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ok, ok this is interesting stuff! I was being a bit of asshole too, want to own that up front. typical of me.

I say ostracism is a weapon of the weak because it's only a passive aggressive popularity contest sort of conflict, yeah? So contrast this with the most obvious examples of old school power, like, compared to using military force, a bunch of people all agreeing they don't like you and making it clear you're unwelcome in their social circles is ... schoolyard level conflict. See what I mean? It's an absurd comparison, I know but not all conflict is equal and power dynamics are the best way to understand conflict, imo.

Put another way, the social capital being weaponized against the person who is being ostracized, is ultimately a very weak form of power that immediately loses out to other, more tangible types of power. These distinctions are important for anarchist analysis because it's embarrassing and problematic when anti-authoritarians make false equivocations about this stuff.

If I don't like you and I punch you in the face because I'm bigger and stronger, this is more straightforward power dynamic but scurrying away to whisper to all my friends about how you suck and are a bad person isn't a particularly impressive use of power, tho it's effective sometimes in smaller social groups where one person wields that power and people blindly follow their lead.

But ostracism isn't the issue in that instance, it's the person or group using their power for the wrong reasons. Also, I just learned ostracism was supposed to be temporary, traditionally, like where the word's from. Also interesting imo! So, that's all just my opinion but there it is. Also, how are you so sure about this clear distinction between "cutting ties" and ostracism? I mean, the dictionary says it's because the leader says so but we're all anarchists here so ... yeah.

Anyway, I've had to deal with these situations many times IRL and the details were really important. Sometimes "the group" was being unfair and unduly harsh, other times they weren't being harsh enough if you ask me and a LOT of the time, a very unpleasant person was successfully intimidating everyone else and mindfucking them and stockholming them so ... yeah, devil in the details.

Also, what does exile mean, in this case? Like, literally run out of town by an angry mob is different than kicked out of a facebook group which is different than can't go to certain public events anymore and so on and so on.

Lastly, I liked your writing about how "consequences" could be a stop-think scenario and I've seen that happen but also ... actions just literally have consequences so there's a lot of possibilities there again, in the details.