Missing Stair

Missing Stair

Routing Around Damage

"The Internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it." - John Gilmore

When a network node fails or a connection is censored, packets automatically reroute through working paths. No central authority decides this - it's distributed, automatic, resilient. The network keeps functioning.

Community social routing works this way too -- but at a huge cost.

The Missing Stair Metaphor

Imagine a house with a broken stair. Everyone who lives there knows about it. They've learned to step over it automatically. They warn newcomers: "watch out for that step." But nobody fixes it.

A missing stair is a person in a community whose harmful behavior is worked around rather than addressed.

The term originated in a 2012 blog post describing known sexual predators in social communities - people everyone knew were dangerous, but instead of removing them, the community developed workarounds:

• Don't let new women be alone with him
• Warn people privately at events
• Create buddy systems
• Just avoid him if you can

The metaphor has since been generalized to describe anyone whose repeated harmful behavior is tolerated and routed around rather than confronted.

The Range of Harm

Missing stairs exist on a spectrum:

SEVERE HARM (original usage)

• Sexual harassment or assault
• Physical violence or threats
• Predatory behavior toward vulnerable people
• Targeted harassment campaigns
• Stalking

PERSISTENT HARM

• Bullying or intimidation patterns
• Discriminatory behavior
• Abuse of power or authority
• Weaponizing community processes
• Monopolizing resources/spaces to exclude others

CHRONIC DYSFUNCTION

• Repeated conflict escalation
• Inability to collaborate constructively
• Consistent boundary violations
• Draining disproportionate community resources

The severity varies, but the pattern is the same: the community routes around the person instead of addressing the harm.

Why Routing Happens Instead of Fixing

FEAR OF CONSEQUENCES

• The person might retaliate
• The person might claim victimhood
• The confrontation could split the community
• Legal concerns (defamation, liability)
• The person is "useful" in other ways

DIFFUSION OF RESPONSIBILITY

No single person feels responsible for addressing it. Everyone assumes:

• Someone else will handle it
• Someone with more authority should act
• It's not bad enough for me to say something
• Other people seem okay with it

See also: Anarchy Paralysis

NORMALIZATION

The longer the routing continues:

• The behavior becomes "just how they are"
• New people learn the workarounds without questioning them
• The routing becomes invisible infrastructure
• Addressing it feels like making a big deal out of nothing

The Cost of Social Routing

BANDWIDTH EXHAUSTION

Every person who routes around the problem pays a cost:

• Remember who the problem person is
• Modify their own behavior around them
• Warn others (often repeatedly, as new people arrive)
• Absorb the extra friction and vigilance
• Manage their own feelings about the situation
• Question whether they're overreacting

This isn't one-time work. It's continuous, cumulative labor. Eventually people run out of capacity.

PACKET LOSS

Some people can't or won't do the routing work. They just leave. The community loses:

• People who had the worst interactions (often those most vulnerable)
• Contributors who encountered the problem early and bounced
• People who came with energy and left depleted
• Those who care enough to be hurt by the dysfunction

Often these are exactly the people the community can't afford to lose. The missing stair acts as a filter, selecting against certain types of people - frequently those from marginalized groups the community claims to want.

ROUTING OVERHEAD

The workarounds themselves become significant work:

• Buddy systems for events
• Informal warning networks that must be maintained
• Projects redesigned to exclude the person
• Event planning adjusted around their presence/absence
• Constant background vigilance
• Emotional labor of deciding who to warn and how

The community spends more energy managing the problem than it would take to address it directly.

BANDWIDTH MONOPOLIZATION

One person consumes disproportionate resources:

• Leadership attention and time
• Conflict resolution energy
• Community discussion cycles
• Emotional labor from multiple people simultaneously
• Physical space (if they monopolize certain areas/tools)

Legitimate community work gets deprioritized. The missing stair becomes the organizing principle.

ROUTING TABLE CORRUPTION

The informal warning system has failure modes:

• Not everyone gets warned (especially new people, marginalized people, people outside certain social circles)
• Warnings get softened ("they're just awkward" vs "they're predatory")
• Information gets lost as people leave
• The reasons for the warnings get forgotten over time
• People question whether the warnings are fair without the full context

CENSORSHIP ENFORCEMENT

The self-censorship that created the routing becomes permanent:

• "We've tolerated this for years, why act now?"
• "Everyone knows how to handle them"
• "It works fine if you just avoid X/Y/Z"
• Direct naming of the problem becomes taboo
• New people learn that questioning the workarounds isn't done

The routing is now load-bearing. Removing it feels more dangerous than keeping it.

