each get to take responsibility for our own boundaries, our own desires, our own shortcomings, our own strengths, our own communication. All of the beautiful, contradictory, challenging, glorious, unique, and absolutely amazing wonder that is each of us. By taking responsibility for ourselves, we are showing up as grown ups, fully realized humans, and fully realized humans rarely choose to harass, bully, coerce, or be sexually inappropriate with each other.
Consider the Consequences!
Ahh. The consequences. The truth is, up until now, there were few institutionalized consequences for those practicing misconduct within the Church and the community. This precept was more of a personal request of people to consider their effect on others. This has changed. CAW is codifying this code of behavior that it is expecting the community and Clergy to follow. And, there will be consequences for serious breaches of such. So, please, consider the consequences.
Walk Your Talk!
This is where you get to put it all into practice in your everyday life. Many of these precepts are easy to say but tougher to live by. The only way any human gets better is with practice. Walking your talk is making the commitment to do better and then practicing that everyday. The point is, if we are going to build a community that is safer for all, it will be because we have all participated in doing so.
Behavior that will not be tolerated by CAW include:
Bullying and harassment such as:
- Shaming
- Intimidation
- Physical or verbal threats of any kind
- Coercion of any person in any way (this can be subtle at times and include flattery and seduction, but the results are equally devastating)
- Racial, religious, gender-based, sexual preference-based, ethnic or slurs of any kind
- Brandishing a firearm or knife, or threatening anyone with any instrument which could be considered a weapon or with bodily harm at CAW events
- Defacing, damaging or destroying property
- Fighting, or in any other way creating a disturbance which is disruptive or dangerous to others
Harassment includes, but is not limited to:
- Persistent verbal comments that reinforce social structures of domination related to gender, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, age, or religion.
- Deliberate intimidation, stalking, or following
- Harassing photography or recording
- Sustained disruption of talks or other events
- Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior.
Sexual Misconduct: (includes but not limited to)
- Inappropriate physical contact
- Unwelcome sexual attention
- Intimidating with size or gender
- Stalking/following
- Constant ”jokes” or innuendo
- Acting on the assumption of continuing consent (just because there was consent once does not mean there is still consent)
- Consistent pattern of Oversharing
- Taking pictures/recording without consent (especially if they could be used to shame/embarrass)
- Manipulating/coercing to get sexual favors
- Any consistent pattern of harassment where one is made to feel physically unsafe because of the threat (stated or implied) of sexual violence.
- Advocating for, or encouraging, any of the above behavior.
Engagement in any of these behaviors will put your community or Clergy status at risk!!!
Any substantial breach of the behavior code will fall under the investigation of the Misconduct Committee. For more information contact the MCC at cawmcc@gmail.com