#keepwaterlooregionkind
I may have caused harm and am looking for support
On this page, you will find support if you are reflecting on ways you may have caused harm related to someone’s identity — intentionally or unintentionally — through words, actions, or silence.
Choosing to look at this is not easy, and it takes courage to begin. Our hope is that these resources offer a space for learning, self-reflection, and growth.
Here you will find supports to help you understand how harm can show up, how our own identities and experiences shape our actions, and how taking responsibility can open a path toward repair and healing — for yourself and for those impacted. You are not alone in this work; accountability is not about shame or punishment, but about the possibility of deeper connection, integrity, and transformation.
What The Journey Could Look Like
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Self-Assessment
Accountability lives on a spectrum ranging from denial or avoidance, recognition and awareness, to understanding and empathy, acknowledgement and responsibility, repair and action to transformation and integration. Ask yourself where you might be at.
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Reflection
Explore how your actions may have contributed to harm, and what shaped those behaviours or beliefs.
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Education
Learn about the roots and impacts of identity-based hate, and how systems of oppression operate.
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Accountability
Understand what it means to take responsibility without defensiveness or shame.
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Repair
Discover ways to make amends, rebuild trust, and contribute to healing — when and where it's appropriate.
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Commitment to Change
Engage in ongoing learning and action to ensure your future choices reflect respect, equity, kindness, and care.
Explore Restorative Justice
Often, hate-motivated incidents, intolerance and discrimination are rooted in misinformation or lack of understanding, sometimes the result of our teachings or exposure. Taking steps to learn more about the person or community you have harmed can be a great starting point.
Change doesn’t happen overnight, but every step matters. By choosing to engage, you’re helping to build a community where harm is addressed, healing is possible, and hate has no place.
Explore Restorative Justice options through Community Justice Initiatives.
Reaching out for support does not trigger law enforcement or legal processes.
Contact us through our website: https://cjiwr.com/contact-us
Email us at: info[at]cjiwr.com
Community Justice Initatives
Community Justice Initiatives is a community organization that offers justice and healing options for survivors of harm, those that have caused harm and communities at large.
Whether it be relationships between family members, coworkers, neighbours, classmates and people impacted by crime and sexual harm, including identity-based harm, we practice Restorative Justice to invite and support shifts towards justice and healing. Learn more about CJI’s restorative justice approach and their work in the community.
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Hate:
Hate is a breakdown or distortion of relationship — an orientation of disconnection that denies the shared humanity, dignity, and interdependence between people or groups. It emerges and is sustained within social and structural conditions that normalize exclusion, devalue certain identities, and erode mutual care. From a community perspective, hate is not only a feeling or act of hostility, but a collective wound that fractures belonging and weakens the relational fabric that holds communities together.
Relationally, hate reflects a refusal or failure to be in right relationship — an abandonment of empathy and reciprocity.
Socially, it is sustained through narratives, policies, and practices that mark some as less worthy of safety, voice, or love.
Communally, healing from hate requires rebuilding connection, accountability, and trust — not only punishing harm but restoring the conditions that make belonging possible.
How Hate Happens
Hate grows in spaces where people don’t feel connected or seen.
It takes root when:People have little chance to know or understand those who are different from them.
Stereotypes and misinformation go unchallenged.
Systems and institutions treat some groups as less valuable or deserving.
Conflict or fear isn’t addressed in healthy, restorative ways.
Left unchecked, these conditions allow hate to spread — moving from private beliefs to public harm.
Protecting Belonging
Communities can prevent and respond to hate by building relationships and accountability:
Listen to and believe people who experience hate or exclusion.
Speak up when harm happens, even in small ways.
Create spaces where people can share stories, learn, and repair relationships.
Challenge systems or norms that leave some community members unsafe or unseen.
Belonging grows when we take responsibility for each other’s dignity and safety — when we choose connection over separation, and care over fear.
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Identity-Based Harm
Identity-based harm is any action, behavior, or structural condition that targets, devalues, or excludes a person or group because of aspects of their identity — including race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, ability, faith, culture, language, or other characteristics that are central to who they are.
This harm can take many forms: verbal, emotional, physical, social, or systemic. It can be explicit, like harassment or violence, or subtle, like exclusion, microaggressions, or institutional barriers.
Identity-based harm affects not only individuals but communities, eroding trust, belonging, and safety. It operates both through direct acts and through systems or cultural norms that normalize inequality or dehumanization.
Key Principles:
Relational: It damages relationships, trust, and connection between people and within communities.
Cumulative: Even small, repeated harms can have deep and lasting impacts.
Beyond legal frameworks: Identity-based harm exists even when no law has been broken. Justice, accountability, and healing can occur outside the criminal legal system.
In short: Identity-based harm is harm rooted in who someone is, shaping experiences, relationships, and communities, calling for responses that restore dignity, belonging, and safety.
Understanding Hate
We aim to understand hate and identity-based harm beyond narrow, individual definitions involving emotion or prejudice by shifting into the realm of relationships, belonging, and community wellbeing.