SYSTEM CRASH

Eventually one of several things happens:

• Enough people leave that the community dies or fundamentally changes
• Someone burns out catastrophically trying to manage the situation
• The harmful person causes damage severe enough that it can't be routed around
• External pressure forces action (legal, financial, reputational)
• New leadership doesn't know/respect the routing and breaks the unspoken rules

At this point the community must either address the damage directly or accept permanent dysfunction.

Recognition: Signs of a Missing Stair

COMMUNITY-LEVEL INDICATORS

• Private warning networks exist ("don't work alone with X")
• People use careful language around certain topics/people
• Attendance patterns shift when the person is/isn't present
• Certain spaces or activities become de facto off-limits to some
• Newcomers receive warnings without context
• Long-term members have elaborate strategies for "managing" the person
• Good contributors quietly stop participating
• The community can describe the problem in detail but won't act on it

INDIVIDUAL-LEVEL INDICATORS

You might be witnessing a missing stair if you:

• Receive vague warnings about someone ("just be careful around them")
• Notice people avoiding certain situations involving this person
• Hear multiple similar stories from different people
• Feel gaslit when the person's public persona doesn't match private warnings
• See elaborate social choreography around the person
• Notice your gut reaction is being explained away by others or yourself

SEVERE HARM INDICATORS

Some specific signs that require immediate action:

• Pattern of people from marginalized groups leaving after interactions with this person
• Multiple reports of sexual harassment/assault
• Threats or intimidation
• Behavior that would be criminal outside the community context
• Targeting of vulnerable/new community members

Why Communities Protect Missing Stairs

THE EXCELLENT HACKER FALLACY (aka The Usefulness Trap)

"But they're such an excellent hacker! We can't afford to lose them!"

The person may:

• Have valuable technical skills
• Control important infrastructure or resources
• Have institutional knowledge nobody else has
• Do unglamorous work nobody else wants to do
• Bring in funding or community connections

The community performs a calculation: their contribution value vs. harm caused. But this calculation typically fails to account for:

• People already driven away by them
• Potential contributors who never showed up because of them
• Opportunity cost of their monopolization (what could happen if others could step in)
• Compound cost of routing overhead across the whole community
• Long-term community health and culture

In hacker/maker spaces, technical skill often gets weighted too heavily against social harm. "They're brilliant" becomes justification for tolerating behavior that would be unacceptable from someone less skilled.

The fallacy: assuming the work can only be done by this person, or that their contribution outweighs the damage. Often when the missing stair is finally removed, others step up and the work continues - sometimes better than before.

SUNK COST FALLACY

"We've already invested so much time trying to work with them."

The more resources spent on managing the person, the harder it becomes to acknowledge that management isn't working. Each new intervention becomes proof of investment rather than evidence of failure.

FEAR OF CONFLICT

• Being accused of unfairness or discrimination
• The person's defensive reaction
• Community splitting over the decision
• Retaliation (social, professional, legal)
• Being seen as "starting drama"

In consensus-based communities, this fear can be paralyzing. Everyone waits for someone else to act.

MISPLACED FAIRNESS

"Everyone deserves chances."

This conflates:

• Individual compassion (wanting to believe people can change)
• Community responsibility (protecting members from harm)
• Enabling ongoing harm (protecting harmful behavior)

You can have compassion for someone's struggles AND recognize they shouldn't be in this community. These aren't contradictory.

ATTRIBUTION TO CIRCUMSTANCES

People explain the behavior as:

• Neurodivergence ("they can't help it")
• Mental health struggles ("they're working on it")
• Trauma history ("they've been hurt")
• Cultural differences ("that's just how they are")
• Good intentions ("they don't mean to")

These may all be true. They still don't make the behavior acceptable or the community responsible for absorbing it indefinitely.

DIFFUSION OF RESPONSIBILITY

No single person feels empowered to act:

• "I only saw one incident, maybe it's not a pattern"
• "Others would speak up if it were really serious"
• "Someone with more authority should handle this"
• "What if I'm wrong and ruin someone's reputation?"

Meanwhile everyone is thinking the same thing. The routing continues.

Intervention Strategies

Assessing Severity: When to Act Immediately

Not all missing stair situations require the same response. Assess quickly:

IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED

If someone is:

• Committing or threatening violence
• Sexually assaulting or harassing people
• Stalking or threatening community members
• Creating imminent danger

DO NOT route around this. DO NOT attempt community mediation.

