Hey, I'm very confused about your post on RAMCOA. You're a non-survivor non-professional discussing RAMCOA in your post, which is exactly what you're condemning. As a survivor myself, I agree with your stance, and it would have been fine had you stopped after saying non-survivors and non-professionals shouldn't talk about the experience. But then you went on. You said that RAMCOA is a breeding ground for false memories, and that people can and do claim the RAMCOA experience without having it. While there were many other things you said in that post that are harmful, I'll focus on these two for now. For starters, you do not get to tell people whether or not they experienced RAMCOA. That is not for you to decide. Personally, if someone came to me and said they've been through it, I'd choose to believe them. Yes, there are going to be people out there who claim the label. Yes, some people probably are saying they've been through RAMCOA without having been through it. But that is not up to you, as a non-survivor, to decipher. You don't have the ability to look into someone's past, into someone's mind, and say they do or don't have experiences in RAMCOA, especially if you don't have them yourself. The complexities and the differences in each experience are far too vast. Now, to discuss the false memory claims you made- that whole THING in regards to RAMCOA was created during and after the satanic panic. False memory as a claim has been used to discredit survivors for ages. I don't have as much information about it that I could discuss here, but it's incredibly harmful to call memories false in regards to RAMCOA. That rhetoric is used to discredit everyone and prove that RAMCOA doesnt actually exist. I encourage you to read this post on Instagram for a better understanding of that point-
https://www.instagram.com/p/DT15-J7kWqO/?img_index=7&igsh=MThvcmI2c2dnN2xuMQ==
Please, before you post anything about RAMCOA as a non-survivor, think about the harm you're doing to the community you aren't a part of.
Hey, let me clear up some of your confusion here. I am talking about it for the purpose of warning people against educating on it without understanding the risk and without the knowledge, expertise, and maturity to do so safely. I am not saying "do not mention RAMCOA ever in a million years." Of course, I knew that there was a chance that people who came across this post would research it. I'm aware of that possibility, but decided it was worth the risk because when I was younger and trying to spread awareness, I did so incorrectly and dangerously and there are people who are likely making the same mistakes I made. Those people were my target audience. The goal was harm reduction. It is kind of hard to say "don't educate people on RAMCOA" without talking about RAMCOA. Hope that helps.
Edit: I also changed the title to “Do not talk in depth about RAMCOA.”
Onto your second point, which deserves to be taken seriously. This is a nuanced topic and my post may not have reflected that nuance. I will clarify here: I did not say that RAMCOA was not real and that survivors' memories are false. I said that the formation of false memories is a possibility, and it does happen when people try to fill in the gaps in their memories with narratives about RAMCOA ("the absence of memories is actually programming", "having trouble reading about it means you went through it", "these are the signs that you might be programmed", etc). I do not condone telling RAMCOA survivors (or ANY abuse survivor) that their memories are false or that their trauma did not happen. I do not go around putting survivors' stories under a magnifying lens and trying to determine whether the abuse actually occurred. That is not my goal here and I have never done that.
Now regarding what I said here:
"I want to preface this by saying I'm unsure about how much of the RAMCOA narrative is based in reality and how much is misinformation/exaggeration of DID symptoms, real abuse, and trauma-based conditioning - please do not take what I say as an an endorsement of misinformation or conspiracy theories, or as validation of everything people may believe about their trauma."
I meant exactly that. That I, personally, am unsure how much stuff about RAMCOA is real and how much is misinformation or exaggeration that made its way into the stories and communities of RA/OA survivors. Admittedly, I have been more skeptical of some of the things I have learned about RAMCOA (read: SOME) and this snippet probably reflects that, but again, I have never treated that as a license to tell survivors that their trauma isn't real. I am not some ultimate authority that decides what is and isn't real. I said I am unsure, and I do not want to risk encouraging the spread of misinformation or validating beliefs that may or may not be true.
If you have spent any time in online spaces that discuss RAMCOA, you know that many people take any mention of RAMCOA as endorsement of antisemitic conspiracy theories and moral panics. Additionally, I do not know how much of the information about MC in particular is accurate.
BUT, reading over the post again, I can see how my use of the term 'RAMCOA narrative' conveys skepticism about RAMCOA as a whole. That was bad word choice and doesn't reflect my stance on this issue.
I also have heard about the false memory claims being used to discredit survivors. That is why I was EXTREMELY resistant to the whole idea at first. Every mention of false memories, I interpreted as an attack on survivors, until I saw survivors themselves talking about it in 2022. False memories can and do form, although they shouldn't be used to invalidate survivors. However, they remain one of the risks of educating incorrectly about RAMCOA or going too in depth about what it entails. That is why I discouraged young people and non-professionals from venturing too deep into the subject.
I know this was unnecessarily repetitive but people online don't always grasp nuance. Not every mention of false memories is an attack on survivors.
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