• Remove the person immediately (ask them to leave, call authorities if needed)
• Warn the community openly
• Document everything
• Support survivors/targets
• Contact relevant authorities or organizations

The community's comfort with "handling it internally" does not supersede people's safety.

URGENT COMMUNITY RESPONSE

If someone is:

• Engaging in discriminatory harassment
• Abusing positions of authority
• Weaponizing community processes to harm others
• Creating hostile environment for marginalized members

This requires swift community action but may not need external intervention:

• Direct conversation with clear boundaries and consequences
• Temporary removal (Ask to Leave) while situation is assessed
• Community meeting to address pattern
• Clear documentation of behavior and agreements
• Defined timeline for improvement

STRUCTURED INTERVENTION

If someone is:

• Repeatedly causing conflict through communication patterns
• Monopolizing resources/spaces
• Draining disproportionate community energy
• Unable to collaborate constructively

Community process may be appropriate:

• Individual conversations using Restorative Communication
• Documented patterns and specific examples
• Clear requests for behavior change
• Accountability structure
• Timeline for assessment

Stop Routing, Start Fixing

The first step in any intervention is recognizing that routing IS the problem.

STOP:

• Warning people privately without addressing the source
• Modifying community activities around one person
• Explaining away your discomfort
• Waiting for the perfect time/documentation/consensus
• Treating "avoiding drama" as more important than addressing harm

START:

• Naming the pattern openly (in appropriate venue)
• Documenting specific incidents
• Comparing notes with others affected
• Treating the problem as a systems issue, not individual failures
• Taking action proportional to harm

Early Intervention (Preferred)

Address patterns before they become institutional.

INDIVIDUAL CONVERSATION

When you notice concerning behavior:

• Direct conversation: "I've noticed [specific pattern]. This impacts me/the community by [specific effect]."
• Use Restorative Communication framework - observations, feelings, needs, requests
• Document the conversation and any agreements made
• Set clear boundaries: "If this continues, I will [specific consequence]"
• Follow through - if the boundary is crossed, enact the consequence

PATTERN DOCUMENTATION

If individual intervention doesn't work:

• Keep dated records of specific incidents
• Note who else was affected/witnessed
• Document your attempts to address it
• Share with trusted community members to compare patterns

Don't wait for "enough" evidence. If you're seeing a pattern, others likely are too.

Community-Level Intervention

When individual approaches haven't worked or the pattern is widespread:

COMPARE NOTES

• Talk to others who've had issues
• Look for patterns across different people's experiences
• Document the aggregate pattern, not just individual incidents
• Be specific about impact (who left, what stopped, what changed)

COMMUNITY DISCUSSION

Present the pattern to the community:

• Be specific about behaviors, not character judgments
• Focus on impact and pattern, not single incidents
• Name what needs to change (specific, observable behaviors)
• Propose clear next steps with defined timeline

ACCOUNTABILITY STRUCTURE

If the person commits to change:

• Specific behaviors to stop/start
• Timeline for assessment (weeks, not months)
• Who will observe and report on changes
• Clear consequences if pattern continues
• Regular check-ins

Be honest: if the accountability structure requires more work than just removing the person, that's data.

When Intervention Fails

If patterns persist despite intervention:

ASK TO LEAVE (ATL)

Temporary removal to create space for:

• Person to reflect and work on themselves elsewhere
• Community to recover from the routing overhead
• Assessment of whether change is possible
• Clear air for those who were affected

Be specific about:

• How long (definite timeframe or indefinite pending conditions)
• What would need to change for return
• Who decides about return

PERMANENT BAN (86)

When:

• Harm is severe enough to warrant immediate permanent removal
• Pattern persists despite multiple interventions
• Person refuses to acknowledge impact or change
• Community safety requires it

Document clearly:

• Specific pattern of behavior
• Interventions attempted
• Why those interventions failed
• Decision process (who was involved, how decided)

PUBLIC STATEMENT

For serious situations, especially those involving safety:

• Warn the community clearly
• Be specific about what happened (facts, not speculation)
• Protect those harmed (get consent before sharing their stories)
• Share with other related communities if appropriate

The "Not Everyone Belongs Here" Principle

A hard truth: not everyone is a good fit for every space.

This doesn't make them bad people. It doesn't mean they can't thrive elsewhere. It means this particular community and this particular person don't work together.

Recognizing this early and acting on it with clarity and kindness prevents:

• Years of routing overhead
• Good people leaving
• Community resources consumed by management
• The person themselves being in a hostile environment

Sometimes the kindest thing is clear boundaries: "This space isn't working for you or for us."